HOW TO DECENTRALIZE TOP-DOWN
TO ACCOUNTABLE TEAMWORK PROCESSES
According to Mark Twain: The secret of getting ahead is to get
started. The secret of getting started is breaking your complex and
overwhelming tasks into small manageable tasks and then starting on
the first one.
It is in the human nature to be self-centred and manage their tasks
in an ad hoc manner. Many people would go about tasks based on
undefined conceptual or presumed self-ability, leadership quality
without being concerned with accountability or implementation work
processes or teamworks.
Self-centredness has been identified as the primary cause of
malpractices by the Asian Financial Crisis and the mammoth
corporate shenanigans in the aftermath.
Today despite the many corporate malpractices as unveiled by Enron
or World-com collapses management practices remain self-serving and
conceptual. Too university management courses are teaching
conceptual ad hoc and self-centred management approaches: e.g.
Neurological systems, Management-by-objective, Taylorism, FAYOL,
Standard Operating Procedures (ISO), Organization theory etc. Most
of these concepts are too centred on personal abilities, abstract
and cannot be applied to actual work performance to attain
results.
Today, the fast-paced globalised knowledge-based environment has
made it increasingly difficult for a few men at the helm to oversee
every major decision or their implementation. The abilities of a
few are too slow and inept to adapt and reach to changes in all
fields from human psychological motivation to technological
renewals and upgrading. Problems get bogged down or locked in while
everyone will be pretending all is well with policies or decisions
when inefficiencies are affecting all in slow attrition.
On the other hand, it is increasingly proven that complex problems
are performed in established work processes with coordination and
knowledge application by all staff as demonstrated in many
computerized business applications. Everyone is capable of leading,
being motivated and appy knowledge irrespective of the level of
management not just the top management personnel.
Leadership and talent or its allied meritocracy are simply too
self-serving and individualistic to produce such
process-organizational efficiency or economic
competitiveness.
Therfore all the conceptual general management are insufficient to
produce competitiveness and are making no difference to material
results except for look-good public relation.
Such general conceptual management concentrate on decision making
often at the expense of implementational coordination corrections
and adaptation and teamwork.
Results on the other hand will not be realized until everyone in
the whole team is just as capable in making good decision and
implementing them with coordination and knowledge
application.
Hence traditional approach in management fails to delegate or
empower the team and consequently unable to meet with the demands
of changing conditions or technological environment in the new
age.
Newer management approach will have to increase implementation
emphasis by establishing follow-through process steps such as : (1)
Study of Ideas, (2) Enquiry, (3) Securing Contracts and (4)
Contract Administration (Operations).
The first three steps are macro-level decision steps while the last
step, namely contract administration (esablished often in project
management core activities) which will allow proper follow-through
of tasks in structured departments to coordinate all functional
departments as follows:-
]1.(General) 2.(Human Resource) 3.(Revenue) 4.(Accounts)
5.(Marketing) 6.(Services-outsourced activities) 7.(Facility)
8.(Enforcement) 9. (Production) 10.(Compliance).
Although the functional departments names vary in practice there is
no reason not to structure them functionally along the above-stated
lines for all individual businesses for the purpose of maintaining
integrity of process and follow-through departmental delegation and
two-way communication, coordination and knowledge application the
major part of process management.
Whether a business is governmental or non-governmental, overall
functional departments are as a whole functionally the same as
stated in the foregoing from the point of attaining follow-through
organizational efficiency or economic competitiveness.
CORE ACTIVITIES AND PARAMETERS
Complex tasks can now be clearly structured and performed by all
departments with in-built coordination, consistency and focus
(primary factor of success) to realize economic
competitiveness.
A typical department can be set up for processing in attainable
work processes thus:-
1. Department Report (defining 3-4 core activities)
2. Assign 2-3 quality-time-cost parameters to each core
activity.
3. Process detailed tasks derived from each core activity
sequentially in time-based knowledge-application work forms.
Monitoring of tasks and reporting systems are now self-regulated by
generated quantifiable assessments:-: "1" for non-compliance of
parameter, "2" for compliance and "3" for excellence.
TRACKING OF PERFORMANCE THROUGH CALL CENTER
With tasks so standardized the organization is on the way to
establishing a call center to oversee tasks to attain coordination
and knowledge application by all in a two-way communication.
Variances or "1s' as communication to the call-centre are
self-corrected by all departments.
Level 1: Management Report (call centre)
Level 2- Department reports oversee operations giving variance
feedbacks.
Level 3 - Work forms - sequential knowledge application.
FINAL GOAL - ORGANIZATIONAL EFFICIENCY
Government services hence can be decentralised in integrated
parameter-defined accountable work processes while producing
information, feedbacks and results to citizens. Dont wait until it
is too late ?
