Organizational Order of Operations

Organizational dysfunction, inefficiency, or just not quite reaching goals can provoke consternation and the feeling that the business needs major interventions. For many organizations the answer to this worry is tools, the latest the greatest, the best architected, the largest LLM, the simple, subscription solution to all your problems can be found and implemented, remove the barrier to continued, renewed, and always expanded success.

As someone who has worked in for profit, nonprofit, and government spaces in North America, Africa, the Middle East, and Southeast Asia, I have seen organizational dysfunction and organizational excellence. The gap between those two states, in my experience has never been tools. Even when a tool can help, implementing a tool without a comprehensive approach inevitable produces new, unanticipated challenges. The ability to meet isolated and team goals, produce desired outcomes is built block by block and honed through organizational capacity developing, fostering, and strengthening.

The secret sauce of building effective teams sits within doing the work. I don’t pretend to be offering ground breaking thoughts here, putting in the work, often works. But I do contend, strongly, how you do that work matters; itentionality in approach matters. To support intentionality, I work with clients and recommend using a simple order of operations, think PEDMAS but with less math, people, process, tools.

People

Organizations are people. A sometimes overlooked foundation, from bottom to top people are the essential component. Particularly when identifying problems, addressing barriers, finding ways to create efficiencies or improve results, skipping consultation with the people who are in the middle of everything will not save you time. To ignore the reality that people are what decision makers have the least control over, is to ignore a major risk factor. Though sometimes tempting to assume since your people are employees, they have reduced agency, making assumptions about how people will react to potential change will inevitably produce unexpected, often negative, outcomes.

Process

In this framework, the processes are all the systems, procedures, and workflows that an organization utilizes to connect teams and move work forward. Processes, when well defined and implemented, align teams to effectively and efficiently execute tasks toward achieving short and long-term objectives. However, sometimes processes become so ingrained and natural, they can be skipped when considering changes needed. Processes can become so rote that the answer to the question why do we do this is because we do. When thinking about your organizational processes, it is essential to avoid this circular logic that traps teams in processes that negatively affect people, teams, and outcomes. When there are inefficiencies or failure to meet goals, sometimes the simplest and most effective action is to understand from your people where the processes are failing them and the organization.

Tools

On top of and after progress has been made regarding understanding the challenges and opportunities with the people and process, there are tools. There are so many tools, and right now, there are many AI solutions that are being sold promising to end your need for both people and processes. But even with new and evolving tool capacity, tools can best be implemented as additive to existing workflows that are working. Tools will not and cannot solve all the problems. Organizational leaders can leverage tools by intentionally considering what the tools will do and importantly what they will not do to design the solution that works for their people and processes.

People, Process, and Tools

I urge organizational leaders to consider this organizational order of operations when they are planning to implement new tools, hearing frustrations in the team, or just wanting to assess how to achieve organizational goals. It does not require an extensive or laborious approach, just considering people, processes, and tools in an intentional and consistent way.