Saved by Adam Zeiner
The Emerging Shape of Design Orgs
Design is not what we make. Design is what we make possible.
wearecollins.com • 101 Design Rules
With this in mind, here are the basic steps to organizational design: 1. Figure out what needs to be communicated. Start by listing the most important knowledge and who needs to have it. For example, knowledge of the product architecture must be understood by engineering, QA, product management, marketing, and sales.
Ben Horowitz • The Hard Thing About Hard Things: Building a Business When There Are No Easy Answers
In most companies, activity is driven by the org chart. That’s how decisions are made, communicated, and acted on. That’s why it’s hard to scale as a company grows. Deep org charts give structure to huge hierarchies of people, but they’re not great for executing on projects.
In order to implement strategy, an organization needs to integrate structure, processes, and people. A successful redesign will focus the company's resources on its strategic priorities and reduce costs. An example of a typical motivation for a redesign is a company that decided to expand outside of its US home base.
McKinsey • Getting organizational redesign right
Design organizations are increasingly expected to contribute to product strategy, but these structures support little more than product delivery. If the team is asked to develop a vision for the future product experience 2-3 years out, how do they get it done?
Peter Merholz • Creative and Strategic Leadership in Design Orgs—Super-Senior ICs and the Shadow Strategy Team (3rd in a series on Emerging Shape of Design Orgs), Peter Merholz
Six (out of many) key differences between product managers and org designers 1) As a PM, you advocate for a clear vision for your product. As an org designer, you help teams co-create that vision themselves.2) PMs hedge against indecision, whereas org designers help teams make better decisions.3) You’re much more data-driven as a PM than as an Org ... See more