Instead of a traditional hierarchy run like a feudal system with kings and peasants, what if a business was run more like a city where everyone had a job to do? Would it help empower employees and increase productivity? That’s the basic idea behind a new organizational structure that is making waves around the world.
Holacracy disrupts the traditional way of organizing a company and instead taps into many principles from the future of work to create a cohesive environment of contributing employees. Here are the basics you need to know from the creator of the system, Brian J. Robertson.
What is holacracy?
Instead of focusing on organizing people, like traditional organizations do, a holacracy organizes work. The system essentially works like a series of circles. The smallest circle is each individual role, which has a clear purpose and accountability. Each person in the company fills multiple roles and is the steward of those responsibilities. For example, a person could fill the role of website manager, marketing head, and outreach coordinator. Roles are then organized into larger circles based on their purposes, such as a circle for marketing or for research and development. Roles can be in different circles, meaning an employee filling multiple roles can work with different groups of people. Each employee has total control and autonomy over his or her role and has the freedom to tweak it and customize it as necessary, with the overall purpose of the larger circles to collaborate as necessary to meet the goals of the organization.
Brian compares a holacracy to a city. Just like everyone in a neighborhood has his or her own house, each employee has his or her own work domain. Neighbors can collaborate if needed, but with boundaries. Just like a neighbor wouldn’t enter your home without asking, employees can’t jump into someone else’s role or domain without collaborating together. Every person fills a role and knows what they are responsible for, which leads to the success of the entire neighborhood. The neighborhood serves as the larger circle full of similar roles, with multiple neighborhoods contributing to the same city, or company.
Why do we need holacracy?
Brian didn’t create the system to solve a particular problem. Instead, it’s more of an update to the traditional way of running a business. After all, much of how we typically structure an organization was established decades ago when the telegraph was the predominate new technology. The world has changed drastically since then, and so should the way we are organized.
Brian uses the example of updating his computer from a PC to a Mac. There wasn’t necessarily anything specifically wrong with his PC, but he wanted a better platform where he didn’t have to think about the operating system and could just get things done. By moving to a more streamlined system, he could focus less on the system and more on productivity. So it is with holacracy—its goal is to provide a structure that helps organizations run more efficiently instead of being bogged down by bureaucracy and outdated practices.
How do we implement holacracy?
Holacracy is practiced by hundreds of companies around the world, but most famously by Zappos. Putting holacracy into action can start by simply testing it out for a few days. Then a company can look at the overall goals and programs it has and break it down into smaller, more specialized roles that are needed for the success of the company. Working in a marketplace of sorts, the roles can then be distributed to employees based on their talents and interests. With holacracy, employees should be able to focus on more specialized roles where they can shine. A holacracy uses dynamic role descriptions that can change with the needs of the company or the employee.
As the future of work continues to change, organizations need to evaluate their structures to see if there is a way they could operate more smoothly. Holacracy is on the forefront of a new frontier of innovation and empower employees and the way they work unlike any other structure.
Would you try a holacracy in your company?
My new book, The Employee Experience Advantage (Wiley, March 2017) analyzes over 250 global organizations to understand how to create a place where people genuinely want to show up to work. Subscribe to the newsletter here.
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