The greatest challenge for today’s leaders is how to upgrade their organisation’s operating system.

Agility, adaptability and connected innovation are hard to achieve within divided structures.

In a software-driven world, organisations need to become more like software to evolve.

We help design, develop and run your organisational operating system.

We look at five key dimensions of the organisational operating system.

Our diagnostic health bot asks questions and gathers data to create a real-time picture of progress towards becoming an agile, adaptive organisation. We use this information to create custom learning journeys and suggest new management techniques to address weaknesses.

We map digital capabilities and talent, identifying gaps that are priorities for action, and help create distributed agile transformation systems to make change routine.

Shared digital leadership and strategy are key to making sure all stakeholders are aligned and helping build the connected capabilities the organisation needs.

Structure

What is getting in the way of connected, agile working? How can we create real-time co-ordination & communication structures that are faster and more reliable than hierarchy?

Culture

An agile organisation needs more openness, accountability and psychological safety for people to step up and own their work. How can we test for these attributes and what interventions can help?

Practice

Shifting from a process view of the world to a service-oriented approach is key to continuous improvement. How can we make operations more collaborative, data-driven and service-focused?

Technology

How can we better integrate our workplace technologies to connect, standardise and automate the boring bits, whilst freeing up people to focus on value-added activities?

Leadership

What does leadership look like in a digital, networked world? How can leaders not just drive incremental improvements, but create the conditions and the platform for exponential success?

At the leadership level

We work with digital leaders to map digital strategy, capability gaps, and cultivate a network of digital guides across the organisation; we also deliver in-depth digital leadership learning and development programmes.

At the platform level

We map the capabilities, services and skills of emerging agile teams, and help assemble them into a service platform that the whole firm can use. We also help design and implement key platform elements starting with a digital learning hub.

At the team level

We help switch from a process-centric work system to a more agile and service-centric approach, identify scope for automation or standardisation of these services, and then create the interfaces and connections with other teams to work better together.

Our Thinking…

How can we overcome the culture of ‘learned helplessness’ surrounding digital technology in the workplace, and give people opportunities to help themselves and each other?

Bridging the skills gap in the digital workplace

Our Thinking…

Change is hard, but it is unlikely to stop any time soon. Instead of big bang change programmes, we need to make distributed, agile transformation part of the agenda for all teams and organisational units.

Distributed, agile transformation makes change routine

Our Thinking…

The first wave of digital transformation was about adding digital capabilities to existing structures; the next is about creating natively digital and connected structures that operate more like software.

It is time to upgrade our organisational operating systems

Measuring the Economic Impact of Digital Change

Measuring the Economic Impact of Digital Change

In this issue, Livio digs into some of the ways that digital leaders can quantify the value of their transformation efforts and translate them into measurable financial benefits. 8 out of 10 IT execs prefer… Demonstrating the business value of IT is an established...

Old Wine in New Bottles

Old Wine in New Bottles

Sometimes change gets stuck between two worlds, and all we end up with is old structures with new branding. During a period of transition or paradigm shift, there is often an interim phase where we use new models to create a slightly better version of the old world...

Mind the Experience Gap

Mind the Experience Gap

Some thoughts on making 'experience chasms' a bit shallower at the boundaries of traditional orgs. We’re seeing increased interest in customer and employee experience from most organisations, focused on increasing loyalty, revenues, engagement and empowerment. But...

Between Two Worlds

Between Two Worlds

Thoughts on institutional upgrades, hierarchies versus networks, and re-wilding as an organisational design priority. This week’s ‘Lunch with the FT’ featured the social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, and he had some interesting things to say ($) about how mature...