As an organization, we must align our internal procedures, people, and programming with our external situation. At the same time, as an individual member of our organization, I must ask myself, "Am I moving in the desired direction? Am I too close or too far away from our desired direction?"
And, at the same time, as one of multiple groups within our organization, we must ask ourselves, "Are we moving in our desired direction? Are we too close or too far away from our desired direction?"
Procedures resolve the contending claims from the various individuals and groups of people within our organization. Consider our procedures as a way to document our similarities and our differences. Procedures define 'who or what does what to whom or what by when and where'.Given any complex organization, the definition of organization cannot be anymore complicated than our ability to define 'who or what does what to whom or what by when and where'. The complexity appears when we are unable or unwilling to define in writing our complex organization.
Sometimes a complex organization is held hostage by people in power who refuse to state the procedures in writing. Thus, the powerful people stay in power by keeping others ignorant. Other organizations sustain confusion by stating that updating procedures takes too much time. So, each member of the organization is reduced to 'doing their own thing'.
Helpful procedures have a purpose statement, date of final agreement, and list of the names of the authors of the procedure. Helpful procedures may only resolve the tension for a certain time and situation. Thus, we need to write the 'halfway helpful' procedure to cover a trial period and then require another review.
Changes in our environment, our situation, and our organization will require us to adapt. As a leader, I can pro-actively restructure by using procedures. Or, I can let our environment or situation restructure our organization for us. When an organization is first restructured then the short term result is likely confusion, resistance, and puny performance.
However, success or failure, in the long run, depends on how our procedures, people, and programming are aligned with our immediate situation and our long term environment. Our organization will change. The open question is -- will the change be done by us? Or, will the change be done to us?
Effective restructuring requires us to transform the invisible into the visible.
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1 comment:
I think structure and procedures certainly aid in a companies organization, and I agree that a goal has to be in place in order to structure the necessary procedures to accomplish the goal of the organization.
I don�t understand why people in power would not state the procedures to maintain there power and keep others ignorant as this summary suggests, and I am not sure I agree---I think the reverse is true.
I think people in power DO state policies and procedures that act as a legal shield that protects the people in power and the organization itself. Organizations have access to better legal and financial resources compared to individual workers, and by stating detailed policies and procedures, a company can use these written procedures as a way of getting subordinates out of the organization that they don�t like, by stating that they didn�t follow certain policies. Hence, I think that most companies have detailed policies and procedures�especially large ones.
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