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Re-orgs are just a part of life in companies and organizations. As the facts on the ground change, people need to move around and structures need to change. Departments get restructured, job descriptions and responsibilities change (slightly or drastically). Re-organizations can happen for a variety of reasons, including but not limited to people leaving due to layoffs, high growth and lots of hiring, new leadership that thinks a different organizational structure will be more effective, and growth opportunities for leadership.

These opportunities can be exciting but also daunting. You’re not new to the company and so you don’t get that same “I’m new here” grace or as much time and space to learn. You’re expected to understand what needs to happen and act quickly communicating up, down, and around with expertise and care. To add to it, rarely when there’s a reorg, is it completely business as usual. Accompanying these reorganization decisions is often the need for new or updated processes, changing mandates, or clarifying expectations.

Here are five things to look for when overseeing a new department or area.

Goals

You can tell a lot about a team or department by what their goals are (or if they had any goals). These don’t necessarily have to be formal OKRs or KPIs. Maybe these goals are written somewhere and checked in on regularly, maybe they’re just scribbled somewhere. Maybe there are department goals, or maybe goals are just set team by team. All of this information tells you a lot about where the department and teams are. Some additional questions to ask are:

• How the goals are set (bottom-up? top-down? a mix of both?)
• Once goals are set, how often are they checked on? How do people show the status or progress towards goals? And is that only transparent for the group leaders or is it communicated somehow to individuals as well?
• Once goals are set, how often are they changed or stuck to? How frequently do the goals set become irrelevant because new priorities came in?
• What did the group actually achieve in the past few quarters? This is less about saying if a group is “bad” or “good” but just understanding what gets written down vs. what actually gets accomplished (we all know that’s frequently different) and what were some of the reasons for delays or issues along the way (because there are ALWAYS some delays or issues... again, not necessarily a bad thing, but important to understand what those were and how visible they were/how they were communicated, if at all)

Team Effectiveness

To summarize this... are the right people in the right seats? And where are the growth opportunities for individuals. Real talk - not everyone is always in the right seat, and sometimes a new leader needs to come in with an outside perspective to ask different or new questions and understand the state of things. I’m always one to try to work with individuals, provide feedback, and help them grow in the right ways, but sometimes there is just a mismatch of skills and ability, or a career desire mismatch where what the group needs from someone doesn’t align with what they want to do with their career.

These are rarely blatant. It’s looking for things like is there a team or group that is completely misaligned with the rest of the company? Is there a manager or leader who is in super protective mode as opposed to really providing the feedback their group needs? And if so, where does this stem from? Is it from the individual? or is the individual manager operating with past baggage or how they felt they had to operate under a previous leader based on that leader’s potentially non-optimal leadership style? 1. Alignment and Clarity

Alignment and clarity are really about understanding how this group’s work fits in with the bigger picture. Is the team clear on why they’re doing something? Do they know how their work contributes to what the company as a whole is trying to do (which honestly may or may not be connected to the company goals. In an ideal world, there’s a clear connection, but it isn’t always there)? Do all the teams in the department understand how/if their goals relate to one another and fit within the larger department?

It’s easy in larger organizations (and even sometimes in smaller ones) to operate in a silo - to be very clear on what their team is doing but have no sense of adjacent teams, departments, or individuals (in smaller companies) goals and how it all fits together. If there isn’t clarity or even awareness, it’s a clear spot where you as a new leader can provide those connections and start creating that connective tissue with other areas. 1. Barriers

Ok, you might not get this right away depending on what trust needs to be built and the circumstances of the reorg but understanding where people think the barriers are is such an interesting conversation to have when you’re walking into somewhere new. Now, these barriers might be problems or might not be. They also might not be the actual barriers but it’s always interesting to understand the perception here of individuals in different areas and different teams. Basically, what do people think is holding them back from whatever it is. It could be holding them back from being a high-performing team, from accomplishing goals, from communicating effectively, from having the culture they want... all sorts of different barriers might be present. The goal here is just to listen and then see where there are patterns or places you want to explore further. 1. Culture and Communication

It’s common for assumptions about areas of a company or organization to be around talent, who is in what role and if they’re able to execute on their role and responsibilities. AND, it’s very possible that some things need to change there (see item 2), but I’ve found that more often than not, understanding the culture and communication that is happening in a department, in teams, or between all of the above, is incredibly telling.

Now, this bucket is HUGE. Some of the key things I try to hone in on are:

• What is the mood? If you were to describe how people feel about the department (or if you ask them), what are the 3 words they use?

• How do people interact with each other? And are there differences between written communication (slack or chat app) and verbal (in meetings, for example)?

• Do people depend on each other? What’s the level of perceived trust and reliability on each other (either within a team or between teams)

• What communication seems to be happening “up” and “down”? In other news, how is a manager or individual managing up and what information comes to you as the person who they’re reporting to and just as important, how is information getting to the team? When you talk to the team, does it seem like they’re hearing the messages you’re conveying to their manager that you’re assuming is being amplified? or does it seem like they’re not getting that message for whatever reason? This communication could be through formal OR informal structures (which is also interesting to notice) Here’s what I commonly see after a re-organization...

• A top down message for the department from you, as the new leader

• A deep dive from the leader with each area they’re taking over

• Showing up to a variety of meetings

• Potentially skip levels or small group conversations that are mostly a listening tour

• Talking about coming up with a new strategy or plan (sometimes even with an associated goal timeline) Here’s what I don’t see as often... Actually getting people together to make this progress. Note - I didn’t put many qualifiers on this statement. Is it getting people together virtually vs. in person? Is it the whole group or just the leadership? Really any of these is better than what currently happens.

One of the most overlooked opportunities when taking on a new department is bringing people together. As a leader, this gives you the chance to set the tone, meet everyone face-to-face, and most importantly, make real progress on key initiatives that will move your teams forward. Whether it’s the entire department or just the leadership team, a well-designed gathering can set the foundation for the incredible work ahead. Of course, you want this time to be useful, valuable, and memorable—which is where thoughtful design and facilitation become essential to striking the right balance.

Now, of course you want this gathering to be good (and, shameless plug, this is where a professional comes into play and can be very helpful), so here are some suggestions about what to do with that time:

1. Helping the team get to know one another. Not through a happy hour or “field trip” (although an experience together can be excellent, if it’s been thought through and isn’t just branded as “team bonding” that doesn’t actually bond the team). This doesn’t have to be fancy or expensive. It needs to be meaningful. It needs to actually spark new and interesting conversations, and it needs to build trust.
2. Identify what the group considers as pain points or places where there can be more efficiency. The best way to do this depends on a handful of different factors apparent within the team, but bringing to the surface these issues and then providing space and time to talk about them in a constructive way helps lay the groundwork for how this first team will work together in the future.
3. Dream a little bit. It’s exciting to get a new group together, even if the circumstances of the reorg were based on constraints or other company issues. Now, you don’t want to do a full blue-sky brainstorm if you can’t actually take action on any of that, but there are great ways to frame these kinds of sessions so they’re still inspirational and energizing while not making empty promises. That right there is probably 2 full days of time together, which gives you plenty to work with.

Stay tuned for parts 2 and 3 of this reorgs series - Part 2: How to adjust and operate if you’re reporting to a new manager Part 3: How to make re-orgs easier for individuals

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If you’re looking for someone to run your gathering so you can focus on participating instead of running the sessions, Book a free consultation call with me today. With a range of pricing options and levels of involvement, I’m here to help you GSD to set the right foundation with your new team.