Book review
Guide to Organisation Design: creating high-performing and adaptable enterprises
By Naomi Stanford
Published by Profile Books Ltd. (2007) for The Economist
ISBN 978-1-86197-802-8
This book talks about organisation design, but it is actually about far more than that. As one would expect, organisation design impacts other areas than just the structure of an organisation and Naomi covers all the bases. This isn’t just a must-have book for OD specialists, but I would suggest that any manager who is thinking about a re-organisation would do well to read this carefully.
It starts by talking about just what organisation design is, why it is important and how it links into the business. The most important of which – it seems to me – is that there must be a compelling reason or business case for undertaking a re-organisation. The design must then be driven by the strategy of the business bearing the whole system in mind, not just focusing on a part of it.
Next she focuses on different models, approaches and designs with some excellent tables listing designs in use, their benefits and their limitations. I particularly liked a list of questions you could use to help you choose a model, approach and/or design.
The book has practical information, but also nice case studies of when a particular approach or model had been used in well known organisations and a warts-and-all story telling you what actually happened.
When she talks about Organisational Structures I was amused to see that in her experience most leaders concentrate on the organisational structure, equating the structure with organisation design. It is only one of the issues to consider. Naomi sees organisations as complex adaptive systems rather than as being mechanistic and linear. Again, there are useful tables and interesting case studies as well as insightful questions to ask yourself (or your client) to help you to make the right choices.
This is followed by a chapter on Planning and Sequencing which emphasises the iterative and inherently messy nature of moving forward with organisational design. In her words, “taking a programme management approach [to organisation design] provides a robust framework for planning and sequencing organisation design work.”
In the rest of the book she looks at measurement, stakeholder engagement, leadership, culture and group processes and morphing “not future proofing”. She tackles difficult subjects like
- How do you measure your progress in an area that is almost impossible to measure?
- What are the nitty-gritty’s of stakeholder engagement? How do you analyse and map them?
- How do you lead a change? Especially in times of uncertainty and ambiguity? How do you become aware of the political games being played? How do you enable collaborative working?
I would say that this is the best book on organisational change I have ever read. And I do read a lot of them. It is a book I wish I could have written – it covers the subject handsomely and the writing is clear and straightforward. It is well arranged and it backs up suggestions about theories and models with examples of real life case studies from organisations that we all know. It does not imply that any one method, design or model is the right one – for there is no silver bullet – rather it helps you to decide which one is the best to choose for the situation you find yourself in. It is unafraid to tackle difficult areas, like the need to keep the larger perspective in mind and the difficulty of measurement, or leading the design and implementation or working out what is the best model or method in a difficult, quickly changing environment. Best of all it helps readers to focus on thinking about what they are doing and what is working and to continually check that it is working – as soon as it stops working, to revisit and do something different…. It all sounds rather solutions focused to me!