An organization which never grows will eventually die (hence the following suggestion.) The key is structure should consider the future potential for long-term sustainability of the organization.
3. It should accommodate or encourage continued future growth.
Again, this should make sense. The problem is we don’t always ask the right questions to see if this is true.
Structure’s purpose should be to help the organization continue to grow over time. Structure should make things more efficient — not less efficient. Healthy structure enables growth. It does not control growth (except in rare cases as noted previously).
A lot of times you accomplish this by including the people who are going to be most impacted by the structure change. Let them be a voice into it and even if they don’t completely agree with it, they’ll be more likely to support it.
4. It should hit the center of acceptance.
This is a hard one to balance. Not everyone will agree with any change, but if the structure is universally opposed then it may need to be considered more closely before being implemented.
This goes back to the suggestion about DNA. You shouldn’t make change based solely upon popularity – it needs a better thought process than simply what people like. Leadership is never about making people happy.
At the same time, if you want the structure to be sustainable and helpful it must meet general acceptance. You’ve likely heard “people vote with their feet” (or their pocketbook). This is true in organizational leadership. You don’t want a few people determining structure changes – but you don’t want a mass exodus either.
This leads to the last suggestion.
5. People should understand the why.
This may be the most important one of all of these. People are more likely to accept structure when they can identify the value to them and their area of responsibility. They should at least understand the value to the overall organization.
I once interviewed Zig Ziglar. He continually said, “If people understand the why they will be less opposed to the what.” I’ve learned how true this principle is over the years.
We took a year to make one structural change, so people could clearly understood why we were making it. Some people still didn’t understand but most people did. Over time it became a widely accepted change in our church.
This article about adding new structure originally appeared here, and is used by permission.
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