By Robert Simons Levers Of Organization Design: How Managers Use Accountability Systems For Greater Performance And C [Hardcover]

by Robert Simons

The design of an organization--the accountability system that defines roles, rights, and responsibilities throughout the firm--has a direct impact on the performance of every employee. Yet, few leaders devote focused attention to how this design is chosen, implemented, and adjusted over time. Robert Simons argues that by viewing design as a powerful and proactive management lever--rather than an inevitable outcome of corporate evolution--leaders can maximize productivity across every level of the organization. Levers of Organization Design presents a new design theory based on four key yet often underrated customer definition, critical performance variables, creative tension, and commitment to mission. Building from these core areas, Simons lays out a step-by-step process leaders can follow to create structures and accountability systems that positively influence how people do their work, where they focus their attention, and how their activities can be aligned to contribute to overall strategic goals. He also introduces four levers of organizational design--unit configuration, diagnostic control systems, interactive networks, and responsibility to others--that leaders can manipulate to improve overall organizational efficiency and effectiveness vastly. For anyone accountable for measuring and managing performance, this book shows how good design can become an organization's roadmap to success. Robert Simons is the Charles M. Williams Professor of Business Administration in the accounting & control area at Harvard Business School.

Genres: Business, Management

Hardcover

First published July 1, 2005

Reviews

[Robert · Rating 5 out of 5]

Levers of Organizational Design: How Managers Use Accountabiolity Systems for Greater Performance and Maintenance
Robert Simons
Harvard Business School Press

Unlike subtitles of so many other recently published business books, the one for Levers of Organization Design correctly identifies its author's primary objective: to explain "how managers use accountability systems" to achieve "greater performance and commitment." Simons thoroughly and brilliantly responds to questions such as these:

What are the nature and extent of tensions of organization design or redesign?
How to get "span of attention" in proper alignment?
What is an appropriate "unit structure"? Why?
Which diagnostic control systems can be most effective? How?
Why are interactive networks essential?
How to establish and then strengthen them?
How should shared responsibilities be determined and then managed?
Then, how to sustain productive collaboration?
Which "levers" of organizational design are most effective? Why?
Which examples best illustrate how to make appropriate adjustment of them?
What are the most effective strategies and tactics when designing organizations for performance?

According to research which Robert S. Kaplan and David P. Norton provide in The Strategy-Focused Organization, only 5% of the workforce understand their company's strategy, only 25% of managers have incentives linked to strategy, 60% of organizations don't link budgets to strategy, and 85% of executive teams spend less than one hour per month discussing strategy. If true, these are chilling statistics, suggesting that few decision-makers in any organization (regardless of its size or nature) would be able to answer, clearly and realistically, each of the questions listed previously. Hence the urgency of their reading Simons' book. I also urge them to check out the several works co-authored by Kaplan and Norton.

[Lori Grant · Rating 4 out of 5]

A should-read book on performance management for knowledge workers, managers, executives, and entrepreneurs.