At the end of 2011, we asked the team what they thought 2012 would bring. This was the response from training consultant Rod Farnan.
Rod Farnan, Training consultant, Global Integration
In 2011, every market segment was adjusting to the new economic situation.
Almost every segment I am working in is now moving to a virtual matrix organization model. There is a gradual movement away from thinking of this as the latest in a long line of re-organizations: people are appreciating, I think, that this is a new way of working, a new reality, demanding new skills (which is why Rod was so busy last year!).
There are still some unresolved issues though, notably in the systems to support this new way of working.
Compensation is a big one. Are people being compensated to reflect the loyalties they are expected to show? If people have a regional role but also have to be a member of a global project team then does their bonus reflect that? In addition, are HR ready for these compensation plans to change much more frequently as the shape of the virtual matrix changes?
Performance measurement is another. How do we measure our people when we am one of three managers who impact that person’s time and performance? What about the budgeting process? If the person is working on a global project team, they presumably have an increased travel need and require money to support that (and an acceptance by their local manager that they wont be in the office so much).
These were Rod’s thoughts as we came into the New Year. To date, they’ve been pretty much accurate. These challenges are rearing their heads for many of our customers. Have you noted these same trends?
Our latest entry to the Global Working video competition is from Rasma Kass, based in Brussels, Belgium, who shares some of her top tips for managing high performing remote and global teams by interviewing, and being interviewed by, others.
The latest entry in our Global Working video competition focusses on globalization. Young Canadians, Josh and Lewis, discuss how three elements of globalization – technology, production and economy – have improved the areas of trade and transaction, knowledge and immigration.
They need your vote on their entry page (earned by sharing the page) to be in with a chance of being shortlisted for the judges: Vote here.
Paul Stamper created a visually beautiful video on global warming as his entry to our global working video competition, with just one simple message: “I believe we need to know this; and we can work together to live more efficient lives.”
In the latest entry to our Global Working video competition, Howard Lake discusses how technology has facilitated far more effective global working amongst not for profit organizations, who have been able to see some of the benefits of genuine co-operation across organizations that might even consider themselves competitive. A forward thinking manager let Howard experiment in his early days at Amnesty International with en email forum. The rest, as they say, is history.
You can vote for Howard’s video on his competition page – he needs your votes to be included in the top twenty videos that go through to the judges for the winner to be selected.
January 26 is Australia Day, and at least half of Australia’s 21 million inhabitants stop to party.
The date officially marks the raising of the Union Jack flag at Sydney Cove by Captain Arthur Phillip, in 1788, when the First Fleet of convict ships arrived from Great Britain.
Although many celebrate with a mixture of organized community events, family and friends get-togethers, barbeques and fireworks, the day’s official celebrations are now celebrations of citizenship.
The prize is huge, but genuine – $15 thousand (or £10k/12k Euros) and there are just three eligible videos already entered, so there’s everything to play for.
With a current total of eight votes, Scott James of Influence People, a social media expert, uses his video to demonstrate that globalization is pervasive.
With 132 votes, eleven year old Rhys talks about global working in the context of his dream profession as a Formula One racing mechanic.
And currently leading the board, university student and global citizen Yehia Amar has 158 votes for his video offering perspectives on globalization.
There’s an old English expression: “The road to Hell is paved with good intentions”. Many people have expressed an interest in using the competition to try and raise money for a charity, to raise awareness for an issue, or to harness the opportunities for learning and development. Team that expression with the more ’pop culture’ one, “You have to be in it to win it”, and you know what you have to do!
Whilst training consultant John Bland can be caught up with in the UK this week, and Tim Mitchell will be in the Oregon area (USA), Vienna is the place to be this week if you want to catch up with most of the Global Integration senior team in person. Several of our senior team are working there together in the early part of the week.
If you’d like to take advantage of the fact that they’re close by to catch up, do reach out to them directly, or contact your closest regional office and we’ll make the arrangements for you.
Our Matrix Monday series summarises some of the limited literature available on matrix organizations. Today we summarize Challenges and Strategies of Matrix organisations [sic]: by Dr Thomas Sy and Laura Sue D’Annunzio (Human Resource Planning 28.1, 2005).
This paper defines five key challenges of the contemporary matrix organizational form and, following discussion of those, makes best practice suggestions for managers to help improve their matrix organizations. After gathering data based on surveys, workshops and interviews with 294 top-level and mid-level managers in multinational corporations in six industries, the authors identified the five challenges most likely to be present in a matrix structure as being:
1. misaligned goals;
2. unclear roles and responsibilities;
3. ambiguous authority;
4. a lack of a matrix guardian;
5. silo-focused employees.
An overview of what comprises the matrix organization is offered at the start, outlining the strengths - and weaknesses – of a matrix structure, before going on to look more closely at each of the identified challenges. The authors then confirm that the challenges faced by mid-level and top-level managers differ. As an example, top-level managers more often report a higher frequency of misaligned goals, where mid-level managers tend to report that a challenge they more frequently encounter is ambiguous roles and responsibilities.
To conclude, while the research does admit its own strengths and weaknesses, it notes that organizations often fight ‘complexity with complexity’: in order to win this particular battle, they must overcome the five identified challenges.
To find out more about Global Integration’s consultancy and training to help build the people capability to make complex organizations faster, less expensive to run and more satisfying to work in, please contact your closest regional Global Integration office. You might also enjoy our LinkedIn Matrix Management Group.
The competitors need your votes to get them into the top 20, although with just three qualifying entries all last minute entries stand a great chance of winning the cash. We are expecting something of a last minute rush if all of the entries promised materialize.
We’ve had lots of questions from entrants. These have been responded to and our Q&A pages updated, but in the interests of fairness, the questions are repeated below:
What exactly is the “public voting”? Is it Views or Likes on YouTube? Perhaps Likes on www.global-integration.com itself?
