Organizational functions

“Our necessities Map, to fully understand your organization!”

There are three Org.-Centers and functions we will need to talk about:

1. Moving Center (Operational Functions)

• Manufacturing, logistics, production, service, demand and supply chains
  • Physical processes and systems
  • Instinctive organizational behaviors and habits
• The Moving Center is how your organization actually gets work done.
  • The physical processes, systems, and daily habits that turn plans into products and services.

2. Intellectual Center (Strategic Functions)

• Planning, analysis, decision-making, innovation
  • Data processing, strategic thinking, and conceptual frameworks
• The “mind” of organizational direction fed within a circle of bottom-up and scaled through a top-down approach.
• The Intellectual Center is how your organization thinks and decides.
  • How you gather information, make sense of it, plan ahead, and turn ideas into action.

3. Emotional Center (Climate & Cultural Functions)

• Human Resources, team dynamics and organizational culture
  • Values, motivation, and interpersonal relationships
• The Emotional Center is how your organization feels from the inside: how people relate, what they believe is “normal,” and how safe and motivated they feel to do great work together.
  • Any “climate/culture related-Responsibility” for organizational purpose and meaning.

These three Centers will be transformed through integrating our S&OP/IBP approach:

• S&OP/IBP coordinate the moving and intellectual centers
• Cultural transformation details will be recognized through an embeded HR-analysis, adding the general people evaluation and the recognition of their actual feelings concerning the upcoming and already communicated Change initiatives.

Attachment below – The details per Functional Level:

Emotional Center (Culture and People)

What it is:

• The Emotional Center is how your organization feels from the inside: how people relate, what they believe is “normal,” and how safe and motivated they feel to do great work together.
• It covers HR practices, team dynamics, values in action, motivation, and everyday relationships. It also includes the shared sense of purpose and meaning at work.

Why it matters:

• Culture drives execution speed, quality, and innovation.
• People stay, grow, and collaborate when they feel respected, safe, and connected to purpose.
• Misalignment between “what we say” and “what we reward” erodes trust fast.

Who is responsible (key responsibility, not just the C‑suite):

• C‑suite: Set a clear purpose, make trade‑offs visible, role‑model values, fund time for culture (onboarding, learning, rituals).
• HR: Build systems that reinforce values (hiring, rewards, performance, promotions), develop managers, run listening mechanisms, ensure fairness and inclusion.
• Middle managers/leads: Translate purpose into team goals, create psychological safety, give feedback, run rituals (1:1s, retrospectives, check‑ins).
• Teams and individuals: Live the values daily, give/ask for feedback, support peers, raise misalignments early.
• Culture champions (volunteers): Catalyze rituals, storytelling, peer learning across teams.

What good looks like (outcomes you can observe):

• People can explain how their work ties to purpose.
• Healthy debate without fear; mistakes lead to learning.
• Recognition is frequent and tied to values.
• Managers coach; career paths are visible and fair.
• Diverse voices are heard; inclusion is practiced, not just stated.

Core practices to build and sustain it:

• Team charters: Shared norms on decision‑making, feedback, and collaboration.
• Psychological safety rituals: Regular retrospectives, blameless postmortems, “red flag” channels.
• Purpose in the workflow: Start roadmaps and reviews with “why,” connect metrics to customer and societal value.
• Hiring and onboarding for values: Behavioral interviews; onboarding that tells the real story and connects newcomers to mentors and communities.
• Manager basics done well: Weekly 1:1s, clear expectations, strengths-based coaching, career conversations.
• Recognition and storytelling: Tie shout‑outs to values; leaders share real examples of values under pressure.
• Learning loops: Pulse surveys, listening sessions, skip‑levels; close the loop with actions and updates.
• Inclusion by design: Diverse slates, structured interviews, meeting facilitation that includes quieter voices.

Measures that matter (keep them simple and regular):

• Psychological safety score (e.g., “I feel safe to speak up”).
• Purpose alignment (e.g., “I see how my work contributes to our mission”).
• eNPS/engagement trend and participation rate.
• Voluntary turnover, regretted attrition, internal mobility.
• Promotion and pay equity metrics; diversity and inclusion indices.
• Manager effectiveness (from upward feedback).
• Recognition frequency tied to values.
• Absenteeism and burnout risk indicators.

Common failure modes to avoid:

• “Slogan–system gap”: Values on posters but rewards contradict them.
• Culture as a one‑off project or HR‑only initiative.
• Over‑index on perks; under‑invest in trust, fairness, and manager quality.
• Ignoring middle managers’ load and skills.
• Collecting feedback without acting on it.

First 90‑day moves:

• Listen: Run short, frequent pulse surveys plus a few listening sessions; publish what you heard and 3 actions you’ll take.
• Name the behaviors: Define 5–7 observable behaviors that express your values in daily work and decisions.
• Align two systems: Update hiring/interviewing and recognition to reinforce those behaviors.
• Enable managers: Train on 1:1s, feedback, and psychological safety; provide simple playbooks.
• Start two rituals: Team retrospectives every 2–4 weeks; values‑tied recognition in all‑hands.
• Remove a visible contradiction: Fix one policy or metric that undermines the stated values (e.g., only rewarding output over collaboration).

