Improving Cooperation
Improving the Cooperation among Units of the Organization
During our work as consultants we often experience that individual organizational units function in isolation from each other and primarily focus on their own partial tasks. This means departments do not assist each others’ work as much as they could. There is insufficient cooperation and communication among corporate units which, if projected over the entire organization, results in sub-optimization and entropy.Sub-optimization is among the most common organizational problems, and one of the most significant causes of operating losses. This is because the optimum of parts never yields the optimum of the entire system.
- Certain corporate problems can only be resolved through the coordinated cooperation of relevant experts from several organizations. In such cases a preliminary analysis can be followed by devising programs with specific, measurable aims, ie shortening of lead times, reduction of stock volumes, improvement of cost efficiency etc.
- No matter what kind of structure an organization has (functional, divisional, matrix or project), certain tensions between organizational units are structurally encoded within the system, e.g. tension between sales and marketing, between development and manufacturing, between the financial department and other functional units, and so forth. Such tensions can only be alleviated through conscious, well thought-out actions, projects and programs.
Thus with preliminary situation analysis and with systematic work we can reduce sub-optimization. Major tools in this process are cross-functional programs, which not only provide solutions to a specific problem as well as a shared experience to all participants, but are also an empirical learning opportunity in the field of cooperation and competition.