The Future of the Organization, Part 2

Joe,

Thanks for summarizing our thoughts in your last post. The only place where I wanted to add a comment was related to #4 regarding choice. My thoughts are that individualization and customization are much more complex than simply choice. I think we already expect choice today as consumers. In the future, we not only expect choice, but we'll expect to be able to buy a product or service in almost every situation that is specifically and uniquely designed to meet my own needs.

As for the future of organizations, I want to issue a caveat before sharing my thoughts. There is a difference between predicting what the organization of the future SHOULD look like versus what the organization of the future WILL look like. I'm choosing to take an idealist view of things for the purposes of this post. So, what I'm about to share is how I think a successful organization ten years in the future should look. In addition, I'm taking a little more prescriptive approach as I think about how the organization itself needs to evolve.

1. The flatter the better. While I think it will take time to break down the hierarchies of the past, organizations that become flatter in the future will be better able to innovate and adapt to rapid changes. The fewer layers, the faster information can travel and the less places there are for silos and walls to be built. However, to become effectively flat requires some radical changes in thinking about accountability, power, career paths, development and communication.
2. Learning is the super competency. Innovation, design, driving and adapting to change are all learning activities. They require that individuals be constantly taking in information, processing it, looking for patterns and opportunities, and taking actions. Those who can learn the fastest and put new knowledge to work will be best positioned in the future. This is particularly true for leaders and executives (which will be a major change for them from the past). To effectively deliver on this, organizations are going to have to get much more aggressive in providing learning and development programs for all employees at all levels.
3. Transparency is king. The days of closed books and controlled flow of information are gone. With social networking, blogging and the web oozing in through every crack in even the most locked down organizations, there is no longer any place to hide. In the future, organizations will have to build their companies and cultures in such a way that they are fully authentic to their brand promise. Their actions will truly need to match their words.
4. Flexibility is the new norm. Fixed schedules, set work locations, and narrow job duties are things of the past. This may be where technology has it's greatest impact. It won't be long before all of your knowledge workers will require broadband wireless enabled laptops so that they can work where ever they happen to be, whenever they do their best work. Online collaboration tools are making "the office" less and less relevant. Additionally, even those who work in front-line, more traditionally structured jobs are going to expect flexibility in scheduling, job responsibilities, learning opportunities, etc. This will create a great deal of management complexity which will require organizations to be very creative to be successful.
5. Manager/Leader as coach. If you have ever participated in sports, you know how much differently a coach behaves towards his or her players than a manager does towards his or her employees. A coach may have been a player at one point in their life, but in their role as coach, they have very specific responsibilities that are different than being a player: teaching the game to players including the formal rules and the subtle nuances; figuring out where each player fits best (what position should each play); helping each player master the fundamentals of playing the game; setting up a system; and finally, managing the game and making adjustments as situations change during the game. The coach spends most of his time with his players practicing the skills required to perform when it counts. Contrast this to the manager of today who spends most of their time still playing the game and minimal time working with the team (and almost no time practicing). The leader of the future will need to model the style of a sports coach and spend 90% of their time focused on helping their employees excel in their positions.

Certainly, this list isn't exhaustive, but I think that these five things will be the fundamental changes that successful organizations will make over the next ten years to survive in this changing environment. I'm sure I've missed a few, so I'd look forward to you filling in the gaps and telling me what I may have gotten wrong.

Jason

The Future of the Organization

Jason-

So, let me try to summarize what we have pointed out as key influences changing business:

1. Innovation is becoming a prime opportunity for competitive advantage
2. The rate of change is increasing
   
3. Disruptive technology
4. Choice is becoming increasingly important (you said individualization and customization, can I lump those together as "choice?)
5. Trust is becoming a prime opportunity for competitive advantage
6. Design is becoming increasingly important
   

Does that accurately capture what we have sketched out so far?

I think that this seems like a decent list and that there is some evidence to support each of these trends. As I think about what this means to the organization, this is what comes to mind for me:

• Organizational culture is going to be really, really, really important. Culture has always been important, but culture plays a huge role in an organizations capacity to innovate, adapt new practices and technology, and build relationships based on trust. Honesty, transparency and authenticity are becoming critical and that is a big change.
  
• Understanding the value of ideas and information is becoming critical as are access to information and tools to share and organize information.
• The relationships between the organization and its employees and between the organization and its consumers will have to become much more interactive and "two-way" in nature. Employees and consumers (past, current, potential) have valuable information about a great many things and it is no longer feasible for that information to slowly "trickle up" to key decision makers. Employees and consumers have to be viewed as as scouts and forward observers.
• There is little (if any) case remaining for the profession of management as we now know it.
• Organizations are going to need to find ways to put more power and tools and resources into the hands of employees and consumers. I think that organizations will become less about specific products or services and more about building community and providing that community with platforms upon which they can build what they want and need.

Looking forward to seeing what you have to add to this.

-joe

Previous Posts in this Series:
1- Where Will We Go?
2- Game On
3- Thinking About Where We Will Go
4- Thinking, Take 2

Thinking about where we will go . . . take 2.

Hey Joe,

Good thoughts and thanks for getting us rolling on our Business 2020 discussion. I've been thinking and collecting notes on this topic since you first posed it. Predicting the future is a more daunting task than I originally anticipated.

Two issues you raised were on my list as well.

• Rate of Change. Speed is becoming critical. Not only the speed at which you change, but the speed at which you can adapt to the change around you.


• Technology. The disruption of technology has only just begun. Increasingly, more jobs will be replaced by technology leaving people searching to find different ways to create value.

