This is a tweetstorm about what I’m learning about company organizational structure, alignment, and how to innovate rapidly while scaling.
Disclaimers:
1. Learning from other companies often means de facto survivorship bias
2. I’m not an expert, just learning as fast as I can
Disclaimers:
1. Learning from other companies often means de facto survivorship bias
2. I’m not an expert, just learning as fast as I can
1. Successful companies seem to derive the structure of the organization backward from goals (OKRs).
Amazon calls it “service-driven architecture,” Google apparently calls them “functional units,” many CEOs refer to it as something about decentralized teams
Amazon calls it “service-driven architecture,” Google apparently calls them “functional units,” many CEOs refer to it as something about decentralized teams
But what this really means is an organization defines its objectives (Bezos recommends selecting objectives that will be the same 10 yrs from now) and starting with small teams dedicated to that thing. E.g. a “lower prices team” and a “better selection” team at early Amazon
Those teams tend to be very autonomous and are designed to not require central sign-off. One owner is responsible for each OKR set and get help from centralized units (finance, for example) as needed. Duplicate work isn’t frowned upon as coordination to avoid that is so difficult
Management relies heavily on those units to understand about what’s happening, and tries to have frequent reporting as a means of understanding as much as accountability.
Andy Grove famously turned Intel around on a dime based on a single memo from a field salesperson.
Andy Grove famously turned Intel around on a dime based on a single memo from a field salesperson.
Teams are built to be fully functioning units. There isn’t often a monolithic “engineering” organization, but a couple of engineers assigned to each team. You’re grouped by task/objective not skill set. Amazon refers to itself as “hundreds of little startups.” That’s powerful
2. OKRs (objectives/key results) have been written about in a dozen books, with google being perhaps the strongest advocate. You can get 90% of the information in a single page here: rework.withgoogle.com/guides/set-goa…. They work.
3. Leadership of these teams means 100% ownership of results no matter what happens, and a huge number of companies consider who those people are is incredibly important
That concludes the last couple weeks of trying to learn as quickly as possible.
Books:
Measure what Matters by Doerr
7 Powers by Helmer
The Outsiders by Thorndike
In the Plex by Levy
Anything Andy Grove has ever written or said, but particularly High Output Management
Books:
Measure what Matters by Doerr
7 Powers by Helmer
The Outsiders by Thorndike
In the Plex by Levy
Anything Andy Grove has ever written or said, but particularly High Output Management
If you’re only going to read one book I recommend High Output Management
