Morrie the Toupee Salesman

One of the more pointless courses I took back in my B-School days was called “Organizational Theory.” It’s subject matter was org. charts, those tree and box diagrams that are ubiquitous in large organizations, and its focus was mostly on the decisions made by the person at the top of the charts (the CEO). It went into endless, tedious detail about whether the next level down from that CEO should be divided functionally (i.e. VP, Finance, VP, Operations, VP, Human Resources), by product (VP, Widget1, VP, Widget 2, VP, Widget 3) or by geography (VP, Europe, VP, North America, VP, Asia). At the time, while I was aware that job description, title, and role were central to my perception of what I was, and how satisfied with my job, I didn’t connect that with the course material.

Having worked in a few companies since then, and especially at startups, where the promise of influencing the direction of the company is so palpable (especially when you’re there from day 1, like at digg), I’ve become more aware of how important the design of an organization is. Not as a static chart dictated from the top, but as a living, progressing organism made up of people with goals and ambitions, trying to balance all the various aspects of their personal and work lives, that changes as those people change, and leave, and new people arrive. Certainly my disenchantment at digg began with an organizational decision communicated by someone I thought of as a friend previous to the decision (and the communication of the reasoning behind it) and a complete hypocrite after. I probably should have left immediately after that (this was November 2006), but I stayed, for nearly a year after, lured by the promise of wealth (and with what one commenter has called the “fiasco” of the Series B financing soon after, it became obvious that that was just as illusory and just as full of hypocrisy).

So now, in somewhat of a leadership position, and in the final stages of making the first of what I hope to be many hires, I’m cognizant of the value of OT, especially in a fast growing company, where people get parachuted in at higher levels than people who have demonstrated hard work, and loyalty, and invest much of their life, and more of their dreams. It wasn’t the course material that sucked, it was the professor (who I’ll leave nameless). It’s not a lifeless chart communicated top-down by a detached leader at the top, but something driven by the efforts of everyone in an organization, and the way it evolves should reflect their efforts, goals and dreams.

Incidentally I got an A in the course. Boring, tedious courses also tend to be easy.