This is a guest post by Craig Brown from Betterprojects.net.
Most of the talk about project performance is focused on systems and structures. The real pathway to improved project performance is through people. I propose that the most important factor affecting people’s ability to work together and solve complex problems is culture. This article investigates Goffee and Jones Sociability-Solidarity culture matrix (1) and how it can be used to map out an improvement plan for your project.
According to Goffee and Jones, organizational culture can be observed along a 2 dimension axis showing sociability and solidarity.
Sociability is whether people like working together – in particular, whether they are communicating and co-operating freely. At one end of the axis people do not co-operate and do not communicate. At the other end of the spectrum people are sharing houses and marrying one another.
Solidarity at its extremes is ONE goal or NO goal. The solidarity axis is the mission focus. An organization that has solidarity is focused on the NEXT BIG THING, while an organization that does not have a solid focus is full of different and potentially conflicting agendas. We often describe these letter types of organizations as political.
The four quadrants are represented in this diagram:
Many (many, many) organizations find themselves in the bottom left quadrant of the model in a ‘fragmented’ state. We don’t think that this state is a good one. We characterize the fragmented organizations as petty, political and difficult places to get things done.
| Org type | Sociability | Solidarity | Description of where this type of org may be useful |
| Fragmented | Low | Low | Lots of local optimization, many potentially conflicting goals. For example; A global business delivering local services to high value customers. |
| Networked | High | Low | People like working together but aren’t necessarily working towards the same goals. Example; A research community exploring different approaches to a problem, or a confederation of governments working on local issues. |
| Mercenary | Low | High | A competitive first-to-market context where there is clearly one main goal and one best way to get there; Often short term focused, such as the finance industry. |
| Communal | High | High | Aiming for innovation at a sustainable pace, leveraging professional skills, working in a context that can be uncertain; Software projects. |
I think it’s important to call this position on ‘communal-culture-as-optimal’ out as an assumption, because the authors of this model make the point that the appropriate quadrant for an organization is actually context dependent and that organizations, depending on their purpose and context, may find any of the quadrants the right one for them. But, for us project people… Well, we are very goal oriented, so we tend to the right.
So, we have done our gap analysis on our culture and we have our current state and our target. Now, there are three paths to the target state from where we are;
- From Fragmented to Communal directly
- From Fragmented to Communal via Mercenary
- From Fragmented to Communal via Networked
In reality culture change comes from the corners and a whole of organizational change effort is unlikely, so let’s park the direct route for the moment. It’s a radical shift, and without everyone focused and committed to such a change, it ain’t gonna happen.
Instead people and organizations are going to pick a path that leads down one axis on this model (and then potentially builds out the other axis for a while before swapping back in a zigzag fashion.)
That means that values, shaped by experiences, capabilities and perceived need, will make you and your colleagues favor either working on increasing sociability, or on increasing focus.
If you are a large bureaucracy you tell your employees that people are your biggest asset so you may be biased to push up along the sociability metric. If you are a start-up you have no money to waste, or perhaps you are in an industry where lives are at risk, or maybe you are a company where people would pay you to let them work there; as a result you are probably going to take a mission focused approach to culture shift.
What is interesting about all this is the two distinct paths are shaping up as a divide in industry standards. One the Sociability axis we have PM2.0 products and practices being promoted that encourage better communication and interaction. On the Solidarity axis we have some fairly solid PM1.0 practices (that are often poorly applied) including clear product definition, unity of vision, senior sponsors closely engaged with the project and it’s outcomes and a ‘start-with-the-end-in-mind’ approach to planning work.
The right pathway for you and your organization depends on who you are and what your current context is.
1 Rob Goffee and Gareth Jones, The Character of a Corporation, 2nd edition, Profile Books, 2003
This is a guest post by Craig Brown from Betterprojects.net.
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This is a splendid article as the selected dimensions are impacting. The matrix shows clearly situation in which one organization may be fragmented into several mini organizations as we move from one division or department into another.
I have challenged the use of balanced scorecards in organizations that show lack og culture or goal alignments. I dared to put my ideas in two recent publications, which are in full agreement with this article.
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/17651011/Balancing-the-Balanced-Scorecard
http://www.docstoc.com/docs/19238451/The-Cost-of-Poor-Vision-on-Companies
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