YouTube - https://youtu.be/fBeekJVEWTc
Summary
In this episode of the Org Design Podcast, we're joined by Elizabeth Venter and Ross Libby to explore the human side of organizational change. Our guests share invaluable insights on how to implement structural changes while keeping people at the heart of the transformation process.
Key discussion points include:
- The importance of involving team members in organizational change rather than imposing decisions from above
- Why continuous communication is crucial throughout the entire change process
- How seeking clarity rather than certainty leads to better organizational outcomes
- The value of experimentation and learning through pilot programs
Elizabeth emphasizes that successful organizational change requires supporting each team individually through their transformation journey, while Ross shares the powerful perspective that "the future punishes certainty but rewards clarity." Together, they provide practical advice for leaders navigating organizational change, whether they're org design experts or just beginning their journey.
This conversation offers essential insights for anyone interested in creating more effective, human-centered organizations that can adapt and thrive in today's rapidly changing business environment.
Show notes
AgileSherpas - https://www.agilesherpas.com/
Organization Design Forum - https://organizationdesignforum.org/
Bob Johansen & Institute for the Future - https://www.iftf.org/people/bob-johansen/
Transcript
[00:00:00] Amy Springer: I come from a doctor family and you learn to ignore symptoms until it's really bad. So, I think that, org design needs the specialist like a surgeon makes sense, but you want leaders to know, what do my symptoms look like?
Hopefully get some help when it's just a niggly problem and not when it needs the full anesthetic — let's cut this baby open
[00:00:24] Elizabeth Venter: major surgery.
I think in some of the symptoms or the causes for the symptoms is kind of hidden because of the belief that work is linear. It comes in from all sides. It's all different types of work and it goes from here, and then there, and then up there, and then through there. And then, eventually it goes out somewhere, and even people that are in functional teams, network organically. I remember when I was in teams working for Ford, I used to network to get things done and to get them done faster than the normal way things needed to happen. So even though we think work is linear, and we structure the organization linear, top down, straight, right? Work happens in a network. It happens like this, bottom up, top down, sideways, and then crisscross. So why not structure the organization like that, in a more of a natural way that people are working.
So when you don't do that, and the symptoms that you might be experiencing "Oh, things are very siloed. I don't know what another department or another team is doing", or leaders just lobbying for one area, so another area struggles or work doesn't have visibility, and why can't the work just go faster? I'm going to compress the timelines. I'm going to force them more. I'm going to be more strict. Why can't I flog the horse and why can't they run faster?" Because the system. It's an organism, it's a system that's working together.
It's not one linear line in and out. Frustration, not satisfying customers or stakeholders. I think it hits leaders all sides, but what does it really mean when I experience those things in the organization? Do I need more people? Do I need a bigger budget? We don't really go for the root cause.
[00:02:21] Damian Bramanis: Thank you so much, Elizabeth. Really excited to talk to you both today. Welcome to the Org Design Podcast. I'm Damian and I'm joined by Amy, and today we have Ross Libby and Elizabeth Venter from AgileSherpas, and we've had a great conversation so far.
I'm really excited to dig in further with some of the interesting kind of points we've touched on. Elizabeth is calling in from Cape town in South Africa and Ross is calling in from Minnesota in the USA. Thank you so much for that introduction about whether org design is linear or where it goes. Ross, love to get your perspective on that.
[00:02:55] Ross Libby: Yeah, like you said, a great introduction or way of thinking always helps to think of an analogy or metaphor, but if it is that, that human body or that system, I think we were discussing a little bit. You don't always understand it. You might be "Well, I know what's going on, I'm working in this every day. I'm working through the process and I'm the leader of it or such. And I better know what's going on, But oftentimes, it's much more complex. A lot of different interconnections, and if one thing is off, it can disrupt the whole. Definitely experienced that time and time again, over the course of places I've been and things I've seen where, yeah, sometimes you're almost too close to it. Sometimes, you have your own bias that get in the way. Or you're own experiences. And those aren't a bad thing. But are you actually taking in more than just your purview? We're talking about, too, the help that a specialist or an expert, or sometimes just an outside perspective, a second opinion can provide, and so, that's what I think when we look at organizational design, it can be a multitude of things. There's no one right way or one right answer. But, often gets better when you're exposed to more thinking, more ways that something could happen, and that possibility, "how might we" mindset of, let's not get stuck in the way it has been, but let's balance that with what it could be. And find the right path from there.
