Ep 81 – Key Considerations for Proposing a New Team Structure as a Manager

Hello, and welcome to this week's episode.

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Today, we are talking about how you can

propose a new team structure as a manager,

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because we know that as a leader, as a

manager, you're going to be in a situation

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at some point in your career where you

are asked to propose a new team structure.

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And for most people, this is going to send

them into a tailspin of where do I start?

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How do I do this?

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This is not something that as a

leader or a manager we do on a daily,

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weekly, even monthly or yearly basis.

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This is usually something that is

very much a one off unless it's

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an area that you're working in.

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What we're going to do today is we're

going to unpack all of this and we

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actually came about this episode

because Jackie had a client who

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was going through this very thing.

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So what we're going to do is we're

going to quiz Jackie on exactly

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what happened on that call.

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And you can basically start to think

about what you would do if you were in

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that situation where you as a leader

or a manager needed to restructure or

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create a new structure for your team.

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Jackie, where do we start with this?

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What are the considerations that we need

to think about before we get into this?

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So I think, like you say, this is

something that very often comes

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up at a point in time where you

then suddenly realize, hang on,

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I'm not prepared, I don't know.

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For me, this happened when I was promoted

to my first leadership role and The

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business was a growing business, so

we'd increase the size of the team,

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would increase the capacity of the team.

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And I was then asked by the CEO

to propose a different structure.

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So growth is one area that can

cause it, and that can come from

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Organic growth of the business.

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It can come from mergers and acquisitions.

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But it also can come up in

situations that are not as positive.

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When a company needs downsize restructure,

when there are, the potential for

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roles being at risk of redundancy.

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So there are often a lot of emotional

factors that come into play and certainly

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on the call that you're talking about

where this was happening for a client

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was this whole thing of, Oh, it's the,

it was a positive circumstance for the

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business that they were in, but equally,

then it's I know that this is going to

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have an impact on my team and I know it's

going to have an impact on some of the

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roles and maybe what people enjoy doing.

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And I don't know either how to logically

think about what structure there needs

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to be, but also then how do I factor

in the people stuff as part of that?

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So I think, both of those are really key.

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Yeah.

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And I think that's the thing is now,

because sometimes it can be a really

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positive situation and sometimes it

can be a really daunting and stressful

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situation, and I think as long as you've

got a process and framework to work with

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and you know what to think about, it will

just make that whole thing a lot easier.

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Where do you start?

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What are the first things

that you need to do?

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So I think the first thing you really

need to do is understand what is

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the brief that you've been given

because very often people will just

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be asked, can you have a thought

about, can you propose a structure?

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Can you suggest how things could be?

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And I think very often when

that's the case, if you're not

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familiar with this situation.

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The temptation is to think

about the relatively short term.

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It's to think about, okay, if for example,

it's a merger and acquisition, we might

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have, several businesses and now we're

going to, bring them under one roof.

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Do, how do we do that?

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And what I say to people is first thing

to always do is to think about what are.

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What is going to be the shape of the

business and what will that impact

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on the structure that's needed over

the sort of mid to longer term?

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So if for example, it is a

merger and acquisition situation,

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then what will that look like?

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Is this a business that's going to

continue to grow in that way and

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is going to have to integrate more

different things in the future?

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Is that part of the strategy?

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The business strategy, if the business is

growing its own revenue and not looking

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at mergers or acquisitions, but is

looking at, increasing and very ambitious,

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that was the situation that I was in.

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And I was heading up customer

services at the time.

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For, from an operational

perspective, every.

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2 million or 5 million that

we were growing in revenue

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that was on the business plan.

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That then meant that we needed more people

and there was more stuff that needed

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to be dealt with in customer service.

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So it's understand the ambition and kind

of the intent over the mid to longer term.

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And equally, if it is a situation

where potentially, a business has been

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contracting and has been reducing, it can

then also be about, okay, and do we feel

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like this is where, we need to cut once

and cut quite tight so that we can then

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get back to profitability and then we can

aim to grow again, or is this perhaps a

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kind of more gradual thing of, we just

need to get through the next few months

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and then hopefully we can get back to it.

