Do Organizations Really Want Holacracy Today? [POLL]
Estimated reading time: 2 minutes
I was in a meeting recently with a fellow consultant who said that their clients are looking to move toward holacracy. Honestly, I was a bit surprised. I haven’t heard the term in years.
Holacracy made headlines back in 2014 when Zappos decided they were going to move to this type of structure. Holacracy promotes flatter organizational hierarchies, distributed decision-making, and more self-management.
Don’t get me wrong, I have nothing against holacracy. But realistically, not every organization is a good fit for it nor does every organization want to put in the work to build a good foundation for it. Holacracy requires a lot of training and a redefining of organizational policies, procedures, and guidelines.
But for the organizations that do want holacracy, the benefits can be tremendous. Holacracy can foster more collaboration and teamwork, increase innovation and creativity, and ultimately reduce bureaucracy. All of which lead to greater profits.
Getting back to my comment at the beginning of this article, is it possible that organizations are looking for the benefits of holacracy without actually calling it such? Maybe I’m being too skeptical. I’m curious to know your thoughts.
Let’s do one of our quick, one-question HR Bartender polls. As always, your responses are completely anonymous.
I hope you’ll take the time to respond. We’ll leave the poll open for a couple of weeks and then report the results.
As HR professionals, the organization’s culture focus is important to our work. We talk about it during the recruiting process. It’s part of our employment brand. We also include it in training programs, whether the programs are in-person, online, or during one-on-one meetings. Organizational culture drives the employee experience and plays a key role in retention.
Thanks so much for participating in this poll. I think the results will be very interesting.
Image captured by Sharlyn Lauby while exploring the streets of Los Angelas, CA
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