[00:04:13] Amy Springer: Ross, when you talk about a second opinion, are you talking outside the organization, within the organization? What's our scope of additional opinions?
[00:04:24] Ross Libby: I think, there's always the answer it depends. But that's no fun to leave it at there. So, it's probably a why not both more, more accurately? Oftentimes, we see there is tremendous expertise within an organization, and also, it can be further enhanced by having some of those from outside the organization or even outside the system— if you think of that interconnected system— to really bring the best of both worlds. I know when we get the opportunity to go in, that's the way we see the biggest bang. Meaning, you've got people who have a deeper knowledge in some of the why is this the way it is?" Or industry or domain specific, sometimes, and then we can come in and bring, sometimes, a broader view. And, sometimes, a deeper view, depending on the situation or scenario. So yeah, it's just the why not both?
[00:05:12] Elizabeth Venter: It's also good to have some curiosity. Sometimes, you don't quite know exactly what's going on, but you know there is something that's not working in the system. It's good to have different perspective and different eyes that look at the situation. And, to what Ross was saying, somebody from the outside working together with the teams and the people on the inside to really understand how the work flows and how people are connecting. If you're only leaning on expertise, you'll get one version of the truth. When there's connection and there's people working together on it, you get a completely different perspective on the org design, something that might actually work.
[00:05:55] Damian Bramanis: Curiosity, I think that's really interesting. So, you both work with different organizations. Let's rewind to day one. Someone from there has said, "Hey, Elizabeth, we really need your help here. Things aren't going well. Our organization is a bit dysfunctional or maybe a lot. Somewhere, probably, more on the 'a lot' side. And they probably will tell you, here's what we think is wrong.
On day one, you've got that framing. What are the first things that you do to satisfy that curiosity to figure out that pathway forward?
[00:06:25] Elizabeth Venter: You're spot on. Very often, there's some kind of a problem statement that you can explore with the client. What are you experiencing? What are you seeing? And that, for us, very often happens on the senior level of the marketing organization. And then we want to discover, we want to explore, and we want to be curious. We want to hear from everyone in the organization as much as what we possibly can . And that's where there's different methods and that's both quantitative and qualitative to help you understand what's actually happening in the fabric of the organization. You want to lift up the hood and you want to see how things are structured and how things are actually working. And where those pain points are. Going back, like a little bit of the medical profession, but you want to do a couple of blood tests, and a couple of scans, you want to talk again, you want to measure a couple of things, and then you want to synthesize that, and you want to say, "Alright, what is all of this telling us?" With our expertise in different ways of working and in an org design, what are some of these pain points actually mean? And how do you solve for that? Because org design is one aspect. There's also the ways of working, the way that information flows. There's various different levers that you can pull to effect change within the system and within the organization. And, very often, when we play that information back, it's connected to what was said first, but it goes a lot deeper. And, the interesting thing is, as you uncover it, it's as if the leadership team people go, "Yeah, that's true. We know that." It's not often that we find something that people haven't somewhere experienced or realized. They didn't quite know exactly how to put it together and then how to shift it in a way that's meaningful and systemic over time. The change in the design is not necessarily what was expected and why that could be better in conjunction with different ways of working— why is that so needed? So on that aspect, that's not something that they necessarily ask up front. They will come with a range of symptoms, and then already think that they know what the answer is. But as you get under the hood, you need to adjust that.
[00:08:42] Amy Springer: From previous experiences, do you have an example that has stuck with you where they thought it was one thing and it ended up being something completely different?
