Hierarchy as a factor of organizational complication
When we talk about pyramids, we’re of course talking about the hierarchical pyramid, which is the culprit behind so many ills, including bureaucracy and the excessive complication of organizations , which means that as soon as a new subject arises, the width of the base is increased, which mechanically increases the height of the top, with the quasi-mechanical addition of managerial layers (How to Manage Complexity without Getting Complicated).
It’s easy to criticize, but it’s not so much the pyramid that’s to blame as the way in which it’s getting out of control, and is no longer a tool in the service of the organization (determining responsibilities, decision-making and efficient information feedback) but an objective that contributes to making it heavy and cumbersome.
That’s the problem: hierarchy doesn’t cause bureaucracy by its very nature, but because it’s poorly managed, and it’s still necessary: most businesses that have tried to live without it have failed (Why it is impossible to have a company without hierarchy). This also closes the debate on the supposed uselessness of managers (Is manager still a profession?)
Let’s keep in mind, then, that hierarchy is just one way of apprehending responsibility , but should not dictate the way we work (An organization that is inconsistent with the way we work. Irritant #6 of the employee experience)/
Turning the pyramid upside down to better serve employees
The question of how the pyramid can serve employees rather than be a burden to them is nothing new, and dates back to the 1970s.
The idea originally came from Robert Greenleaf, who developed and popularized the concept of servant leadership, a philosophy that reverses the traditional vision of leadership. In this approach, the leader’s role is to serve others before seeking to be served, notably by putting the needs of employees, teams and the organization before his or her own.
It’s an idea born of his observation of the professional world after a long career at AT&T, where he saw that leaders often emphasized power, authority and top-down decision-making. For him, this often led to inefficient organizations, where employees were demotivated or disengaged.
Hence the idea of the inverted pyramid, with the employee at the top, management in the middle and leaders at the bottom.
Where does the customer fit into the inverted pyramid?
Some, but not all, representations of the inverted pyramid put the customer above the employee, but only by way of illustration. The customer is at the top of the pyramid, but not in it, and besides, all the businesses that try to implement the concept limit themselves to a purely internal vision.
For me, it’s essential to include the customer in the pyramid, not above it but inside it, so that he’s part not only of the pyramid but of all the thinking that goes on around it.
This may seem like purely conceptual thinking, but it can be essential to the adoption of the concept, or even simply to convince management that this is the way forward.
I was confronted with this in the context of an employee experience initiative aimed at putting management back at the service of the employee (Management. Irritant #9 of the employee experience).
The customer at the top of the pyramid and at the heart of the employee experience
It will come as no surprise to learn that this type of approach can be met with reluctance by people for whom it does not come naturally, and who have a certain vision of the exercise of power in business (No, authority is not an outdated notion in the workplace).
I drew up a fairly complete model listing what was expected of managers in the service of their employees, of executives in the service of their managers and of the business as such (support functions) in relation to everyone else (Do you have a delivery model for management?)
But there was something missing: I knew I wasn’t going to be able to convince the last reluctant ones without breaking out of the traditional servant leadership model, even if it meant hacking it up a bit.
In a business with a very financial culture, where we swear by Saint EBITDA, the solution was simple: start with the customer.
Start with the customer and add a layer: what is expected of the employee who has to serve the customer, and then align everything else with that.
This had a first virtue: it removed a certain number of ideas that seemed good on the face of it, but in fact did nothing to serve the customer. I called them my “executive whims”, and in the end it was a rather healthy exercise in transparency when I had to explain why.
But its main virtue was to get the last holdouts on board: how can one say no to something that will ultimately contribute to customer satisfaction? It’s not a tenable position, so it didn’t stick.
It also definitively established that employee experience is not a support function but a business function…
Bottom line
Reversing the pyramid doesn’t just mean repositioning management to serve employees, but also including the customer at the center of our thinking. Placing the customer at the heart of the organizationaligns employees, managers and executives on a common goal: customer satisfaction. This approach overcomes internal resistance and shows that the employee experience is a strategic function, essential to the overall performance of the business.
Image : reversed pyramid de Salvador Maniquiz via Shutterstock
