Formalized operations need not be complicated

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Some time ago, I had a sharp disagreement with someone about the advantages and disadvantages of formal organization and, beyond that, formalized operating procedures.

My interlocutor argued that businesses were dying because they were too formal, leading to complication, demotivation and loss of accountability.

As for me, I supported the idea that excessive flexibility without formalization was at least as great a risk as over-formalization, since it could leave people without any reference points or guidelines.

In fact, if we don’t agree, I think it’s a matter of vocabulary and knowing where to place the cursor.

For me, formalization means above all “writing down how things are done”.

I’ve been through the throes of a business with an almost exclusively oral culture, which I formalized in writing to deal with several problems.

First of all, when a newcomer asked “how do I do this?”, they sometimes got two or three different versions, depending on who they asked, in a context where the number of employees to be integrated was growing and the number of “knowers” who embodied the company’s knowledge was tending to diminish due to a natural turn-over caused by seniority (The knowledge base: a lifeline for your employees). And let me tell you, when it came to remote onboarding during COVID, it was a lifesaver, despite a very successful mentoring program.

Secondly, because there was a lot of room for improvement, but to start asking how things could be done better, and even in collaborative mode (I’d say especially), you need to be able to write down the current situation to share a common view and then challenge it.

But like him, I was allergic to complication (The organizational complication: the #1 irritant of the employee experience).

That’s where the misunderstanding came in: the question is how formal to be , because I think that formalizing is not stifling but liberating.

In any case, I think it’s worth continuing the debate here, and I’d be delighted to hear your opinions.

The heavy legacy of the manufacturing world

When we talk about processes, operations and formalism, we come up against a quasi-historical cognitive bias, because we’re talking about concepts that come from the world of manufacturing, where the preoccupation was to “replicate perfection ad infinitum“, with all the rigidity that this could demand, at least at one time.

But it’s not difficult to understand that the service economy and the world of knowledge have other constraints that must lead us to rethink and adapt these concepts.

Here I can’t help but illustrate my point, as I do every time I broach the subject, with the words of Peter Drucker.

““ Peter Drucker pointed out that, over the course of the 20th century, the productivity of manual workers in the manufacturing sector increased fiftyfold, as we became smarter about how best to build products. He argued that the knowledge sector, by contrast, had barely begun a similar process of self-examination and improvement, existing at the end of the twentieth century while manufacturing had been a hundred years earlier.”

Peter Drucker noted that over the course of the 20th century, the productivity of manual workers in manufacturing increased fiftyfold as we became smarter about how best to build products. He argued that the knowledge sector, on the other hand, had barely begun a similar process of self-examination and improvement, existing at the end of the twentieth century while the manufacturing sector had been a hundred years earlier.”

The Newyorker – Slack Is the Right Tool for the Wrong Way to Work

We’re still a long way from that, even if, as we’ll see later, some recent studies do exist, and even the old Deming recipes are adaptable (Let’s talk about the quality of work).

And speaking of the industrial world, even it realizes that ultra-compliance no longer works, and that a customer-oriented, perhaps more flexible approach is needed (Why Traditional Quality Is Failing You).

The absence of formalization does not mean adaptability

Let’s start by dispelling a common misconception: formal organizations are rigid, while non-formal ones are adaptable.

In fact, both can be equally rigid or equally adaptable.

Let’s take, as I said, the example of a business with a strong oral culture. The lack of formalism doesn’t mean that it’s adaptable, it just means that the way of doing things isn’t shared and known by everyone , or not with the right level of detail.

There’s only one way of doing things, and everyone’s supposed to follow it, but it’s not well known.

On the other hand, a formal organization can be adaptable.

Formalization can be a framework for creativity

Imagine a business where nothing is formalized. Each person, each team, does as they please, inventing their own rules as they go along, even reinventing them every day. This may be appealing in terms of adaptability and resilience, but it comes at a cost: wasted time, misunderstandings and immense energy wasted reinventing the wheel instead of moving forward.

And I won’t go back over the subjects linked to the transmission of the most basic knowledge internally.

On the other hand, formalizing doesn’t mean locking people into a system, or rather, it can be something else. You can define a clear framework and allow autonomy within that framework. You can even formalize best practices, which are not compulsory but are a tips from which you can draw inspiration to know what to do when faced with an unknown situation, a sort of toolbox.