[00:08:51] Elizabeth Venter: Yeah, a couple of that, was really around how we uncovered and what we uncovered about the culture. And it's usually culture. That's where the hardest understanding is and the style of the leadership in the organization, how information flows, authority flows. That could be a bit of a knee jerk because that's not why they came to you.They came to me because people need to work differently. The teams need to work differently. Teams need to be set up differently. But the whole system actually needs to be set up differently and behave differently for real change to be affected. And that is not necessarily what was asked for.
That was not what was expected. It was more around, "Okay, this is how we're going to fix your people. But fixing the system needs the leadership, as well. So, how's the leadership team structured? What is the cultural undertones? How is culture holding the organization together? How's culture enforcing the system that's in place? So, you need to dismantle that if you want to see real change and actually create a different environment for your teams. And fix the teams, that's not the way to really affect change. That's not going to create the environment that you're looking for. Teams, they work together in harmony, or there's collaboration, and there's real innovation.
[00:10:10] Damian Bramanis: You mentioned a minute ago about doing that blood test, the things that might be going wrong could be around culture or leadership or authority. Are there specific tools or is there a really bang for your buck question that you ask or a way that you evaluate those things? Is our leadership healthy or is the culture doing well?
[00:10:29] Ross Libby: I think, oftentimes, even right when you're trying to diagnose whatever it might be, there's, sometimes, a few different things that have to be done or run or a few things are being looked for. And I'd say, I believe that's similar how we approach it or what we find, we go in with, a few different ways in which we're wanting to try to do that.
Where's the symptom? How can we help diagnose something? And so, quantitative assessments where you can get everyone answering the exact same question with the exact same range of responses, to then the more qualitative, where we can do more conversations, do observations or we can get documentation, right?
And that you can have some sturdy documentation that you can see, but then you can also help to interpret it through those other of those other kind of tests being run to say, what is now telling us when we see of the bigger picture? I think that's apt because Elizabeth was saying to the ideas of, that system as a whole and some interrelations or culture specifically, culture is kind of a gnarly sometimes there's hidden pieces of it.
Sometimes there's pieces, especially, leadership teams, don't really want to show no, that's for us and thing so those multifaceted ways in which you can look at it, it doesn't always mean it's just, oh that's exactly the thing, but you start to uncover, you start to reveal things or you start to eliminate pieces, Which I think is a very important part of the process as you start to hone in on what might this be, with a little bit of a structure to it, because you want to isolate variables. So you don't want them all to be on the table, it could be one of ten. That's not helpful. There's a few different tests, a few different things you want to run, in order to understand, or even what I was mentioning earlier, our own bias, and we can have that right as we come in from the outside. "Oh what doesn't this look at what we just saw over here?" You got to fight that. You've got to let the data proof it out of the different qualitative and quantitative help inform, what is this scenario?
[00:12:21] Amy Springer: You both have mentioned, that often something around leader, around culture does come up in one of these assessments, if you could click your fingers and give every leader on this earth, a skill in relation to org design, that would help org design be as successful as possible. What would that be?
[00:12:42] Ross Libby: That experimentation, and looking at things with that, Elizabeth said it. Hopefully I'm not stealing yours too, Because I think, especially when we're more seasoned in something doing something for longer it brings a confidence, which is a really good thing, but it can bring, an overconfidence, can bring, "I know it", noise and want to push that away or, but that's where some of the greatest right risks are blind spots. The thing we know the best oftentimes has, blind spots, so yeah, if you can just take those back to, I don't know, at least many, I don't know, if it looks the same, but here in the States, science experiments as kids, but I don't know, in the grades of 3, 4, 5, 6, when you're 8, 9, 10, 11 or something, you start to learn that scientific process, which at the time I think you think this is "when I'm ever going to use this", but that's what I go back to and say, that same thing, you have something you believe to be true, right? You have to then try to, how can I prove that out, and that same idea too, you're taught limit the variables, right? Isolate the the things that you can limit and try to test out to this thing true or not? So yeah, I'd just say that, that experimental kind of curiosity,
[00:13:50] Elizabeth Venter: Fantastic, Ross, when you said experimentations, exact note that I made as well, because you when you start, looking at a model or a structure within the organization that will flow, you'll have to experiment, a little bit and have some resilience as well, because you may try something and it doesn't quite work as well as what you expected. then you've got to say we're Instead of saying, okay it didn't work that well, let's just keep things the way that they are. You know, that happens sometimes. We took a chance. We're not going to explore any further. Saying that really, like I said, increase the flow and changes the way that people work and the way that people are organized and collaborate together.
