Functional separation is closely related to a Hierarchical reporting structure. Knowing where there's inertia and the assumptions that lead to it is a good starting point for change.
The interesting thing is that if I look at your LinkedIn profile it states your history in terms of functional roles CTO, CIO, CPTO … I’m sure you are justifiably proud of these roles. But they are effectively heads of functional groupings. By suggesting cross functional teams you are trying to destroy the decades old hegemony of a career progress to C-level, through a traditional hierarchy.
Think back to the beginning of your career. Would you have preferred a cross-functional structure that has no clear career progression or a functional structure that states the career progression clearly?
I posit that the examples of flat organisations, like Buurtzog, Semco, even Haier, exist in a bubble. There is so much traditional journalism (books, articles, blogs) the reinforces the traditional view (99% of everything written out there) that the stories of Haier and Buurtzog float through as unique and individual aspirations. Almost impossible for us to comprehend, yet alone achieve.
Adding a cross functional team is lipstick on the pig when my career progression directs me onwards and upwards to the CTO and CEO role.
100% agree with you there's a big opportunity to apply these ideas at the C-level. It was no accident I said 'from the boardroom down' :)
There are plenty of examples in recent times of organisations introducing C-level roles that are more closely aligned to a purpose or imperative of an organisation than merely the senior-most person at the top of a skills hierarchy.
Of course, some examples are still more categorical in nature (e.g. 'this person is responsible for everything to do with people' as opposed to something like ' responsible for making talent a strategic advantage', but it's shifting this direction at the edges.
There are two dimensions here - the hierarchy and what the roles are responsible for - that's why I covered them in separate posts. Both can be related but you can make adjustments to one or both. You are right that to adjust either dimension you need to rethink what incentives support the new model to work. You must have a theory of how it is supposed to work - a common issue I see organisations fail with a restructure is they have a very shallow rationale on how it is actually supposed to work. If you have a theory you can then monitor and see if in reality it is working that way or whether adjustment is needed.
One example from my career; Ken Chin and I formed a Product Development organisation at Seek Asia and co-led it as CTO/CIO and CPO. It didn't do away with the functional roles completely (that was a journey the CEO and board were on, but they were great in supporting the degree of change we undertook over 5 years).
Still, it was a step toward breaking the assumptions about how we were organised and what the responsibilities of leaders were. We had a cross-functional leadership team reporting to us. We met more often as a cross-functional group than by discipline (although sometimes issues specific to a discipline would mean the right people in the room were ones in functionally related roles).
To make this work we also had concepts such as Communities of Practice in place, the discipline/skills development leadership separate from the delivery responsibilities, and explicit expectations about what we expected from different levels of seniority (I will cover in a future post but one dimension was expectations about what the demonstrated circle of influence was to be for a given level of seniority). I am not anti-hierarchy; in many situations, it can be a great fit, especially when it is approached differently from what is the default.
I don't put forward a one-size-fits-all proposal for what is better; I seek to identify the assumptions that are there to be challenged when the context and situation suit them. There's great examples across a spectrum of approaches. Wardley has shared Haier as an example and also has explored some of the competitive dynamics that make their approach the right competitive option for them. The same forces are not likely to be at play for every company. The context/situation for a company is key to the choices they make and they should be wary of copying what works for someone else as maybe the context is different. Copy the questions, not the answers :)
Thanks again for your thoughtful feedback - again, I've shared some details in my response that might be good for me to include in my next edit!
Good article. I agree with most of it.
The interesting thing is that if I look at your LinkedIn profile it states your history in terms of functional roles CTO, CIO, CPTO … I’m sure you are justifiably proud of these roles. But they are effectively heads of functional groupings. By suggesting cross functional teams you are trying to destroy the decades old hegemony of a career progress to C-level, through a traditional hierarchy.
Think back to the beginning of your career. Would you have preferred a cross-functional structure that has no clear career progression or a functional structure that states the career progression clearly?
I posit that the examples of flat organisations, like Buurtzog, Semco, even Haier, exist in a bubble. There is so much traditional journalism (books, articles, blogs) the reinforces the traditional view (99% of everything written out there) that the stories of Haier and Buurtzog float through as unique and individual aspirations. Almost impossible for us to comprehend, yet alone achieve.
Adding a cross functional team is lipstick on the pig when my career progression directs me onwards and upwards to the CTO and CEO role.
100% agree with you there's a big opportunity to apply these ideas at the C-level. It was no accident I said 'from the boardroom down' :)
There are plenty of examples in recent times of organisations introducing C-level roles that are more closely aligned to a purpose or imperative of an organisation than merely the senior-most person at the top of a skills hierarchy.
Of course, some examples are still more categorical in nature (e.g. 'this person is responsible for everything to do with people' as opposed to something like ' responsible for making talent a strategic advantage', but it's shifting this direction at the edges.
There are two dimensions here - the hierarchy and what the roles are responsible for - that's why I covered them in separate posts. Both can be related but you can make adjustments to one or both. You are right that to adjust either dimension you need to rethink what incentives support the new model to work. You must have a theory of how it is supposed to work - a common issue I see organisations fail with a restructure is they have a very shallow rationale on how it is actually supposed to work. If you have a theory you can then monitor and see if in reality it is working that way or whether adjustment is needed.
One example from my career; Ken Chin and I formed a Product Development organisation at Seek Asia and co-led it as CTO/CIO and CPO. It didn't do away with the functional roles completely (that was a journey the CEO and board were on, but they were great in supporting the degree of change we undertook over 5 years).
Still, it was a step toward breaking the assumptions about how we were organised and what the responsibilities of leaders were. We had a cross-functional leadership team reporting to us. We met more often as a cross-functional group than by discipline (although sometimes issues specific to a discipline would mean the right people in the room were ones in functionally related roles).
To make this work we also had concepts such as Communities of Practice in place, the discipline/skills development leadership separate from the delivery responsibilities, and explicit expectations about what we expected from different levels of seniority (I will cover in a future post but one dimension was expectations about what the demonstrated circle of influence was to be for a given level of seniority). I am not anti-hierarchy; in many situations, it can be a great fit, especially when it is approached differently from what is the default.
I don't put forward a one-size-fits-all proposal for what is better; I seek to identify the assumptions that are there to be challenged when the context and situation suit them. There's great examples across a spectrum of approaches. Wardley has shared Haier as an example and also has explored some of the competitive dynamics that make their approach the right competitive option for them. The same forces are not likely to be at play for every company. The context/situation for a company is key to the choices they make and they should be wary of copying what works for someone else as maybe the context is different. Copy the questions, not the answers :)
Thanks again for your thoughtful feedback - again, I've shared some details in my response that might be good for me to include in my next edit!
There is a lot of wisdom in this. Thanks for the response.