In fact, flexibility can be formalized by explicitly stating the red lines that must not be crossed, and what falls within the autonomy of the employee, who is given advice and suggestions, but not a prescription.

This can even be a refuge for managers who are a little too focused on control: they focus on controlling the system and not the people, and in so doing, they free them (How to love control and not be a burden to yourself and your teams?).

And it’s not just a question of formalization, but also of who has control over it. You can formalize things and give employees the right to make them their own, and take power over them to adapt them to each situation (Employees must follow the processes. Are you sure?).

“”“ For many years, most operations management research has treated people in operating systems as fixed, immutable or exogenous entities. However, this assumption is increasingly being challenged, particularly with the rise of service and knowledge-intensive businesses, where workers and/or customers have a fundamental impact on operational outcomes.Research in the field of People Centric Operations focuses on the operational importance of the interaction of people (workers, customers, or both) with and/or within an operational system.

““For many years, most research in Operations Management (OM) has treated people in operating systems as fixed, unchanging, or exogenous entities. However, this assumption has been increasingly challenged, particularly with the rise of service and knowledge-intensive businesses where workers and/or customers fundamentally impact operational outcomes. Research in PCO focuses on the operational significance of having people (workers, customers, or both) interacting with and/or within an operational system. 

(People-Centric Operations: Achievements and Future Research Directions)

Formalization is not complication

A common mistake is to confuse “formalization” with “bureaucracy”. It doesn’t mean adding unnecessary layers of documentation or creating barriers at every stage. On the contrary, it means focusing on what’s essential. What are the objectives? What is everyone’s role? What are the critical processes that guarantee quality, compliance or safety?

Having set up a continuous improvement program with simplification as its primary goal, and in a collaborative mode at that (Improving a team’ s work: a story of continuous improvement), I can tell you that nothing would have been possible without formalizing the situation we wanted to get out of , in order to establish a consensus on the problem to be solved and provoke reactions and contributions.

And the new operating methods that were put in place needed to be formalized, even if it meant formalizing the employee’s autonomy, otherwise they wouldn’t have been in their comfort zone when it came to changing their way of doing things. It’s as if we had written “I have the right to do things differently, I have the right to do things in my own way and take initiatives within these limits”, so that they could take advantage of it in front of others.

And in an organization with an oral culture, there’s nothing worse than having two different operating modes coexisting, the old and the new, when not everyone knows which is the right one (real-life situation).

Good formalization must therefore be uncluttered. It must be based on minimal but essential, non-negotiable rules, with freedom for everything else.

People power over processes

When processes are poorly defined or absent, employees often feel powerless in the face of new problems and situations. And don’t think that this frees them up to be innovative: on the contrary, it blocks them. When everything is possible, we don’t know what to choose, and we’re not sure that all choices are authorized.

On the other hand, clear formalization enables them to understand, as we have seen, the rules of the game, what is non-negotiable and what they can dare to do, and also to contribute to improving things. They can identify what works and what doesn’t (and are in the best position to do so), suggest improvements, and above all, focus on what really matters.

This is where the “people-centric” dimension of operations comes into its own. Rigid processes imposed from above are often poorly accepted, poorly understood, and sometimes even totally inappropriate.

On the contrary, we need to work with the employees who use them on a day-to-day basis to co-construct them. In fact, I often say that a process that is seen as a burden and not as a service is a problem.

There’s no better approach to change management than upstream conconstruction (Change and transformation need a new approach).

Formalization as a simplification tool

Well thought-out formalization doesn’t add weight, it eliminates it. It saves time by avoiding ambiguity, unnecessary questioning and the search for information.

But to free up time, you need to be disciplined: regularly evaluate processes, remove what has become obsolete, and above all, keep in mind that the aim is not to control everything, mobilize collective intelligence to constantly improve, and make the improvement process exist in people’s minds alongside the day-to-day work…

For me, formalization is not a return to rigid, hierarchical organizations. On the contrary, I’m in favor of a balanced approach: setting a clear framework that gives freedom to individuals, while ensuring that energy is directed towards what really matters, and that red lines are well protected.

Image: Complication by lassedesignen via Shutterstock..

Bertrand DUPERRIN
Bertrand DUPERRINhttps://www.duperrin.com/english
Head of People and Business Delivery @Emakina / Former consulting director / Crossroads of people, business and technology / Speaker / Compulsive traveler
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