That's that resilience, that experimentation, that curiosity, that Ross is also mentioning now, then psychological safety. So that as a leader, you can say, well, maybe not so much, but "we're going to try this now" and the teams being open. So creating that environment where we're open to say "we're going to try this way". " We're going to tweak it this way". "This is why". "This is what we see is working". "These are the things we want to adjust". That creates also an environment to say that it's safe to fail. It's safe to not have it 100%, but that we are not gonna give up. We are going to keep on adjusting and find something that, that really works.
Because I, working with a client now where we've made. Quite a few adjustments to the design. That's okay. It's not supposed to be one and done. If we're treating it like a body in an organism, if you want to structure it like a network, of course, there's going to be movement and that's fine. That's okay. So the other one thing that I'll mention last is crucial conversations, is the ability for people to speak to one another. So leader to leader to manager management team across, to be able to have open conversations and say, let's try this.
Let's not try that. Let's shift it this way. This is not working for me. I'm not comfortable in this role, how can I support you? How can I help you, is changing conversation and that skill, that conversational skill and being leaders, coach, you want to embark on org design, you've got to think of the softer skills as well for the, for leaders, your managers, and your team so that they can speak up when there's discomfort. When you stay in the status quo, you're just gonna keep things as they are, and be as uncomfortable.
[00:16:33] Damian Bramanis: The status quo is definitely scarier. What you talked about there is having that being safe to fail is for many people, organizational design, is really scary. What if it goes wrong? Everything we're talking about here is high stakes. These are not conversations that we can have in public. We can't make a mistake because if we do, we're putting people's livelihood, their purpose is, comes from their work of putting all of those things on the line, and so to many people, it feels like somewhere that absolutely is not safe to fail.
So what would you say to those people who are, um, quaking in their boots at the, idea that org design is, something that you can fail at?
[00:17:09] Elizabeth Venter: Yeah, and I'd say take courage and take a step. Sometimes Organizations, when they're facing an org change or when we're working with an organization can feel quite overwhelming in that overwhelm, they might step back and say I want everything perfect. I want every name in every box. want to know exactly where everything's going to fit and it's not wrong to seek some certainty, right? It's not wrong to want to know the detail.
However, with every change, not all the details 100 percent clear in the beginning. a step, experiment, try something. a pilot team up and running that is structured in a different way. Run it, learn from it, communicate. When people feel that change is is pushed on them, especially in, there's a level of resistance that is, based in fear, my job, my security, my meaning, my purpose, the things that you were mentioning, Damian, feels under threat and, that's where leadership and managers need to be very strong in their support for teams to be able to say this is the way that we're going, let's move together, you are secure in this way, let's talk about it, let's hear from you, let's try things and adjust things where it is really not working.
[00:18:34] Amy Springer: Elizabeth, you're making me think, I used to work in a very large global organization and so these reorgs happened fairly regularly and something I always heard was, "who did they even talk to? Why are we going to be this way? Who did they even talk to? Do they even know what we do here?" it sounds like your sound advice would ideally prevent that sentiment, involving the right people.
[00:19:02] Elizabeth Venter: I would hope so, yeah, because I know, often, and we spoke about this, and that the leadership needs to be mindful about the type of specialist, right? Because this is a big change. And if it, if that change, that decision to change happens in a vacuum of the people that will be affected by it there will definitely be dissonance, right?
And you'll see churn. You will see people being unhappy with what happens to them, if they are part of the conversation, if they are part of shaping it, if they are part of saying, these are the things that's not working and they see that they were being listened to, they were being understood, that they were being heard and that their ideas are now taking shape and taking form and being put into action, it's much easier to support them through that change and you're going to have a different response. one thing that I will say about the communication is it's not one and done right at the beginning.
