Structure sets you free

My client, the new Managing Director of a specialist PR firm, had sent me some documentation in advance of a strategy workshop I was running for them.  Unfortunately, it seemed as if one of the files was corrupted; when I printed off the organisation chart the boxes with job titles were there, but the connecting reporting lines were missing.

I mentioned this to the MD in our brief meeting before the workshop and asked him if perhaps someone could print me a copy complete with lines. He seemed surprised. “Oh, we don’t have reporting lines. We think that would make us inflexible and unresponsive to customer requests.”

One of the issues that emerged in the workshop was that staff below the Board lacked innovation and never took responsibility or made decisions for themselves. I suggested that clearly defined accountability, authority and reporting lines meant staff could innovate and take responsibility within the areas that belonged to them. Conversely, they were unlikely to take ownership of problems if it was not clear that it was their problem, or if they did not know, metaphorically speaking, where the cliff-edge was.  Clear boundaries free employees to take responsibility.

The follow-up discussion about addressing this revealed the (pretty common) fact that one reason for leaving the structure hazy was that it avoided the need for some rigorous analysis, difficult conversations and hard decisions.

If you would like to understand how you can free up your staff by appying more structure then take a look at this website.

Based on an original post on wy website www.nickbettes.co.uk

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

It's about the management, stupid

Image
To paraphrase the famous US election slogan "It's about the economy, stupid.", research (1,2) has yet again shown that the most important factor in business performance is the quality of management. Not how much the company spends on technology. Not how much digital marketing they do. Not even how much is spent on R&D. Just how well the business is managed. Really simple, doable stuff.  A clear purpose.  A usable orgchart.  Useful job descriptions.  Repeatable written processes.  Measurement and regular review. None of these are difficult to do, although implementation does take time, determinationa and resilience on the part of the owner and there are some basic techniques to learn. If you would like to learn how to apply better management techniques to your business then take a look at this website . 1) What Drives Differences in Management Practices? Nicholas A. BloomErik BrynjolfssonLucia FosterRon JarminMegha PatnaikItay Saporta-EkstenJohn Van Reenen, A...
Read more

Scaling - gotta love the numbers

Image
There are two critical elements to running a scalable business:  People and Numbers. We know that a scalable business is one where the owner focuses on developing the capability, capacity and accountability of employees.  But you need numbers to do that. If you want to delegate properly you must delegate the responsibility for a business result - not a task.  To do this, you need a clear, agreed definition of success and this is almost always a number. If you want to develop employees you must develop their business understanding, commercial awareness and ability to plan.  All of these things require conversations and coaching based around numbers; what they should be, what they actually are and what needs to change to close the gap or improve. If you want employees to consistently succeed by achieving their number then what is delegated must be a repeatable, teachable, measurable process. Some business owners think applying numbers to managing employees will be ...
Read more

Do you even measure productivity?

Image
Is low productivity built-in to UK small businesses? One benefit claimed for Brexit was forcing UK business to address its woeful productivity.  Particularly in the SME sector our productivity is far worse than that of our competitors and there is a school of thought that says ready access to cheap labour contributed to this (although opinions vary of course – these are economists. In particular, countries such as France and Germany have had the same access to labour without it depressing their productivity in the same way). Be that as it may, many UK businesses have faced labour shortages and wage increases.  The news bulletins run interviews with under-pressure business owners, most of them saying: I cannot get the staff so I am limiting capacity and turnover I have had to raise wages to get or keep people and I can’t pass that on in prices I am paying higher wages but that doesn’t translate into more productivity The gist of these opinions (from albeit a tiny and edited sam...
Read more