seth gray » organizational structure http://sethgray.com marketer. musician. geek. Mon, 23 Jan 2012 16:01:22 +0000 en hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 Flat is Good http://sethgray.com/2009/07/07/flat-is-good/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=flat-is-good http://sethgray.com/2009/07/07/flat-is-good/#comments Tue, 07 Jul 2009 13:14:33 +0000 seth http://sethgray.com/blog/?p=206 #leftcontainerBox { float:left; position: fixed; top: 60%; left: 70px; } #leftcontainerBox .buttons { float:left; clear:both; margin:4px 4px 4px 4px; padding-bottom:2px; } #bottomcontainerBox { width: 50%; padding-top: 1px; } #bottomcontainerBox .buttons { float: left; margin: 4px 4px 4px 4px; } I work for a big corporation. As with most big companies, the corporate hierachy is pretty tall. That makes it a bit tough to create and/or maintain a culture of innovation: politics and title are usually more influential than a good idea. But blaming management for not accepting your brilliant idea is a cop-out. What if Al Gore gave up on inventing the Internet “because his boss said no?” You don’t want to be a cop-out, so you work the system to make friends, and influence people. But that’s a little like pushing spaghetti uphill. Instead, you could sidestep that whole mess and at least get a running start. This is where social networking can be more than just an interesting sideshow. There’s a great tool called Yammer. It’s like Twitter for private networks. Maybe I’m slow on the uptake, or maybe I just have a profound grasp of the obvious… but one thing I’ve noticed is that Yammer is (relatively) flat– it completely sidesteps all the day-to-day corporate hierarchies. The CEO and I are somewhere around 6,269 levels removed in the official corporate structure (not to mention half the land mass of the US and then the Atlantic ocean). But [...]]]> #leftcontainerBox { float:left; position: fixed; top: 60%; left: 70px; } #leftcontainerBox .buttons { float:left; clear:both; margin:4px 4px 4px 4px; padding-bottom:2px; } #bottomcontainerBox { width: 50%; padding-top: 1px; } #bottomcontainerBox .buttons { float: left; margin: 4px 4px 4px 4px; }
Uyuni Salt Flats

Uyuni Salt Flats

I work for a big corporation. As with most big companies, the corporate hierachy is pretty tall. That makes it a bit tough to create and/or maintain a culture of innovation: politics and title are usually more influential than a good idea. But blaming management for not accepting your brilliant idea is a cop-out. What if Al Gore gave up on inventing the Internet “because his boss said no?” You don’t want to be a cop-out, so you work the system to make friends, and influence people. But that’s a little like pushing spaghetti uphill. Instead, you could sidestep that whole mess and at least get a running start.

This is where social networking can be more than just an interesting sideshow. There’s a great tool called Yammer. It’s like Twitter for private networks. Maybe I’m slow on the uptake, or maybe I just have a profound grasp of the obvious… but one thing I’ve noticed is that Yammer is (relatively) flat– it completely sidesteps all the day-to-day corporate hierarchies. The CEO and I are somewhere around 6,269 levels removed in the official corporate structure (not to mention half the land mass of the US and then the Atlantic ocean). But on Yammer, we have the opportunity to interact as equals. Most innovation articles I’ve read suggest that flat is good. Flat means that the best ideas– not politics or title– attract the best people. What company wouldn’t want the best people working on the best ideas?

Now, moving the ideas from this ephemeral channel into the real world? That’s another story. But don’t be a phony! Learn some sweet moves and go get something done.

]]> http://sethgray.com/2009/07/07/flat-is-good/feed/ 1 Flubber! http://sethgray.com/2009/01/23/flubber/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=flubber http://sethgray.com/2009/01/23/flubber/#comments Fri, 23 Jan 2009 11:00:18 +0000 seth http://sethgray.com/blog/?p=140 #leftcontainerBox { float:left; position: fixed; top: 60%; left: 70px; } #leftcontainerBox .buttons { float:left; clear:both; margin:4px 4px 4px 4px; padding-bottom:2px; } #bottomcontainerBox { width: 50%; padding-top: 1px; } #bottomcontainerBox .buttons { float: left; margin: 4px 4px 4px 4px; }         Businesses Should Be More Like Flubber   Yesterday a coworker asked a great question: ”Quick Poll: What do you think is the most valuable productivity goal in terms of employee-to-employer contribution — A) units of profitable new ideas per employee, B) units of work per hour, C) both, or D) something else?” My answer? None of the above. I’m not sure yet what would be better, though. And here’s why: current corporate structure and measurement is essentially based on Henry Ford’s “they can have any color they want, as long as it’s black” assembly line process innovation, where manual laborers were interchangeable. That still basically works in a physical labor/manufacturing setting. Maybe. But, according to “the Support Economy,” people are now looking for “psychological self-determination.” We want something other than a black Model T now. Also, good chunk of our economy is now built around “knowledge workers,” who are significantly less interchangeable. That framework is self-limiting. People (employees and consumers) are forced into a box. That box doesn’t recognize or capitalize on the parts of the person outside the box. We need a new paradigm. IDEO calls it looking for “T-Shaped people.” David Armano, from Critical Mass, calls it the “Fuzzy Tail.” We need something less like a Rubik’s Cube, [...]]]> #leftcontainerBox { float:left; position: fixed; top: 60%; left: 70px; } #leftcontainerBox .buttons { float:left; clear:both; margin:4px 4px 4px 4px; padding-bottom:2px; } #bottomcontainerBox { width: 50%; padding-top: 1px; } #bottomcontainerBox .buttons { float: left; margin: 4px 4px 4px 4px; }
       

Businesses Should Be More Like FlubberBusinesses Should Be More Like Flubber

 

Yesterday a coworker asked a great question: ”Quick Poll: What do you think is the most valuable productivity goal in terms of employee-to-employer contribution — A) units of profitable new ideas per employee, B) units of work per hour, C) both, or D) something else?”

My answer? None of the above. I’m not sure yet what would be better, though. And here’s why: current corporate structure and measurement is essentially based on Henry Ford’s “they can have any color they want, as long as it’s black” assembly line process innovation, where manual laborers were interchangeable. That still basically works in a physical labor/manufacturing setting. Maybe. But, according to “the Support Economy,” people are now looking for “psychological self-determination.” We want something other than a black Model T now. Also, good chunk of our economy is now built around “knowledge workers,” who are significantly less interchangeable. That framework is self-limiting.

People (employees and consumers) are forced into a box. That box doesn’t recognize or capitalize on the parts of the person outside the box. We need a new paradigm. IDEO calls it looking for “T-Shaped people.” David Armano, from Critical Mass, calls it the “Fuzzy Tail.”

We need something less like a Rubik’s Cube, and more like Flubber. Once we have the structure, then we can measure.

What do you think?

 

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