Simple language you can use:

• Purpose: “Why we exist and who benefits.”
• Values: “How we behave when it’s hard.”
• Culture: “The way we do things when no one is watching.”
• Psychological safety: “I can speak up without fear.”
• Manager’s job: “Make goals clear, remove blockers, grow people, and model our values.”

Bottom line:

• Culture is everyone’s job, guided by leaders and enabled by HR.
• If systems, manager habits, and daily rituals reinforce your values and purpose, performance and well‑being follow.

Intellectual Center (Strategy and Thinking)

What it is:

• The Intellectual Center is how your organization thinks and decides: how you gather information, make sense of it, plan ahead, and turn ideas into action.
• It covers strategic planning, data analysis, decision-making processes, innovation pipelines, and the frameworks you use to understand your market, customers, and capabilities.
• It’s the “brain” that connects bottom-up insights from teams with top-down direction from leadership.

Why it matters:

• Good thinking leads to better bets and faster course corrections.
• Clear decision processes prevent analysis paralysis and random pivots.
• Innovation happens when you systematically turn insights into testable experiments.
• Strategy only works if it flows both ways: leaders set direction, teams provide reality checks.

Who is responsible (shared across levels):

• C-suite: Set the strategic framework, allocate resources, make big bets, ensure decision rights are clear.
• Strategy/Planning teams: Facilitate planning cycles, synthesize data, run scenario planning, track strategic metrics.
• Middle managers: Translate strategy into team goals, surface operational insights, run local experiments, escalate strategic blockers.
• Analytics/Data teams: Provide clean data, build dashboards, run analyses, teach data literacy.
• Teams and individuals: Generate bottom-up insights, test assumptions in daily work, contribute to innovation, execute with strategic context.

What good looks like (outcomes you can observe):

• Strategy is clear, memorable, and connects to daily decisions.
• Data is trusted, accessible, and actually used for decisions.
• Teams can explain how their work fits the bigger picture.
• Decisions happen at the right level with the right information.
• Innovation has a process: ideas flow in, experiments happen, learnings scale.
• Planning includes multiple scenarios and clear trigger points.

Core practices to build and sustain it:

• Strategy rhythm: Annual vision/strategy, quarterly goal-setting, monthly reviews, weekly pulse checks.
• Decision architecture: Clear RACI for different types of decisions; escalation paths; decision templates that include data, options, and trade-offs.
• Data infrastructure: Single source of truth for key metrics; self-service dashboards; regular data quality reviews.
• Innovation pipeline: Idea intake process; small-bet experiments; clear criteria for scaling or killing projects.
• Planning processes: Bottom-up input gathering; scenario planning; assumption tracking; regular strategy stress-tests.
• Learning loops: Post-decision reviews; experiment summaries; strategic retrospectives; competitor and market intelligence cycles.
• Cross-functional collaboration: Regular strategy forums; shared planning templates; rotation programs between strategy and operations.

Measures that matter (keep them actionable):

• Strategic goal achievement rate and confidence levels.
• Decision speed and quality (time from need to decision; success rate of major decisions).
• Data utilization (dashboard usage; data-driven decision percentage).
• Innovation flow (ideas submitted, experiments launched, successful pilots scaled).
• Planning accuracy (forecast vs. actual; assumption validation rate).
• Bottom-up insight quality (actionable insights from teams; early warning signals).
• Cross-team alignment on priorities and trade-offs.
• Strategic learning velocity (how fast you spot and act on new patterns).

Common failure modes to avoid:

• Strategy as PowerPoint exercise with no operational connection.
• Analysis paralysis: endless studies without decisions.
• Data hoarding or poor quality that undermines trust.
• Top-down only: strategy created in isolation from operational reality.
• Innovation theater: lots of ideas, no systematic execution.
• Planning perfectionism: over-detailed plans that can’t adapt.

First 90-day moves:

• Map current decision flow: Who decides what, with what information, in what timeframe? Fix 2-3 obvious bottlenecks.
• Establish strategy pulse: Simple weekly check-in on strategic progress and blockers; monthly deeper review.
• Create data foundation: Identify 10-15 key metrics everyone needs; ensure they’re reliable, accessible, and regularly reviewed.
• Run strategy stress-test: Test current strategy against 3 scenarios (base case, optimistic, pessimistic); identify early warning signals.
• Start innovation hygiene: Simple process for capturing, evaluating, and testing ideas; launch 3-5 small experiments.
• Connect strategy to operations: Ensure every team can explain how their goals connect to overall strategy; fix misalignments.

Simple language you can use:

• Strategy: “Where we’re going and how we’ll get there.”
• Decision rights: “Who decides what, with whose input.”
• Data-driven: “Using numbers to test our hunches.”
• Innovation: “Turning good ideas into testable experiments.”
• Bottom-up insights: “What teams learn that leadership needs to know.”
• Strategic thinking: “Asking ‘why’ and ‘what if’ before ‘how.'”

Bottom line:

• Strategy works when it’s a conversation, not a presentation.
• Good decisions need good data, clear process, and the right people in the room.
• Innovation happens through discipline, not just creativity.
• The best strategies emerge from combining top-down vision with bottom-up reality.

1. Moving Center (Operational Functions)

What it is:

• The Moving Center is how your organization actually gets work done: the physical processes, systems, and daily habits that turn plans into products and services.
• It covers manufacturing, logistics, service delivery, supply chains, IT systems, facilities, and all the operational muscle that makes things happen.
• It’s the “body” of your organization – the instinctive behaviors, workflows, and systems that run automatically when everything is working well.

Why it matters:

• Operations is where strategy meets reality and where customers experience your value.
• Smooth operations create capacity for innovation and growth; broken operations drain energy and create firefighting.
• Reliable systems and processes free people to focus on higher-value work.
• Operational excellence builds customer trust and employee confidence.

Who is responsible (everyone plays a role):

• C-suite: Set operational standards, invest in systems and capabilities, remove systemic barriers, model operational discipline.
• Operations leaders: Design processes, manage performance, ensure quality and safety, optimize flow and efficiency.
• IT/Systems teams: Build and maintain technology infrastructure, automate routine work, provide data visibility, ensure security and reliability.
• Frontline managers: Execute daily operations, solve immediate problems, maintain standards, coach teams on processes.
• Frontline teams: Follow processes consistently, spot improvement opportunities, maintain quality, serve customers directly.
• Support functions: Enable operations through procurement, facilities, maintenance, training, and compliance.

What good looks like (outcomes you can observe):

• Work flows smoothly with predictable quality and timing.
• Systems are reliable; when they break, recovery is fast.
• People know their roles and have what they need to succeed.
• Waste and rework are minimal; continuous improvement is normal.
• Customer promises are kept; internal handoffs work seamlessly.
• Safety and compliance are built into how work gets done.

Core practices to build and sustain it:

• Process documentation: Clear, visual workflows that people actually use and update.
• Performance management: Regular metrics review, problem-solving disciplines, performance conversations.
• Quality systems: Built-in checks, error prevention, rapid problem resolution.
• Technology backbone: Reliable core systems, automation of routine tasks, good data flow between systems.
• Maintenance and reliability: Preventive maintenance, system monitoring, capacity planning.
• Training and capability building: Skills development, cross-training, knowledge management.
• Continuous improvement: Regular process reviews, suggestion systems, small experiment culture.
• Supplier and partner management: Clear agreements, performance monitoring, relationship management.

Measures that matter (focus on flow and outcomes):

• Quality metrics (defect rates, customer satisfaction, first-time-right percentage).
• Efficiency measures (cycle time, throughput, resource utilization, cost per unit).
• Reliability indicators (uptime, on-time delivery, promise-keeping rate).
• Safety and compliance metrics (incidents, audit results, regulatory adherence).
• Employee operational metrics (process adherence, training completion, improvement suggestions).
• System performance (response time, availability, error rates).
• Supply chain health (supplier performance, inventory turns, lead times).
• Customer experience indicators (delivery performance, service response time, issue resolution).

Common failure modes to avoid:

• Over-optimizing individual parts while missing overall flow.
• Letting “urgent” crowd out “important” maintenance and improvement.
• Process documentation that exists but isn’t used or maintained.
• Technology investments without process improvement.
• Metrics that drive wrong behaviors (speed vs. quality trade-offs).
• Ignoring frontline insights about what actually works.

First 90-day moves:

• Map current state: Document 3-5 core processes visually; identify obvious bottlenecks and waste.
• Establish operational rhythm: Daily huddles for problem-solving; weekly performance reviews; monthly improvement focus.
• Fix the basics: Address 2-3 chronic operational problems that everyone knows about.
• Strengthen measurement: Ensure key operational metrics are visible, reliable, and reviewed regularly.
• Invest in people: Train supervisors on problem-solving; create clear escalation paths; start cross-training programs.
• Stabilize systems: Address top technology pain points; establish basic system monitoring; create backup procedures.

Simple language you can use:

• Operations: “How we actually get work done every day.”
• Process: “The best way we’ve found to do something consistently.”
• Flow: “Work moving smoothly from start to finish without delays or rework.”
• Standards: “What good looks like, so everyone knows the target.”
• Continuous improvement: “Making things a little better all the time.”
• Reliability: “Things work when they’re supposed to.”

Bottom line:

• Operations is where your strategy either works or fails.
• Excellence comes from reliable systems, capable people, and disciplined execution.
• The best operations feel effortless but require constant attention to the fundamentals.
• When operations run well, everyone can focus on creating value instead of fixing problems.