Category: Organization Design — a Collaboration Platform

Purpose & Function Setting out on the journey of organization design means consciously choosing to align all the parts of an enterprise.  The aim with this deliberate business solution is to ensure the organization’s strategic or competitive advantage—PURPOSE (why it exists) & FUNCTION (what tasks it does in service to its purpose—is delivered effectively and efficiently to its customer base.  Excellent customer service is directly correlated to whether or not these parts are aligned. Shared Experience Broadly speaking, all organizations share the same three parts: • a Social system—customer demands, rewards/recognition, people processes, ways of working, culture, strategy, value-creation activities) • a Technical system—structures, technologies, management/ coordination processes and systems • an Environmental system—geographic-social-political-economic trends surrounding and influencing the business Bringing this “whole system” into a design exercise can daunt even the best of multi-taskers, which is why a collaborative approach not only eases the brain strain and workload but also enriches creativity, innovation and engagement. Whole System Collaborative Design By collaboratively co-designing their entire enterprise, employees and managers learn how to best serve all their stakeholders not just for today’s circumstances but for future change as well.  Designing your enterprise’s collaboration platform creates the stable, agile foundation capable of surviving and thriving in the rapidly changing environment of the 21st century. Collaboration Platform

Organization Design & Development — Is DIY possible?

Like most of you, I have a list of summertime DIY projects waiting for my attention. As I conduct my research on each one of them, I either decide to proceed or to hire a professional. My decision to DIY…

Helen Maupin

Essential Skills for the 21st Century

As the decades pass with technology continuing to accelerate change and demand innovation, increasingly sophisticated skill training is required at younger and younger developmental ages. This was not so evident in my youth. As a 20-year old psychology student in…

Helen Maupin

When Is Enough, Enough?

In 2015, newly-elected Prime Minister Justin Trudeau named 15 women and 15 men to his cabinet. Unbelievably, the media questioned him as to why, and his simple response “Because it’s 2015”, made international headlines and lit up social media. Trudeau’s…

Helen Maupin

Deep Collaboration — Have You Covered Your 4 Bases?

During my early work career, authority and control were still operational skills for organizational leaders, which was the main reason I opted for self-employment.  Frankly, working in autocratic hierarchical organizations of that day was paramount to having one’s creative flame…

Helen Maupin

Internal Issues — 2017’s Top Corporate Challenges

In both informal surveys and more rigorous data samples, corporations today report their greatest problems arise from internal issues. In particular, three challenges — alignment, systems and cooperation — top the list of a number of executives across multiple industries.…

Helen Maupin

Turf to Trust — Co-creating an “I to We” Shift

Image 2115105 © Andrey Semenov | Dreamstime.com In light of what I view as fear-based American politics and propaganda, apparently, the emotional war between the ego’s desire for turf and the heart’s desire for trust is in full swing. Another way of interpreting this…

Helen Maupin

Optimal Decision Making — Integrating Intuition and Intellect

Donald Trump, real-estate mogul and newly-elected American President, has been touted as opportunistic and unpredictable by more than just the media. Both traits are common to many entrepreneurs whose modus operandi for achieving results is get an idea, act; get…

Helen Maupin

Virtuous Organizations Love People and Use Things

People were created to be loved. Things were created to be used.  The reason the world is in chaos is because things are being loved and people are being used.     Unknown If we did a global poll on the above quotation,…

Helen Maupin

Dos and Don’ts to Make Your Business Fit the 21st Century

If your business feels like it’s stuck in the past, now is the best time to modernise it. Every time you put off work that needs to be done, you halt your business’s progress. That’s no way to run your…

Helen Maupin

Vanquish External Business Risks to Achieve Internal Harmony

We’ve all heard businesses being compared to well-oiled machines, which alludes to the idea that great and happy businesses exist because of their underlying culture. However, how you deal with external challenges is what creates that internal harmony in business.…

Helen Maupin