Complexity Science


Blog A633 3.4 –

Reflect on your own organization's strategy or an organization that is familiar to you.  How has it evolved over time? Discuss each stage of development and how feedback and strategy formulation have changed over time. Consider the next steps in your company's evolution and describe what it will look like in 10 years and where you will be.

I have begun to see a shift with Boeing Training & Professional Service, ever so slightly, in terms of feedback influencing strategy formulation.  While there’s general acknowledgement and agreement that we “need to be nimble” and “evolve”, the structure and mindset of leadership is not always in alignment or receptive to such demands. 

Based upon Obolensky (2014), Boeing is still finishing it’s conversion into a cross-functional matrix from the functional silo’s model.  However some smaller or specialized groups remain in a silo structure due to specialized or classified nature of the work statement. 

To be frank, this shift in organizational structure was long overdue but only occurred due to a change in leadership.  The prior CEO was of an older generation that practiced a more traditional operation that was hierarchical, whereas the current CEO is younger and more accepting of these newer organizational structures.  Because Boeing is in a commercial aircraft duopoly along with a relatively limited number of defense contractors, the structural disadvantages likely did not manifest themselves readily and persisted as the silo structure continued. 

Not until the change in leadership occur did a true matrix structure emerge, complete with “verticals & horizontals” that were previously defense or commercial divisions that never interfaced.  It has brought about a good measure of learning with some of these newly constituted groups, but the benefits of specializing tasks (horizontals) across the enterprise (verticals) has driven each group to understand and perform their task more completely.

Where things will be in ten years is hard to say.  Getting such a large enterprise such a Boeing to make such a change is hard enough as so many factors are needed.  An entire generation of leadership had to retire and be replaced by the right kind of people.  The business needs had to be properly identified, humility to admit where we needed to be better, focus on maintaining our product goals, all had to come together at the right time to for this to happen.  And were still far, far away from a CAS model.  I would hope that CAS type model could be achieved, but only if it makes our products better. 

Obolensky, N. (2014). Complex adaptive leadership. (2nd edition.). London, UK: Gower/Ashgate

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