Here are a few other thoughts I have about what the future might look like.

1. Individualization and customization of products will not longer be a differentiator but an expectation. Customers increasingly expect their products to be unique to their needs. As an example, the NFL has begum promoting that you can now order jerseys and shirts from your favorite NFL Teams from their website where you choose the design, color and what it says on the back. We expect to be able to customize everything and that will continue.


2. Trust is officially dead. Skepticism has long been a label of Gen X, but every generation is growing increasingly skeptical. People get lied to or spun everywhere they turn and it seems that there's no one to trust. So, transparency and full disclosure will no longer be a choice but a requirement on the part of organizations. Companies who can build loyalty and trust over time through their actions will have an advantage.


3. Design will be king. The ability to anticipate customer (and employee) needs and desires and design products and services to brilliantly meet those will differentiate the successful from the rest. This isn't just artistic design, but product design, brand design, communication design, organization design, etc. (Think Zappos, iPhone apps, and the Obama presidential campaign--all examples or brilliant design in one way or another).

It seems that we are collectively becoming more impatient and demanding as people. We want things our way, right now. I don't see that this trend will turn and certainly this trend will impact not only how we do business, but how we design our organizations as well.

On to the topic of the organizations of the future.

-Jason

Thinking about where we will go...

Okay, I will get this thing started.

Again, no crystal ball here, but these are some significant shifts or movements that I believe provide some valuable context for the discussion about the future of HR / Talent / OD.

I think that there are three forces currently changing business that will continue to change business for near future...and they are all inter-related to some degree.

1.) Innovation. For more and more organizations, more and more industries and even communities, regions and countries, innovation is the biggest and best opportunity for competitive advantage. This is significant and causing a lot of friction in organizations not built for innovation. The increased importance of innovation will continue to change the structure and strategy of organizations as well as the culture and the role of management and leadership.

2.) The rate of change. We live in a world of increasing volatility. New products and services are introduced more often than they used to be, executive leadership changes more frequently than it used to, ideas and information travel much more rapidly than it used to. This is also significant and will reward organizations that are nimble and most able to integrate new ideas and information and.

3.) Disruptive technology. I got a Motorola Droid phone last week and let me just say that we are not in Kansas any more. I bought my first PC in 1993 for about $2,500 and the phone that I bought last week for right around $100 and carry in my pocket does more for me than that Gateway computer ever did. Moore’s Law, the democratizing nature of Web 2.0 and the explosion of mobile devices all mean more and more power and choice in the hand of individuals...whether they be employees (current, past or potential) or customers (current, past or potential). This also is significant.

There are a lot of things changing in the world of business today and there will be a lot of things changing tomorrow. We continue to become more of a global marketplace, sustainability is becoming increasingly important, our economy is shaky...all of these things and many more are relevant. But I keep coming back to these three things as key drivers of change in the nature of organizations and how we get work done.

In my next post I will talk about how they are and will change the organization.

-joe

Predictions.

Jason-

I hear ya man. 2020 is a long, long way away. And, as you mentioned, things are changing more and more rapidly all the time. I am not necessarily looking for specific predictions about things ten years down the road...as I am not sure that will be of much value, but what will be some significant shifts playing out in the next ten years. For example will organizations continue to move away from hierarchical models towards networked models? And if we believe this to be true, what might that mean for HR (or Talent, or OD) or whatever we want to focus on.

And you can have your seat at the table, and I hope that it is a comfortable one. I believe that the action is moving away from the table out to the front yard, so that is where I am headed. I look forward to seeing what you have squeezed out of your crystal ball.

-joe

Where will we go? Game on.

Joe,

I accept your challenge. However, I must say that you are feeling quite ambitious. Talking about business 10 years in the future in 2010 is comparable to what it must have been like to talk about business 50 years into the future in 1950--the rate of change is exponentially increasing. That being said, I will pull out my crystal ball with the tarnished sterling silver base and get to work.

And for the record, if you are going to put a referendum on talking about HR's seat at the table, can I at least put in a few requests before we go into lock down?

1. I want my seat to be comfortable: nice seat cushion to sit on, big cushioned arm rests, you get the picture.
2. I need a seat that is ergonomically correct. Don't want to deal with the back pain.
3. Most importantly, the seat should be really stylish and impressive. When we finally get this seat, it shouldn't just be another seat at the table. It should be a seat that says, "I am awesome and I am here to kick ass."

Okay, now that these requests have been noted, I can let it go. Let's get on with the future.

-Jason

Where will we go?

Jason-

I have read, participated and listened to much talk in the past 18 months about the future of HR. I personally am not a fan of most of this conversation as it tends to be about "fixing" things that are in place today. My personal opinion is that business, organizations and how we create value are going through some really significant transitions and we need to have some clarity about that before we can really think about what HR (and Talent and OD and Leadership, etc.) needs to become. I like the points that the HR Bartender makes here about the future of work.

I personally am done talking about that illustrious seat at the table. I am done talking about HR as a strategic partner, yadda, yadda, yadda. I am however, very interested in how work and the organization is changing and how we as professionals in and around HR might play a valuable role tomorrow and the day after.

Over the next week or two, let's consider 3 questions. We can work through them one at a time and why dont we each provide 5 answers per question.

Looking down the road 10 years:
1.) How will business be different
2.) How will the organization be different
3.) How will work be different

So, lets meet back here in the next couple of days with 5 ways in which we think business will be different in 10 year...deal?

-joe