Innovation usually happens when things are used in ways we didn't intend.It rarely happens on command and flourishes when people at all levels find new uses for things. Don't limit innovation to isolated R&D; encourage creativity to flourish across the entire organization as people actively sense and seize opportunities.

Bottom-Up Innovation

Structure workflow loosely coupled but still strategically aligned, like a regatta of speedboats heading generally in the same direction. Avoid imposing rigid, interdependent cross-functional processes that cause bottlenecks. Prioritize small autonomous teams that can work independently without bureaucracy.

Streamlined Workflows

Compensation should be fair and generous enough to not matter and to support motivation, keep the focus on autonomy, mastery, and purpose.

Escape the constraints of traditional annual budget cycles that lock in resources based on backwards-looking assumptions and politics. Instead, allocate financial resources based on real-time market data, emerging opportunities, and initiatives that serve the organization's purpose. Minimize long-term spending commitments in favor of discretionary resources.

Budget Dynamically

Centralized authority structures are too slow and bureaucratic to respond effectively in rapidly changing business environments. Pushing authority to the edges of an organization where access to real-time market information resides allows much faster responses. People also need the autonomy to experiment, fail, and learn rather than just follow orders. Freedom enables innovation.

Distribute Authority  

<ul><li>Proactively make information accessible to everyone instead of hoarding it as power. </li><li>Work in public with early drafts instead of waiting for perfection. </li><li>Information is meant to flow freely across an organization, not create power fiefdoms. </li><li>Transparency builds trust and collective wisdom.</li></ul>

Radical Transparency

<ul><li>Organizations need a compelling purpose that goes beyond profits to inspire people. </li><li>This higher collective purpose should directly inform decision-making at every level. </li><li>It provides meaning and guidance beyond top-line financial metrics.</li></ul>

The Need for Purpose

<ul><li>Organizations should create flexible networks of small, autonomous teams that can self-organize around projects and programs in agile ways. </li><li>Allow people the flexibility to go where their passions, energy and skills take them within the organization. </li><li>Drive the organization through customer-focused product teams rather than centralized bureaucracies.</li></ul>

Dynamic Team Structures


In fast-changing fields, even the best strategic plan quickly becomes outdated. The strategy is only as good as the ability to continuously adjust course based on real-time learning and market feedback. Scenario planning is more effective than fixed, long-term strategic plans. Strategies must evolve.

Flexible Strategies

Reduce unnecessary status updates and other time-wasting meetings that suck precious time and resources from an organization. Instead, hold occasional but meaningful governance meetings for voicing concerns and proposing changes. Also conduct periodic retrospective meetings to share perspectives and capture learnings.

Rethink Meetings

Any organization or team needs a purpose. A mission statement that defines success as making a profit lacks an inspiring purpose.

"Brave New Work" is a book written by Aaron Dignan, the founder of The Ready, an organization design and transformation firm that helps institutions like Johnson & Johnson, Charles Schwab, Kaplan, and more.  In the book, Dignan helps teams around the world completely reinvent their operating systems—the fundamental principles and practices that shape their culture—with extraordinary success. He helps them see that organizations aren't machines to be predicted and controlled. They're complex human systems full of potential waiting to be released. 

“This is the management book of the year. Clear, powerful and urgent, it's a must read for anyone who cares about where they work and how they work.”  —Seth Godin, author of This is Marketing   “This book is a breath of fresh air. Read it now, and make sure your boss does too.”  —Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg When fast-scaling startups and global organizations get stuck, they call Aaron Dignan. In this book, he reveals his proven approach for eliminating red tape, dissolving bureaucracy, and doing the best work of your life. He’s found that nearly everyone, from Wall Street to Silicon Valley, points to the same frustrations: lack of trust, bottlenecks in decision making, siloed functions and teams, meeting and email overload, tiresome budgeting, short-term thinking, and more. Is there any hope for a solution? Haven’t countless business gurus promised the answer, yet changed almost nothing about the way we work? That’s because we fail to recognize that organizations aren’t machines to be predicted and controlled. They’re complex human systems full of potential waiting to be released. Dignan says you can’t fix a team, department, or organization by tinkering around the edges. Over the years, he has helped his clients completely reinvent their operating systems—the fundamental principles and practices that shape their culture—with extraordinary success. Imagine a bank that abandoned traditional budgeting, only to outperform its competition for decades. An appliance manufacturer that divided itself into 2,000 autonomous teams, resulting not in chaos but rapid growth. A healthcare provider with an HQ of just 50 people supporting over 14,000 people in the field—that is named the “best place to work” year after year. And even a team that saved $3 million per year by cancelling one monthly meeting. Their stories may sound improbable, but in Brave New Work you’ll learn exactly how they and other organizations are inventing a smarter, healthier, and more effective way to work. Not through top down mandates, but through a groundswell of autonomy, trust, and transparency. Whether you lead a team of ten or ten thousand, improving your operating system is the single most powerful thing you can do. The only question is, are you ready?

AARON DIGNAN

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