Just finished reading up on what Holacracy is and I found it rather fascinating. Definitely something very radical compared to how organisations manage themselves today. It's interesting how as blockchain technology is attempting to decentralise the movement, storage and processing of digital information, things like holacracy are trying to decentralise human authority. Not exactly a new idea but one that's somewhat more formal and structured.
For the uninitiated, the short version is that holacracy breaks down the typical hierarchical structure of a company and clusters it into functional cells staffed by functional roles. These roles are then filled by individuals who, in the course of the day to day, do what they can (and are empowered to act) to fulfill the purpose of the roles they take up. So instead of the typical request for approval, everyone is expected act in the interest of their role and to do so selfishly. Facilitator roles then help to smoothen out operational and governance issues (not exactly by telling people what to do but by bringing various stakeholders and having them come up with evolving arrangements to remove friction). I'm definitely oversimplifying here so you should read the book (or online literature)
This book provided a good introduction to the idea and philosophy of it although I'd also say that it could do more to provide examples of the problems with both the adoption of it as well as the execution of it.
I remember first hearing of the term when Zappos made the news by adopting Holacracy and giving all their staff an accept-it-or-leave kind of deal. A big organisation making a call like that must really believe in the system (I wonder how it's really working out though). Reports are conflicting about whether that transition is successful or not and I suspect it's still too early to tell.
Some articles:
Some questions I'm wondering about :
- How do people react to compensation? How do you even structure compensation if roles and responsibilities are always changing? Do people react positively to increased responsibility/empowerment?
- How do you recruit if the skills you need are potentially evolving often?
- As an employee, does it 'lock you in' since moving to another non-Holacracy company may be difficult because they don't know how to evaluate you and your ever changing roles? (or is this a false assumption that i'm making?)
Somehow I think it'll be perfect for 'opensourcing' a company....
Is anyone out there practicing this? How is it working out for you and your team?