You have to do that constantly and continuously because you don't scale change, really. And then I'll explain what I mean now. you're starting to work with teams and you're affecting the structure, you would think oh, but economies of scale, the more you do, the better it gets. No, you're working with human beings, and human teams and It matters as much to you, Amy, is what it matters to me the effect that it's going to have on Damian It's the same as Amy, etc.
You don't copy and paste the change. You need to help every human every team go through that rate of change that they are going through you can't say well Because we communicate and help the first amount of teams, the last ones, that's fine, we don't need to do all of that work again, that communication, that conversation, you need to do just as much to help them through the change as well.
[00:20:57] Damian Bramanis: One of the things that we find a lot of our listeners are not experts in org design, but they're people who are interested in enacting organizational change within their own, within their own company, their own part of the organization, is that something someone can do themselves? Should they feel empowered to, to jump in and start making org change or do, they need someone?
[00:21:19] Elizabeth Venter: It's a good question. Can anyone learn a new skill, yes, absolutely. Take some time, read as much as what you possibly can about it. Understand what the change means. Understand the different options. Speak to different people, speak to people that specialize in that. But I don't I think the fear of change is something that should stop somebody from exploring what this means and what, org design means and what it is and the benefits that it can bring to an organization. And there are people that specialize in this field, obviously, but when you're in the organization, read and learn as much as possible about it so that you can see if there's certain of the symptoms within your organization, within your team, and then start experimenting Absolutely. I would actually say that, it could be really good for the organization, good for a leader to do that because of the rate of change in the world at the moment and the revolution that we're currently in changes with us all the time, and to create that interconnected network of teams in your organization, even if it's within a functional team, it's needed that people work in a network. We not in the industrial revolution where things come in the one way and they go out on the other way to my point about work not being linear. So I would encourage leaders to learn about org design as much as they possibly can.
[00:22:55] Ross Libby: There's something that popped to the front of my mind actually from, um, Organizational Design Forum conference, and I believe it was Bob Johansen there and so that has influenced now how I think we can help organizations on how to think about this, and it was that idea of, seek clarity, not certainty. And if I got his quote I might be butchering it, but it was something to the effect of that, that future punishes certainty but rewards clarity. And so I think that's an undertone now that really resonated with me or what we want to impart with those we work with, or to Elizabeth point to encourage people to say, that clarity is key, right? that comes from it. And those are things like what is the purpose of that enterprise, of that part within the enterprise or that organization, and hopefully it's not that dissimilar, but, a function or a business unit may have a little unique purpose and are you clear on that? Are you clear on the problems you are trying to solve, right? The customers you're trying to serve, the strategies you're going after, seek confidence in that clarity. If you're using that as your guide, then you should experiment, then you should feel safe to fail, but learn from that failure because that's, what's going to progress you.
And so I think, yeah, a topic like org design and, each one of us probably have different origin stories or whatnot, but at least for me, or probably many, it's not, "Oh, that's exactly what I, went to school for and exactly how I came here to thinking I would get in this". it's evolving. And so when you start to get those experiences, when you start to connect into things like, I have a clarity of purpose, the organization has clarity in their purpose. That's where the power starts to get unleashed and it gets unleashed not by just a single person or a single specialist or whatnot. When the collective organization starts get aligned starts to feel that same sense of confidence and we can try things, we can experiment, we can learn, we can grow.
[00:24:53] Damian Bramanis: I just wrote that down. The future punishes certainty, but rewards clarity.
[00:24:57] Ross Libby: And the credits have to go elsewhere, like I said, but I think that's always best when you can latch onto those things, those wise words of others and find their application to, the, the meaning in many different ways often.
[00:25:09] Amy Springer: Thank you both so much for your time and your humility and sharing your knowledge and stories with us. I've always said at the Org Design Podcast, we believe there's no perfect org, but now I'm thinking maybe it's, there's no certain org, but if we can all share our knowledge and our stories, we can all help each other get more clarity and build better places to work.
[00:25:32] Elizabeth Venter: Thank you, Amy. Thank you to Damian. It was a real pleasure and a privilege to spend some time with you today
[00:25:38] Damian Bramanis: Thank you all.
