The Culture of Self Contained

Autonomy in business is the word of the day. My question is, where is it?

We design business functions to specialize because that is efficient, or at least that is what common knowledge dictates. We have legal and IT and HR and PR and Marketing because specialty in that area of knowledge provides depth. Everybody can’t know all of the complexities around a certain topic AND get work done…

So why is getting things done still so hard?

Let’s explore some of the reasons I’ve been able to come up with:

explanations I recently realized that every time I buy a house or a car, I’m losing money. I’ll never get the money I have to pay the broker or the dealer back. It’s lost in the transaction. That’s kind of like the time it takes to get people up to speed on a project for their approval. Usually the person you’re getting up to speed has no idea about the project and has a boss who is a decision maker… meaning that I have to explain it good enough for that person to be able to explain it well and answer impromptu questions. These two phenomena lead to time that we never get back.

overcomplexity Instead of devoting entire departments to a particular job function, I would argue that we should first be looking to oversimplify each and every job function as much as possible. We don’t necessarily have to design complexity into our work. On the contrary, we should devote as much time as possible to designing the complexity out of our work so that anybody can do it in a pinch. That happens some times.

multi-tasking mayhem One person can physically only be one place at once. I understand that down time appears to be a waste of time, and that is why we multitask. But performance is measured by output not work. Sometimes downtime is required by a specific group so that they’re available when they absolutely have to be. Sometimes that is necessary for optimum team performance. That’s ok.

Self Contained Beauty & The Matrix

I’m finding a new admiration for the idea of the self contained business unit. Everyone has their specialty but all of the specialties are represented within the business unit so that decisions can be made quickly and effectively. Shared resources just never seem to be available when you need them.

From my experience in the military, I can tell you that being self contained is an essential capability for survival. Therefore, self contained becomes a practice at both the macro and micro levels. Self contained becomes the culture…

A matrixed organization is the closest thing to the idea of a self contained business unit, in my mind. You have individuals trained in specialized job functions who are able to make decisions that maintain the organization’s forward progress.

The key, however, is trust. These individuals need to be trusted to make the right decisions. Trust seems to be the root cause of overcomplexity on the job. If I can’t trust you to make the right choice, then I will place five approval processes in front of you and slow you down.

What Do You Think?

Do you have a problem with speed at work? Is it easy to get things done? If not, is a lack of trust the biggest reason for slow moving large organizations? Please let me know in the comments below.

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