Why hierarchy?

A hierarchical structure shows a clear set of relationships between the people in an organisation, a set of relationships in which someone's authority derives from their place in the hierarchy. The more authority, the higher the position in the organisation and the smaller the number of roles that carry it. A hierarchy therefore often takes the shape of an inverted pyramid. The greatest advantage of a hierarchy is the clarity it provides.
Existing hierarchies are changing very quickly, though. Top-down management of organisations, where what needs to happen is imposed from above, is making way for something more bottom-up. And there are sound reasons for that.

Why is hierarchy disappearing from organisations?

More and more organisations are organising themselves differently. The first image above, 'how things were', shows a hierarchical organisation. A few years ago, organisations still worked this way, governed top-down. The second image, 'how things are', shows the change many organisations are going through right now. The hierarchy we were used to is steadily disappearing and organisations increasingly work in teams. There is still structure, in the form of managers who lead those teams. The third image, 'how things work', shows where many organisations are heading. Hierarchy almost disappears entirely and people work in a network of teams. Each team works on a shared project with a shared goal. In this way of working together the team is central and there is far less hierarchical leadership. Responsibility sits with the team, and continuous feedback between people is enormously important. Working this way makes the organisation much flatter, more agile and far more open to innovation.

How do you move from hierarchy to self-managing teams?

In a self-managing team leadership is shared. All members of the team are equals and divide the work between them, which means there is little or no hierarchical leader. That does not mean there is no hierarchy at all. There is certainly leadership in a self-managing team, but of a different kind. Everyone leads their own specialism.
It can come across as though this way of working is less binding. Nothing could be further from the truth. The control a manager traditionally had has been replaced by self-control and by the control of the team.
The team works from a shared assignment, a shared goal. Everyone contributes from their strengths. So it is important that you understand your own strengths and that others can find you on them. On top of that, team meetings review where things stand very frequently. Where are we, and are we still on track? If your contribution is not what was agreed or expected, it will be corrected quickly.
It will come as no surprise that insight into competencies, working with 360-degree feedback and working with goals form an important foundation. The Treams platform brings all of this together. Add the optional role of a coach in the platform and you have everything you need to make self-management fly.