Strategies for Organization Design

12Peopletecture for Individuals and Managers

“People don't resist change; they resist being changed.”

—Peter Scholtes, Brian L. Joiner, and Barbara J. Streibel, The Team Handbook, 3rd ed. (2003)

My client, the head of all the commercial business units for a large insurer, right‐hand advisor, and next in line to the chief executive officer (CEO), looked pointedly at me through the video screen. “I am just really worried about leading through this level of change for the organization.” I nodded understandingly, having already had the “change experience” conversation with the chief human resources officer and with the project management lead of the reorganization project earlier that week.

This was not a conversation I was unfamiliar with. In fact, I cannot think of a single organization design project I have led that did not have a significant change and engagement effort associated with implementing the new design. No matter the level of the leader or the size of the reorganization effort, at a certain point the strategy‐to‐structure work becomes very human.

We were two months into an enterprise‐wide organization transformation effort. This client had followed my Peopletecture Model to the letter. They were keen to protect the “connective tissue” that had been developed over a long period, while restructuring to forge new relationships essential to future business growth. To do this, they used network analysis to inform their changes to their hierarchy (from geography to solution). ...