A normal working day
An employee has a good idea. However, he doesn’t know exactly who he can turn to for implementation. So he writes to his team leader. He also likes the idea, but also doesn’t know who is responsible for it. So he writes to the other team leaders and waits for a reply. A day or two later, he knows that some of his colleagues also like the idea, but he doesn’t have an answer. So he turns to the management. They also liked the idea, asked around with some employees and even found a colleague who might know something about it. In the meantime, around 15 people have been distracted from their work – and the employee has almost forgotten about the idea. Similar incidents like this happen every day in traditional command hierarchies. With Responsiveness, virtual7 2020 has succeeded in breaking up these classic decision-making chains and establishing a faster and more flexible system instead.
Responsiveness and decisions
First of all, of course, there is transparency and the personal responsibility that you take on through roles. This allows you to drive forward and develop topics that are important to you personally. On the one hand, you broaden your own horizons and on the other, you bring the company forward. to.
Dirk Hammes, Customer Cluster Finance
In a responsive company organization, there are no team leaders who have sole decision-making authority. Roles take their place. A role has a clearly described area of responsibility and competence and a time budget. This ensures that there is actually enough time to fulfill the tasks of the role without getting lost in day-to-day business.
The roles mean you have to organize yourself better so that you can keep appointments.Finally, you also have to make sure that none of your roles are neglected or left out. In any case, you should be self-reflective and be able to assess whether you can devote the time that the role entails.What is particularly noticeable is that you no longer only work for the customer, but can also use your interests internally and actively contribute to the future of virtual7.
Anton Thome, Customer Cluster Finance
Responsiveness and Meetings
I’m sure everyone is familiar with these meetings. A topic that actually only affects two or three people present has been discussed for ten minutes. Perhaps one participant was prepared for the topic, and only half of them were. Everyone has lost sight of a concrete solution for nine minutes. These meetings would be a thing of the past in a responsive working environment.
No hierarchies does not mean that there are no rules. They still exist, of course, but they are new rules that correspond to the responsive company organization. For example, we have introduced completely new meeting structures that work precisely by adhering to rules and preventing inefficient discussions. Elsewhere, the model certainly brings with it more freedom, which increases personal responsibility but also flexibility.
Irina Brombacher, Core Cluster Corporate Support
Tactical Meeting
One of these meeting structures is the tactical meeting. In advance, all participants are required to prepare their project statuses and, if necessary, make them available to the other participants. Starting with a check-in round, all participants can communicate their mood one after the other. All recurring actions of the respective roles are then discussed. By answering with “Check” or “No Check”, transparency should be created. If a role’s tasks are measured in metrics, these are presented to the other members and discussed if necessary. The main part of the meeting focuses on discussing the previously created tensions. The aim is to work through the individual agenda items in a given time. The aim here is not to analyze problems, but to discuss them quickly and find solutions. Finally, the participants can share their thoughts again in a closing round.
Governance Meeting
The governance meeting follows a fixed agenda that is set in advance by the moderator. Team members who wish to introduce a so-called tension, for example a problem or an improvement, can do so at the beginning. However, a solution must be provided for each tension. Simply complaining is not an option. The tensions are dealt with one after the other. Each participant is allowed to ask comprehension questions. The team member who introduced the tension then has the opportunity to adapt the solution. The group is then asked whether there are any objections. Each objection is checked to see whether it is valid and whether the participant raising it would be affected by the decision at all. If this is not the case, or if there are no objections, the solution is accepted. These measures avoid lengthy discussions and keep the meeting short and focused.
Internal communication has increased significantly. I see my colleagues more often. We have productive exchanges in meetings. The meeting structures have also changed.changed. You aimtotobetterand faster resultswithoutgetting into endless discussion loops.At the same time, everyone can contribute something to every topic, no one is neglected or overheard.Afterwards, you always have the feeling that you have achieved something.
Paula Procenko, Core Cluster Marketing
Teams and emails – communicating decisions correctly
Of course, making efficient decisions within a team is not enough. The rest of the company must also be informed. This ensures transparency, which is essential for employees to take responsibility for their own actions. In addition to traditional emails, messenger apps such as Microsoft Teams are primarily used for this purpose. These are not only used for business communication, they are also a channel through which decisions can be communicated or opinions and feedback can be obtained quickly and easily.
Internal communication has developed in such a way that it now goes beyond the customer focus. The exchange within my cluster has become more intensive. Depending on how roles develop and evolve in the respective circleswill come together, the communication üacross clusters will change once again.äOverall, I think we have a very good and open communication style. This is particularly important if you want to introduce responsiveness.
responsivenessinsertüwants to introduce.
Dirk Hammes, Customer Cluster Finance