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So it's really understanding what

is it that you're designing a longer

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term structure for and what will that.

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Business in, three, four, five years,

what will that structure need to be then?

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And I think if you start from that place,

you often get quite different answers than

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just, here's a piece of paper, potentially

whip up a team structure and have some

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ideas on what would improve it for now.

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I think that's a really

good point, isn't it?

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Because in the past, when I've been

involved with things like this, it's

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very much about what do we need now?

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What is going to drive

the business forward now?

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And it's very, Rare that people

think ahead and think where do

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we want the business to be in

like five years or 10 years?

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And how does this structure affect

that progress moving forward?

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And I think one of the key things

that I like to do, and we mentioned it

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before we started recording was just

finding out about what what, where

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people have been and what experience

they've got, because a lot of the time

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you've got really good people sat within

your teams that have got these huge

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skill sets that you just don't know.

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What they can and can't do that.

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They're doing a specific job because

that's what you've employed them for.

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But a lot of the time, there's a

lot more to the person isn't that.

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And I think you were saying about like

their career stories and their career

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goals, like asking people about that.

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It's a great opportunity, isn't it?

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To really lean into that and

just find out, what you can do.

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What can people do?

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What other skills have they got?

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What do they want to do?

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Where do they see themselves?

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Because sometimes that can really affect

the team structure corner as well.

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Yeah, absolutely.

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And this is where the balance comes in.

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So I think, once you know what

you're designing for the future, you

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then have to look at the existing.

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Current picture, because you're

effectively what you're doing with

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your, the structure that you're

proposing is starting to build the

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bridge to get from the structure that

we currently have to the structure

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that is going to be needed at that

given point longer term in the future.

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So you need to assess and understand

what is the current workload.

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So we did the episode on the impact

effort matrix, which was about balancing

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strategic and operational workload,

and that's a really good framework

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that can come into play here of

understanding within this team, what

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are the things that need to be done?

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What are the things that need to happen?

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What are the things that

need to be delivered?

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Understanding with the team that

we currently have and the degree of

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workload, how does that plot in terms

of what are the high impact things that

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we need to maintain during a transition

phase as we get to a new structure?

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And what are the things that

potentially might need to change?

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What workload might we be

able to automate or change?

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Does everything that's currently under

this team's remit need to still sit

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under this team's remit, or could there

be things that could potentially sit

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better elsewhere within the organization?

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And then like you say,

really understanding.

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So a skills matrix can be a great idea at

this point of really plotting out who have

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I got, what skills do they currently have?

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Because as you get to the point of

proposing the structure, what you're

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then going to need to do is understand

what might some of the gaps be.

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And part of what you're going to need to

propose is what might we need to do in

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terms of recruitment, what might we need

to do in terms of upskilling, what might

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we need to do in terms of consulting

with people around changes to their role.

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So you absolutely need to start with

real solid understanding of the existing

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workload, the existing requirements,

the existing team, but with that longer

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term view in mind of where do we need

to transition that to ultimately.

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Okay.

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Yeah, definitely.

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And I always love the

skills matrix exercise.

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I just always love uncovering

different things about the team

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that you really didn't know.

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And there are always lovely

conversations, aren't they?

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What can you really do this?

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Why didn't we know about this?

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Why have you never told us?

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And I think that is like probably

one of my favorite things about

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creating a new team structure.

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But in terms of looking at the logistics

of design and the structure and some

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of the real key questions that you

need to ask yourself and maybe, key

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stakeholders and other senior leaders

within the business like what are

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those questions that need to be asked.

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So beyond that point of what are we aiming

towards, you then also need to consider

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what is the organizational structure

and hierarchy like, what is in place in

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other teams within this business, and

do we need this structure to fit in.

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So some organizations will have, for

example, salary bandings or job grades.

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That will need to be accommodated

or equivalent to different

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functions or departments.

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So if that's the case,

you need to know that.

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And you need to be planning and

designing that from the start.

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So what else then?

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Is there anything else?

