BOOK REVIEW: Reinventing organizations by Frederic Laloux (Is Marco Nussbaum running a - teal hotel organization-?)

Having read quite a few business and economics papers and books, I am first of all critical if someone claims to "reinvent" something. I have to admit, however, that this book is exciting to read from beginning to end. It really give food for thought and will cause you to challenge your current way of running your business.

Funnily, you also started to think of people, who run such "next generation organization" (called teal organization in the book). The name in the hotel industry, I came up with was Marco Nussbaum. Marco calls himself a CEO - Chief Enabling officer - which in a nutshell summarizes the central ideas of the book: Selfmanagement, Wholeness, Purpose. Not sure, if Marco is a pioneer without knowing it (like many of the CEOs/companies mentioned in the book). I will certainly ask him next time we meet.

here is an existing and well written review in case you want to learn more.

For me personally, I came up with the following takeaways

1. I think the principle outlined in the book are easiest to apply in the service industry, as you usually have direct customer feedback. Naturally, the hospitality industry would be a perfect candidate for it.
2. Also, if the author is right, our society will turn more "teal" and in particular young and highly qualified employees, will look for
• places with no to little hierachy-but strong principles of selfmanagement, 
• wholeness - being yourself, instead of turning into a "corporate servant" 
• Businesses with a strong purpose (in which purpose is much more than making profit)
3. Biggest challenge will be in consequence how far one can take the principles above in a traditional business organization. The book tries to answer the question, but bottom line the author is convinced that it either all or nothing.

STRATEGY - What's your Strategy for Managing Knowledge? (HBR 04/99, Hansen, Nohria, Tierney)

Summary (Link to text)

• This is a classic piece from 99', which gives you advice on which knowledge management stratgey is the right one for your company
• The authors distinguish between two generic strategies for managing knowledge:
• Codification, which relies on knowledge being codified into documents and made available primarily via databases
• Personalization, which aims at facilitating person-to-person communication of knowledge
• Why not do both - try to code knowledge as well as faciliate personal exchange? The authors claim, that trying to do both will lead to failure. Rather you need to choose your primary strategy and complement it with 20% of the secondary strategy. So if you choose codificiation 80% of you efforts should be aimed on implementing this strategy, while 20% should go into faciliating personal exchanges.
• Important is that your knowledge strategy needs to be aligned with your competitive strategy. The Following graph shows how two different breeds of consulting firms (strategy consulting vs. IT Consulting) would typically differ in their approach based on their different competitive strategies:

• Let us assume your market strategy is clear, how do you know which knowledge strategy is the right one? The authors recommend to look into three areas
• Do you offer standardized vs. customized products? Standardized products = Codification, Customized products = Personalization
• Do you have a mature or innovative product? Again, mature product = Codification
• Do your people rely on tacit or explicit knowledge to solve problems? Explicit knowledge can be codified, tacit knowledge cannot. 
• Who should take care of knowledge managment? The Author suggest an integrated approach between IT, HR and leadership of the company.

My Takeaways

• the creation of a strong knowledge management culture paired with strong people development is absolutely key in retaining talent. This is particular true for generation Z, which will pick and choose to stay in job as long as the learn (in order to capitalize on these learning at a later point of time)
• I also believe that most companies, and in particular Tech/Ecommerce companies will have strong tendencies to codify, using wikis, etc.. and all sort of codified documentation language. To have a deliberate discussion, on the benfits of codification and the limits, e.g. complex problem soliving, new product, should be an integrated leadership discussion
• Last, knowledge management and service excellence as well as sales excellence need to be tackled in a more integrated approach way. Key account manager with large customers will not succeed with codified knowledge given their personality as well as the need for customized solution. Handling customers complains at a service desk, on the other hand, will  benefit from codified knowledge, which might be found in templates or previous handled incidents.