The Organization Design Guide

“This wonderful and academically rigorous book is based on the premise that companies which have a well-designed organization will be better able to implement their strategies and succeed in the market. It therefore develops a high quality, hands-on guide that enables senior executives to think through organization design issues in a structured and comprehensive way and so make the difficult organization design choices necessary for success. The book is clear, well-written and very practical since it is based on the authors’ extensive experience as consultants helping managers redesign their organizations. It should become essential reading for senior managers interested in designing their organizations for success.” Costas Markides, Professor of Strategy and Entrepreneurship and Holder of The Robert Bauman Chair in Strategic Leadership, London Business School “Turbulent times necessitate resilient organizations. Resilient organizations develop capabilities and models to redesign and reinvent themselves. The Organization Design Guide offers a welcome guidepost to that end. The authors provide excellent, up-to-date, hands-on guidance for this journey. A must-read for everyone involved in designing, structuring, and building resilient organizations.” Koenraad Debackere, Chairman of the Board of Directors, KBC Group “The Organization Design Guide is a must-read for managers and consultants interested in how to design organizations to improve their performance. Vantrappen and Wirtz are comprehensive in their treatment of dimensions of organizational design, including (de)centralization, lateral coordination, the corporate parent and technology. The authors convincingly argue that although the process of changing an organization’s design (aka change management) is useful, the substance of the change is paramount. The book does an excellent job of conveying the substance of organizational design by providing principles and examples from their experience.” Linda Argote, Thomas Lord Professor of Organizational Behavior and Theory, Tepper School of Business, Carnegie Mellon University “The authors have succeeded in providing a skillfully pragmatic guide that will enable executives to identify and address the truly critical and specific organizational challenges that hinder their companies from reaching their full potential.” Mohammad Abunayyan, Chairman of the Board of Directors, ACWA Power “Organizational design is one of the most common, badly done, and unnecessarily mystified exercises in business. The authors have done the business world a favor by laying out – comprehensively and simply – the choices leaders need to make to get it right.” Stephen Heidari-Robinson, Managing Director, Quartz Associates and co-author of Reorg: How to Get It Right “It is no secret: Successful companies combine an adequate organizational structure with top people and a top company culture. The authors’ playbook explains clearly and pragmatically how executives can score that hat-trick.” Willem Van Twembeke, Chief Executive Officer, Inkia Energy “Most companies and institutions face challenging transitions, and their leadership teams need to assess the impact of those transitions on organization design. This book provides a refreshing step-by-step approach to defining a future-proof organization design that supports the company’s strategic ambitions. It merges logic with hearts & minds, and demonstrates that culture and structure go hand in hand.” Rob Nijst, former Chief Executive Officer, VTTI “This book explains clearly what it takes to organize complex international businesses for success. It shows how to involve managers in creating clarity on structure, roles and responsibilities. It also recognizes the importance of periodically evaluating an organization’s maturity and taking it to the next level.” Dirk Beeuwsaert, former Executive Vice President, GDF SUEZ and Vice Chairman of the Board of Directors, AMEA Power “Smart executives will use and re-use this book. It goes into the fundamental drivers of organizational design and it provides a balanced perspective on alternative design solutions, enabling executives to effectively make organization choices starting from a solid understanding of the expected benefits and managerial room for manoeuvre.” Olivier Legrain, Chief Executive Officer, IBA “The authors’ comprehensive and pragmatic framework enables executives to clearly recognize the organizational challenges that really matter and then to orchestrate their teams toward devising and implementing design solutions that work.” Guy Richelle, former Chief Operating Officer, International Power plc and Chief Executive Officer of the Belgian Red Cross - Croix Rouge de Belgique