The Case for Training

"Intact Teams"

As Companies Become

Flatter and More Agile

with Elizabeth Doty & Anton McBurnie

What's the biggest trend in large organizations?

Large companies are moving away from their traditional hierarchical structure to one where “teams” are the primary producers of output. While a small hierarchy is retained at the very top, the rest of the organization structure is largely flat and composed of work teams.

As they flatten, businesses become more dependent on these smaller workgroup teams to self-manage projects, decisions, negotiations, communication, conflict-resolution, and the wide array of soft skills required to ensure effective functioning and the maintenance of “Intact Teams.”

This is where training comes in...

Given that in flatter and more agile organizations teams are the primary units of work, capacity-building, and change:

1. Training must adapt to the needs of the work teams
2. Designing and delivering programs based on the varying lifecycles of intact teams can significantly accelerate adoption and time to business impact, and in most cases...
3. The challenges raised by this approach are manageable and far outweighed by increased agility, reduced development workload and improved relationships with the business.

Learning Activities: