When asked how a company does GTD, David Allen's answer is, "Holacracy." It's a self-organizing management framework that has GTD built in. The David Allen Company has been running on this framework since 2011. This recording on how GTD is incorporated into Holacracy's governing structure is from a presentation for the Holacracy community of practice.
I have yet to read the book on Holacracy, however, since The David Allen Co. utilizes it; I figured I would ask a couple of questions for my own edification:
Given the traditional definition of positions/etc. don't exist in Holacracy, how do HR functions (e.g. payroll, benefits, performance management, onboarding/offboarding, etc.) work within the organization?
Without having specific individuals holding the proper and appropriate authority, how do legal agreements work (e.g. signing contracts, entering into legal agreements, signing off on documents/disclosures, etc.)?
In the same vein, without the clear distinction of a principal(s) and agent(s) (and assuming some kind of corporation structure), how do/are legally defined responsibilities and accountabilities of officers of the company carried out?
I am genuinely curious since Holacracy is a very eclectic philosophy, or approach?, that I have never saw or heard of any company adopting. I have always wanted to learn more about the concept and generally like to hear from the real world use cases/samples than the raw theory.
Thanks for asking, Matt. Here are some brief thoughts. And you might get different answers from someone at another company running on Holacracy. It's a flexible system that companies can adapt to their needs.
Given the traditional definition of positions/etc. don't exist in Holacracy, how do HR functions (e.g. payroll, benefits, performance management, onboarding/offboarding, etc.) work within the organization?
Over the years we have had roles defined that correspond to typical HR jobs in an org chart. For example, there might be an HR role, with accountabilities for hiring, onboarding, firing, etc. Performance management (reviews) is an interesting one. With the way meetings are structured, issues and role feedback show up right away, and don't need to wait for someone to conduct a review.
Without having specific individuals holding the proper and appropriate authority, how do legal agreements work (e.g. signing contracts, entering into legal agreements, signing off on documents/disclosures, etc.)?
The "without" in the question doesn't necessarily apply. Roles can be created that have the authority to sign agreements, etc.
In the same vein, without the clear distinction of a principal(s) and agent(s) (and assuming some kind of corporation structure), how do/are legally defined responsibilities and accountabilities of officers of the company carried out?
I've heard that some companies write Holacracy into their corporate structure in an irrevocable way, still adhering to state and federal laws about how to form a company. Some maintain a traditional structure (such as a corporation, LLC, or partnership in the US), but the corporate authority has delegated operations to Holacracy. For example, instead of the board appointing a CEO to run things, the board might create an anchor circle and assign it the authority to run the company. Then the board would assign a lead to that anchor circle. You might say that circle lead looks like a CEO. But the person filling that role would get frustrated from the start by trying to act as a traditional CEO. The way authority is distributed simply wouldn't support an "Do it because I'm the boss approach."
Thanks for the reply John! Yeah, there's definitely giant differences between the size of organizations and the limits of the effectiveness and practicality of pure Holacracy at different sizes.
I am still very uneducated on this particular philosophy's approach, so I unfortunately cannot ask any other questions or intelligently speak about it. It's very interesting and intriguing, I will have to do more research. Thanks again!
