Template:M intro design org chart: Difference between revisions

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→‎When the firm is in motion

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 ===When the firm is in motion===
-The firm’s business only gets done when its gears are ''engaged''. And that happens when its personnel communicate with those who are ''outside'' their immediate reporting line.
+So reporting lines are a static map of the firm, configured in the abstract, ''when it is at rest''. That is, ''before it does anything''. This is how the machine works ''when it is idling''. The firm’s business only gets done when its gears are ''engaged''. And that happens when its personnel communicate with those who are ''outside'' their immediate reporting line.
-Reporting lines are a static map of the firm, configured in the abstract, ''when it is at rest''. That is, ''before it does anything''. This is how the machine works ''when it is idling''.
+This is the firm’s ''real'' arterial network: the ''lateral'' interactions that must ''cross'' whatever boundaries management can dream up, or that leave the firm altogether: these are the communications that employees ''must'' make: between internal specialists in different departments; with the firm’s clients and external suppliers — they make commerce happen and move the organisation along.
-But the organisation’s resting state overlooks its ''real'' arterial network: ''lateral'' interactions that must ''cross'' whatever boundaries management can dream up, or that leave the firm altogether: these are the communications that employees ''must'' make: between internal specialists in different departments; with the firm’s clients and external suppliers — they make commerce happen and move the organisation along. The org chart doesn’t say what should happen if Dan from risk needs to speak quickly to [[Janice Henderson|Janice]] in legal. According the org chart, Dan must escalate up three layers to the [[Chief risk officer|Chief Risk Officer]] Elaine, who will then speak to the [[General counsel|Chip]], the [[General counsel|General Counsel]], who will cascade his thoughts down to Janice. Of course that is not how it works, ever: Dan just picks up the phone to Janice or vice versa. This is a [[desire line]] worn by decades of communal habit.
+The org chart doesn’t say what should happen if Dan from risk needs to speak quickly to [[Janice Henderson|Janice]] in legal. The organogram says Dan must escalate up three [[Spans and layers|layers]] to the [[Chief risk officer|Chief Risk Officer]] who will then speak to the [[General counsel|General Counsel]], who will “cascade” his thoughts down to [[Janice Henderson|Janice]]. Of course, that is not how it works, ever: Dan just picks up the phone to Janice, or ''vice versa''. This is a [[desire line]], worn by decades of communal habit.
-It is ''in'' these interactions that things happen: it is here that tensions manifest themselves, problems emerge and opportunities arise, and here that these things are resolved. These are not [[Drills and holes|the drill, but the hole in the wall]].
+It is ''in'' these interactions that things happen: it is here that tensions manifest themselves, problems emerge and opportunities arise, and here that these things are resolved. It is the [[Dan Grades]] who keep the place running. They are the [[ad hoc]] mechanics who keep the the eighteen-wheeler on the road. They may not be especially “senior” — they don’t derive their significance from their ''formal status'', but from their ''in''formal ''function''. These “super-nodes” know histories, have networks, intuitively understand how the organisation really works, what you have to do and who you have to speak to to get things done.
-These are ''[[informal]]'' interactions. They are not well-documented, nor from above, well-understood. They are hard to see. They are [[legible|illegible]].
-Yet, everyone who has worked in a large organisation knows that there are a small number of key people — the [[Dan Grades]] of the world — usually not occupying senior roles (they are too busy getting things done for that) who keep the whole place running. These “super-nodes” know histories, have networks, intuitively understand how the organisation really works, what you have to do and who you have to speak to to get things done. These are the [[ad hoc]] mechanics who keep the the eighteen-wheeler on the road.
-Often management won’t have much idea who these “super-nodes” are, precisely because they do not derive their significance from their ''formal status'', but from their ''in''formal ''function''. They earn this reputation daily, interaction by interaction.
 A bottom-up map of functional interactions would disregard the artificial cascade of formal ''authority'' in favour of informal ''credibility''. It would reveal the organisation as a point-to-point multi-nodal network, far richer than the flimsy frame indicated by the org chart. With modern data analytics, it would not even be hard to do: Log the firm’s communication records for data to see where those communications go: who chats with whom? who calls whom? Who emails whom? What is the informal structure of the firm? Who are the major nodes?