Making Change: The Star Model In Practice. . - Books in Brief - Designing Dynamic Organizations - book review

Occasionally, a piece is published that genuinely adds to the current state of strategic organizational thinking. Jay Galbraith's 1995 work, Designing Organizations, is one of the books that makes my list. It offers a well-conceived format for integrating organization and strategy. The value of this earlier book is that it simplifies a rather complex art form into a manageable concept, with a common-sense foundation and easily understood definitions.

In this follow-up book, Designing Dynamic Organizations, Galbraith and his co-authors step further away from concept and push into practical application. Galbraith is a professor at the University of Southern California and at the international Institute for Management Development in Lausanne, Switzerland. Co-author Diane Downey is president of Downey Associates International (DAI), a management consulting firm; Amy Kates is a senior consultant at DAI.

The authors say the need for the book is driven by a few crucial events: a company or division startup; growth (and, by assumption, reduction) in scale or complexity; a professional move into a more senior role; a revised business strategy; internal realignment; environmental shifts; or performance shortfalls.

One of the book's first exercises assesses how an organization responds to change. It's here that co-authors Downey and Kates begin to make their impact felt. They behaviorally define the factors of active leadership, knowledge management, continuous learning, organizational flexibility, functional integration, employee commitment and change readiness. They then blend these rather abstract elements into a step-by-step formula for identifying potential pitfalls and stumbling blocks.

Designing Dynamic Organizations offers at least three important things for the reader.

First, as the subtitle implies, this is a handbook. Simple is good. Help with sequential planning is always appreciated. And a heads-up on potential problem areas can only make the change process less painful. Each of the seven chapters is consistently built on that pattern--simplicity, planning and change management.

Second, the text builds bridges between theory and practice. For example, the concept of "lateral capability" nears incomprehensibility for us normal human beings. "The lateral organization is comprised of all the coordinating mechanisms that augment the vertical structure. Lateral capability is the ability to build, manage and reconfigure those various coordinating mechanisms to achieve its strategic goals." So there.

However, the authors carefully take readers through the working parts of lateral capability, logically segment the principles and clearly describe the effect that the concept can have on an organization. They incorporated into their analysis the importance of personal relationships, social networking of teams, information flow, matrixed decision-making and coordinating responsibilities. Before suggesting how these concepts may be used, they guide the reader through a consideration of work-force maturity--an absolutely critical factor that often is ignored.

Third, the book has solid tools for organizational assessment, analysis and change. Recognizing the value of the star model, the authors transform and enhance it with functional, quantifiable tools. Each chapter has, and many sections of the chapters have, interesting and useful surveys and other measures that bring additional life to the model and its fundamental concepts. While these may not pass statistical muster, they are of unquestionable help for those hoping to understand and lead organizational design.

There are two changes that would be useful in Designing Dynamic Organizations. Since this is a hand-book, it would be logical to include a segment on explaining and selling organizational design to executives who are not grounded in behavioral science. The second modification would be more difficult. Probably because of the non-integrative flow of the star model, the book presents a series of distinct, discreet activities rather than a seamless process for change.

But the pluses of the book well outweigh the minuses, which makes Designing Dynamic Organizations a completely worthwhile read.

Steve McIntosh, Ph.D., is president of Tartan Consulting and is a founding partner of the Southern Leadership Institute, headquartered in Bonita Springs, Fla.

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