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Another area that I think is a real

interesting I'm interested actually in

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your experiences of this because I've

certainly considered it is thinking

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about the balance of specialization

versus generalization for roles.

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Because I think what can often happen

when you're proposing a structure and

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you've looked at that skills matrix and

you've thought about who have I got and

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how does that work, is there can be a

tendency to move towards specialization.

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But equally, you need to

really think about what might

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be the risks of doing that.

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And if somebody has got a really

specialized role and that knowledge

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and experience isn't shared or

understood within the team, then

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that can play present a risk.

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So you want people to have the degree

of specialization that allows them to

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be really effective and bring their

own kind of knowledge and skill set

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to bear, but you also want to make

sure that you're not doing that to the

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degree where there's such specialist

roles that if, for example, that

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person's on holiday or that person

were to hand their notice in, there's

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going to be massive panic stations.

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And I think finding that balance

can be a real challenge when

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you're proposing a structure.

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Yeah, definitely.

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And I've seen that myself as well.

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And I think if that's where you do really

need to look into what, you need the

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team to do what you want individuals

to do what you want to deliver overall,

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because it might work out better to

have a couple of specialists and, the

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majority generalist or, it could be

caught anyway, really, but it's just

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about really analyzing it, isn't it?

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And just knowing what you need.

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So that if you do lose a specialist.

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It's not chaos because somebody else

can just pick up where they left off.

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And I think the specialization

with roles, but there's also

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specialization in terms of tasks.

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So I've seen it as well within an HR

function where there was one person

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who was effectively doing all of the

admin of very specialized systems.

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And that kind of admin level, perhaps

felt like it was the right level for

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those tasks to sit at, but then what that

meant was there was one person who had

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the knowledge of all these systems, and

like I say, they go on holiday or they

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leave and all of a sudden it's going to

place quite a requirement in terms of

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handover and in terms of actually other

people being able to pick up and make

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sure that things can still function.

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Yeah, definitely.

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So is there anything else

then that we need to consider?

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Yeah, so I think, You also need to

really look at what cross functional

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dependencies and what collaboration

does the need to be because you

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typically will propose a structure to

your line manager or your boss's boss,

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and you need to really understand.

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How is the structure that you're

going to propose going to have an

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impact in terms of points of contact

in terms of established working

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relationships in terms of how things

get done within the organization.

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So you really need to be factoring

some of that in both in terms of

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communication plan, but also in terms of.

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That whole workload piece

of how does that continue?

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How does that work?

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And how does that continue to

work during a transition to a

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new structure and then beyond?

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Yeah.

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So I suppose that's covering off the main

bulk of the questions that you need to

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ask and the analysis that you need to do.

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But what about career growth

opportunities or financial implications?

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Like where do you stand with those?

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Yeah, those are also really Important

to consider because if you can create

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opportunities, so to give that example

that I talked about from my own

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experience, what we did was created

more specialization within the customer

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service function, because people

were coming in and we're having to

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learn all of the different workflows

and aspects of customer service.

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So we created four smaller teams

within one overall team so that

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people gained experience, but then

they could move from team to team.

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So they didn't have to stay in

one of the smaller teams forever.

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Over time they could, be upskilled

and move, but it meant when we

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were initially training people,

the budget required was lower.

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The training phase was slower.

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Shorter because we didn't have to train

people on everything all at once in order

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to be able to put them into the role.

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And what we also did simultaneously

was created then a team leader role,

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as opposed to a manager role, so that

those people within that smaller team

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had somebody that was their kind of

go to person that was overlooking.

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And there was then a progression

path to the manager level

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that was already in place.

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So you got those opportunities to

consider how can this work to provide

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the upsides and the benefits, both

for individuals in terms of career

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progression and skills development,

but also for from a budget perspective,

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how can we make things more efficient?

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How can we make things more productive?

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So that you've then got potentially

that budget saving that you

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might be being asked to deliver.

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So that will totally make sense.

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And then in terms of the pitfalls and

things that we need to avoid what do we

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need to think of from that perspective?

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There's, again, there's

a, there's loads on this.

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So I've just pinpointed some of

the key ones and things that either

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that I've done in the past or

that I've seen happen for others.

