Reframing Organizations: Artistry, Choice and LeadershipLee G. Bolman and Terrence E. Deal

For Managers and Leaders

Frames

• The Structural Frame

• The Human Resource Frame

• The Political Frame

• The Symbolic Frame

Structural Frame Defined

The structural frame argues for putting people in the right roles and relationships.

Properly designed, these formal arrangements can accommodate both collective goals and individual differences.

Structural ExampleGiant Internet retailer Amazon.com focuses on figuring out what the customer wants and delivering it with speed and precision.

Amazon is a classic example of a highly-developed organization structure – clear goals, focus on the mission, well-defined roles and top-down coordination. The close alignment of structure and task leads to a high level of performance.

Assumptions Undergirding the Structural Frame

Organizations exist to achieve established goals and objectives.

Organizations achieve efficiency and enhance performance through specialization and appropriate division of labor.

Suitable forms of coordination and control ensure that diverse efforts of individuals and units mesh.

Assumptions Undergirding the Structural Frame

(con’d)Organizations work best when rationality prevails over personal agendas and extraneous pressures.

Effective structures fit an organization’s current circumstances (including its goals, technology, workforce, and environment).

Troubles arise and performance suffers from structural deficits, remedied through problem solving and restructuring.

Human Resource Frame Defined

The Human Resource Frame argues that people’s skills, attitudes, energy and commitment are vital resources that can make or break an enterprise.

Human Resource Example

Seattle steel company Nucor pays its workers below the industry average. But when Nucor has a good year, as it often does, employees get big bonuses, based on their own output and the company’s success.

At Nucor, work is more than a job. It’s about pride. Employees enjoy seeing their names listed on the covers of corporate publications. They’re proud that their company, which turns scrap metal into steel, is the world’s biggest recycler. They’re exhilarated when they can show that American companies can still compete on the world stage.

Human Resource Assumptions

Organizations exist to serve human needs rather than the converse.

People and organizations need each other. Organizations need ideas, energy and talent; people need careers, salaries and opportunity.

When the fit between individual and system is poor, one or both suffer. Individuals are exploited or exploit the organization – or both become victims.

A good fit benefits both. Individuals find meaningful and satisfying work, and organizations get the talent and energy they need to succeed.

Political Frame Defined

The political frame views organizations as “roiling arenas,” hosting ongoing contests of individual and group interests.

Political ExampleOn the eve of the Challenger Disaster on January 28, 1986, engineers pleaded with superiors and NASA to delay the launch of the space shuttle. On the other hand Thiokol, the contractor that made the rocket boosters, and NASA both faced strong pressure to get the shuttle in the air.

Both the Columbia and Challenger disasters were extraordinary tragedies, but they illustrate political dynamics that are everyday features of organizational life.

Political Assumptions

Organizations are coalitions of different individuals and interest groups.

Coalition members have enduring differences in values, beliefs, information, interests and perceptions of reality.

Most important decisions involve allocating scarce resources – deciding who gets what.

Political Assumptions (con’d)

Scarce resources and enduring differences put conflict at the center of day-to-day dynamics and make power the most important asset.

Goals and decisions emerge from bargaining and negotiation among competing stakeholders jockeying for their own interests.

Symbolic Frame Defined

The symbolic frame focuses on how humans make sense of the chaotic, ambiguous world in which they live.

An organization’s culture is revealed and communicated through its symbols: GEICO’s gecko, Target’s bulls-eye or Aflac’s duck.

Symbolic ExampleOnline shoe retailer Zappos.com updates ancient symbols and traditions based on tribe and homeland with its carnival-like zaniness, full gradation ceremonies (to Pomp and Circumstance) for newly-recruited trainees, and department-sponsored cookouts and other fun events during the year.

This “Culture of Happiness” pays off: the company is highly profitable, and ranks #11 on Fortune’s List of the Best 100 Companies to Work For.

Symbolic Assumptions

What is most important is not what happens but what it means.

Activity and meaning are loosely coupled; events and actions have multiple interpretations as people experience situations differently.

Facing uncertainty and ambiguity, people create symbols to resolve confusion, find direction, and anchor hope and faith.

Symbolic Assumptions (con’d)

Events and processes are often more important for what is expressed than what is produced. Their emblematic form weaves a tapestry of secular myths, heroes and heroines, rituals, ceremonies, and stories to help people find purpose and passion.

Culture forms the superglue that bonds an organization, unites people, and helps an enterprise to accomplish desired ends.

Improving Leadership Practice

The use of multiple frames permits leaders to see and understand more – if they are able to employ the different logics that accompany diverse ways of thinking.

Leaders fail when they take too narrow a view. Unless they can think flexibly and see organizations from multiple angles, they will be unable to deal with the full range of issues they inevitably encounter.

The power to reframe is vital for modern leaders.