6 Field-tested Steps to Restructure Your Team

Effective organizational structures help teams to perform beyond the sum of their parts. Before restructuring their team, leaders should be clear about what their current and desired organizational structure encompasses in terms of goals, roles, tasks, and processes used to organize the flow of work. This includes the underlying relationships and beliefs required to get work done on a day-to-day basis.  Can Restructuring Solve Your Problem? Periodically and for a variety of reasons, it makes sense to reorganize your team to unlock value or to fix a problem. While team reorganizations sound like a relatively fast and concrete way to solve complex problems, a recent McKinsey survey found that over eighty percent fail to deliver the desired benefits on schedule.   And teams that have been through a reorganization often report higher levels of stress, lower levels of productivity, and decreased levels of employee engagement.  So while structural change sounds like a smart way to improve collaboration, communication, and performance problems, team reorganizations are fraught with performance and people challenges. The Top Reasons to Reorganize Your Team As with any change, there is typically a specific catalyst that drives the need to restructure a team. The most common reasons reported by our clients include:  Realigning functions and people to new strategic directions Adapting to changes in leadership  Solving collaboration, communication, decision-making, or performance problems  Reducing costs  Refocusing priorities  Unlocking potential in terms of efficiency or effectiveness  Keeping up with the fast pace of external change  Aligning confusing or contradictory goals, roles, scope and success metrics Why Up to 80% of Team Reorganizations Fail Any reorganization upsets the status quo. And change is likely to be at least resisted and at worst feared and fought. Like most major corporate change initiatives, team reorganizations typically fail due to employee resistance driven by a combination of:   Lack of a compelling reason for the change  Unclear vision for success  Ambiguous or misaligned goals, roles, or success metrics  Contradictory cultural norms  Misaligned leadership Insufficient resources or capabilities  Inability to monitor progress and continuously improve Is your reorg set up to succeed?

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Founded in 1995, LSA Global is a leading performance consulting and training firm that helps high growth technology, services, and life-science companies create a competitive advantage by powerfully aligning their culture and talent with their strategy. Learn more about getting aligned