Most companies, especially larger ones, tend to see cutting down the number of employees as the first solution, or so it often seems. Luckily more and more companies are really investigating all the possibilites to their disposal to decrease internal loss and increase revenue. The question is, are they really doing everything they can? I’m convinced that this is not the case, often far from it.

The bigger the company, the more abstract the employees become. At my time at Ericsson it could really be felt that we’re all just small pieces of a very large puzzle. Like tiny cogwheels we turn and do our work, without anyone looking down and seeing the actual wheels turning. Employees are seen as assets, not as organs in a living body. Luckily some companies are not like that. Family and smaller companies are much closer and integrated into all employees and the hierarchy is naturally much flatter. But does that mean they can cope with and respond to economical crises better? True they’re more flexibel, but also more vulnerable. Small companies are not flexible in the right places. Most people have very specific roles and shrinking the number of employees has greater consequences that in larger companies. But what is it that small companies have that larger companies don’t and how can they get it?

The answer lies in the flatter hierarchy and feeling of familiarity. Like is said, small companies are tighter and employees work closer together, especially in a family business. This results in more communication. Everyone has ideas, opinions and questions and everyone communicates about this. Larger companies have separate departments and people tend to only communicate with their collegues. Having people communicate more externally, within the company, channels need to be available and open. Ericsson has been attempting this by creating communities with blogs, forums and a knowledge base. These communities seem to be succesful and people are communicating outside their department. There’s still a problem though… People stay within their area of expertice and interest. If a company really wants to innovate and start to produce a steady stream of ideas, commitment and a sense of belonging people need to interact with all disciplines. Like all organs in a body work together to keep it healthy, so should all employees work together to keep the company healthy. Organs produce or interact with hormones to send signals, employees should communicate and be motivated to interact with everyone and every department.

Source: www.utexas.edu

This is where I’d like to introduct the contept of Intracorporeal ThinkTank (or just Corporate ThinkTank). Larger companies, like Ericsson, have special units that come up with new ideas that are analysed, tested, produced and hopefully eventually published (made available to customers). But unfortunately these ThinkTanks are often filled with specialists in a specific field. Like software architects or business gurus.

When a decision is made “in the ivory tower” everyone always has an opinion, but nobody seems to listen. What I suggest is forming a corporate ThinkTank that’s cross discipline — Just as ideal Scrum teams should be — and dedicated to producing ideas and solutions usable by the company or it’s employees. I state “or it’s employees” since not all ideas have to be sellable, an idea that enhances internal processes or increases employee satisfaction would also result in a higher productivity. The ideal ThinkTank could comprise of people from all departments in the company, from administrative, production to support and from multiple levels in the hierarchy. From multiple levels in the hierarchy means having supervisors and their staff mixed in the same team. Each person in the ThinkTank should be considered equal, since they’re all part of the same team with a common goal. It’s important here to make sure the people chosen to be part of the ThinkTank understand that the success of the company has a higher priority than their own ambitions. One or two persons from each department that are commited to the ThinkTank would result in a mixture of dialogues and discussions that would inevatably lead to better processes, higher employee satisfaction, commitment, productivity and ultimately in higher customer satisfaction and Return on Investment. The ThinkTank would ideally work in an Agile way, quickly adapting to needs and changes, with short iteration cycles and quick delivery of ideas and solutions. Every person in the ThinkTank from each department would be a representative of his/her department, thus requiring communication within the department. The communication with the ThinkTank representative, providing quick feedback, would cause all employees to feel more involved and become more enganged in the welfare of the company. (Knowing that the “idea box” is a group of people you know and not a letterbox covering a black hole enables all employees to feel more engaged.) Inviting people with ideas into the ThinkTank for an iteration or rotating people on a regular basis will also increase the overall engagement. This means that people with ideas don’t just send a e-mail to their respective ThinkTank representative, but that they can be a part of the ThinkTank for an iteration and be actively involved in working through his own idea.

I’m lucky to be working at Steria (Sweden) at the moment. This company works hard in making all it’s employees feel engaged in the entire company, yet some parts still seem blurred. I’m hoping into motivating people into forming a ThinkTank — even just thinking about the possibility is a step forward — and getting the departments intraconnected. Since Steria is getting more and more enganged into Scrum and improving internal processes, a corporate ThinkTank would be ideal, especially since the coprorate atmosphere already allows for a lot of feedback from all employees.