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So one is designing a perfect structure

on paper when you don't have anyone

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in reality to sit within that.

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So this is why that element of the

skills matrix and the understanding

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of who you've got now is so important

because you could have this amazing

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idea of this is the perfect structure

if I was building it from scratch today.

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But if what you've got is totally

different to that, and you don't have

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people aligned with those roles in the

slightest, then A, you increase the

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risk of that creating roles at risk of

redundancy, But also that has a knock

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on effect on morale and that also has an

effect then potentially on loss of skills,

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experience and knowledge of the business.

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When what you could do is to have

a slightly less perfect plan or

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structure on paper, but where you

can slot existing people into roles.

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So it's very much that balancing act.

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I think another one I see is

that people make assumptions that

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everything has to be done in house.

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So everything that is

currently done, it's right.

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Okay.

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That needs to sit within house.

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And sometimes.

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You will find that things either

are better outsourced to, an

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agency or a freelancer or what

have you know that there may be not

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big enough to constitute a role.

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Or there's something that

actually could be done.

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Better and more productively by an expert.

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So this again comes back

to that question of kind of

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specialization and generalization.

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And I think sometimes people assume

that everything is currently done

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in house has to stay in house, but

that you can absolutely propose

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that things can be outsourced.

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And then I think the other thing is linked

to that kind of what's perfect on paper.

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is creating roles that are impossible to

recruit externally and this is often done

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almost the flip side where you take the

people that you've got and because they've

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got experience of the organization you

then end up with these kind of roles that

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wouldn't exist in another organization and

so if somebody leaves it's really hard to

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recruit and replace that particular role.

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So you also need to be thinking about

not just the people that you've got

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now, but if you were recruiting for

this externally, and really get that

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balance of making sure that you retain

engagement and morale and retain people

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where you can, but also that you have

something that you can recruit into that

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structure externally, if the need arises.

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So that's brilliant.

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And that is like a pretty

comprehensive overview, but just to

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finish off, what are your top tips?

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And I suppose the best

practice elements of this.

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So there's a few that I'll just again,

run through really quite briefly.

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So one is to really think about the

input gathering and analysis stage before

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you start proposing your structure,

the thinking piece before you come

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to the planning piece is so key here.

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So look at, you know, data, look at

information from those team members,

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look at what other businesses

do that have similar challenges.

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You might want to speak to people in

your network about how they've approached

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creating structures, that kind of thing.

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So lots of different inputs and thinking

before you get to the planning stage.

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I think clearly defining the

roles and responsibilities

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and reporting lines is so key.

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And I think the reporting lines tend

to be pretty clear, but sometimes the

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roles and responsibilities are not.

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It's almost, they're a bit fluffy around

the edges and it's yeah, I could sit here.

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But I think what that can do is

because this often creates upheaval

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anyway, That lack of clarity on

roles and responsibilities can lead

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to problems further down the line

if you don't define them up front.

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I think you also need to be aware that you

might get it wrong or not quite perfect.

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So build in ways of

reviewing it and adapting it.

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Make it a plan where you can get from

here to the longer term without having

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to completely rip it up and start again.

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So build the flexibility in

and build the review points in.

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And then I think really the communication

and the transparency around it is so key.

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And that is something that again,

often is underprioritized or

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not given as much attention to.

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It's again, I remember, that first

time that I had to do it, it was Ooh,

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the relief that I've got the sign off

and this is what we're going to do.

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And then it was Oh, and now actually

I need to go away and implement this

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and I need to bring people on that

journey with me and I need to talk

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to them about why it's happening and

I need to think about what's in it

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for them and how I communicate that.

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So yeah be ready for the fact

that the work is not done when

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your structure is signed off.

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That's the start point, not the end point.

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And then you've actually

got the work to do.

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To do that.

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So that is, that's just perfect advice.

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And if you are looking for support with

anything like this, please do get in touch

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with us because we do provide training

and consultancy in all areas of team and

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leadership development, and as usual, we

hope that you enjoyed this week's episode.

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that you think might find it useful.

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and we will see you again next week.