Thanks for your comment. Yes, I agree critical factors in any corporate system are leadership and accountability. If you design an organization to ensure that employees are assured a manager who can provide them leadership, then design can go along way toward driving success.

Part of that design must include explicitly specifying what I mean by the ability to provide leadership and a means for judging this ability. A total-system approach to managerial leadership and organization design will include this. Accountability and managerial leadership must be designed into the system.

Yes, I agree people must be accountable for the behaviors and actions, but managerers must be accountable for their direct reports’ output. This is yet another critical piece of systems design that drives success.

Regards,

Michelle

Whether an organization’s structure is a pyramid of heirarchy or a flat-land of shared responsibility, design won’t determine success. The critical factors in any coporate system are leadership and accountability. Without leadership (not to be confused with control) organizations easily lose focus, miss opportunities, and people develop attitudes of distrust and fear. Without accountability for one’s behavior and actions, people abuse the priviledges of leadership, organizations squander their resources, and in time, most of the company’s best talent will leave for a more challenging and more rewarding opportunity.