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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on April 26, 2013 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: company 2.0 ( 3 ), enterprise 2.0 ( 90 ), hr ( 10 ), human resources ( 26 ), leadership ( 25 ), management 2.0 ( 28 ), people management ( 2 ), personnel management ( 3 ), team management ( 29 )   

  The professional facilitator in organizations 

  Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

  Technological advances and growing competitiveness force companies to stay permanently up-to-date, so collaborative practices are becoming more valued as a more than profitable option.

  Here we can talk about practice communities that can enhance productivity in organizations thanks to an improvement in processes and empowering the employees who should assess, propose and solve in decision-making.

  Placing these work groups at the heart of any productive improvement involves giving them autonomy, with the result being the sum of the individual productivities and knowledge transfer.

  However a change of such dimensions in any organization used to functional or departmental structures can entail a number of problems in managing this complex change. To face it, and to ensure that projects don’t de-virtualize from their auto-da-fe, total integration is required and not just changing the structure of the departments.

  To respond to these limitations in organizations, professional facilitators or facilitator teams have emerged, which are responsible for developing strategic capacities for re-focusing the actions of the work group.

  These professionals seek to:

  • Drive innovation
  • Ensure strategic cohesion
  • De-bureaucratize the organization
  • Instill a new way of doing things (innovation requires a method)
  • Streamline the organizational change
  • Use social technologies to provide business openness

  These professionals can acquire a greater role in the classical structure, while they reduce their weight and importance. Through their interruption in the work methodology, they seek to generate wisdom across the board that enables the company to give an efficient response to the challenges.

  To sum up, I want to highlight the importance of people, as a high level of involvement and maturity is essential in order for the companies themselves to adapt to the rhythm and the quality of their employees, achieving greater flexibility and orientation on the outcome.

  Rafael García (@rafagparrado) works as a consultant at Índize and has his own blog, which at Zyncro we highly recommend: La Factoría Humana.

  
  
   

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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on March 1, 2013 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: collaboration ( 56 ), collaborative management ( 25 ), collaborative work ( 14 ), cooperation, HR 2.0 ( 3 ), human resources ( 26 )   

  The need for cooperation in new companies 

  Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

  The continuous changes which organizations undergo due to technology advances have become a key trend that generates uncertainties regarding the function of HR in organizations. The function of HR is at a crucial situation as the backbone of the organization and a promoter of change. Market requirements, the wave of constant change, short-lived trends… are some of the reasons for new organizational structures that allow organizational adaptability in the new way of understanding relations in companies.

  The vision of HR as a static or hermetic department must become a thing of the past, transforming it into the first line of internal contact in companies, guiding employees towards opportunity, and supporting intra-entrepreneur figures to ensure the success of the change.

  Cooperation must be a shared pattern throughout the company and therefore requires employees’ involvement to favor a collective constructivism that improves efficiency. And to favor that cooperation, we need to facilitate decision-making and do away with hierarchical structures, because imposed hierarchy can prevent the conversion of ideas emerging from the heart of the organization. By removing this hierarchy, companies will be able to escape from the standardization and the bureaucratization of processes.

  But who said that drawing together all that knowledge was easy? Leading the change, being the organizational glue, requires HR having a method to ensure success. Let’s look at some aspects that need to be taken into account:

  • Organizational transparency, a suitable communication must be the shared pattern throughout the organization.

  • The use of tools 2.0 will enable reinvention in the new scenario, guaranteeing a sensitivity towards new trends and advances to bring organizations closer to the external customer.

  • Learning as a goal of the organization for constant improvement of the production processes, enabling a moldability that guarantees survival over time.

  • Transmission of the business strategy to the entire organization, which helps focus all activities towards achieving the main act of faith or raison d’etre of the organization.

  In short, companies become liquid to adapt to the new changing scenario that prevails in the market and to its requirements, and new organizational structures emerge. But despite the wave of constant change that invades business today, we need to remember that adapting the organization to change is not immediate, rather for large companies, a major investment of resources and time is required. But thanks to those necessary changes, collaboration will become a key base for companies and will enable them to assume the challenge of the new organizational capillarity required for success in the new scenario.

  Rafael García works as a consultant at the company Índize and writes his own blog, which at Zyncro we highly recommend: La Factoría Humana.

   
   
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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on January 3, 2013 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: collaboration ( 56 ), collaborative environments ( 8 ), collaborative management ( 25 )   

  Organizational capillarity: a new challenge 

  Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

  Many companies are interested in and progressively introducing collaborative processes into their business dynamic. Not for nothing is it said that we are immersed in the collaboration era, and this is why it’s interesting to establish an ecosystem for generating new knowledge. This is where capillarity is particularly relevant to the organizational momentum.

  As I’ve said on numerous occasions, the main challenge for organizations is adapting their business model and achieving the active construction of knowledge; to do this companies should pursue the increase of their collaborative coefficient. But, careful! Not only should we look within the organization, but open it up to the outside.

  Collaborative work pursues better productivity through collective intelligence, for which efficient communication must exist in the organization. This is where there is often confusion, because there is the belief that communication is a result of a good working environment, which is true the majority of the time, but not enough. Autonomy in people’s work should be encouraged looking to motivate their learning ability and entrepreneurial attitude as a background to innovation.

  When an organization is open, listens and allows interaction with the environment, it creates a series of business benefits:

  • Internal source of innovation
  • More autonomy
  • Improvement to the organizational climate
  • More productivity
  • Improvement to the monitoring of the environment

  In current times, uncertainty is an inherent characteristic of companies, which is why they must adapt to survive. Thanks to organizational capillarity, knowledge flows, providing the company with sources that allow contents to be updated. To this end, adequate space needs to be created for applying a methodology that allows interaction between collaborators, enabling the capture of knowledge that is useful for the business’s activity.

  It has always been said that information is power. Information, together with this adaptation to new times, will allow better dynamics and the creation of a structure that improves decision making, thanks to the increase in value of these interactions, therefore improving the organization’s monitoring system.

  Organizational capillarity refers to permeability, knowing how to listen to the environment in order to suitably adapt to change, such as the detection of new trends, that allows markets to be approached to discover consumer behavior. In short, for the change to be detected and the response facilitated.

  Individual talent is a basic requirement, but it is not enough in times when success belongs to collectivity.

  To sum up, the objective is to be a network company, which requires transparency, something that isn’t always easy, because it implies overcoming hierarchical structures and the reluctance of people to contribute.

  As Alfons Cornella says “Knowledge should be the nervous system of the whole company”

  Rafael García works as a consultant for Índize and has his own blog which we at Zyncro recommend: La Factoría Humana.

  
  
   
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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on September 3, 2012 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: collaboration ( 56 ), collaborative management ( 25 ), team management ( 29 ), teamwork ( 23 )   

  The importance of the right environment 

  Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

  Currently we are witnessing a series of structural changes that have a strategic consequence for organizations. While competitive advantages were traditionally yielded from assets owned by the company, nowadays it is knowledge that helps improve results.

  These days companies are organized in such a way to encourage business practices that generate and protect the company’s knowledge. For this reason, self-managed teams use collective intelligence as their modus operandi with the goal of the group’s ideas and conversations having an impact on the business results. Working together as a team is more productive than working as individuals.

  There are many advantages to working as a team: greater productivity, better quality, customer satisfaction, job satisfaction, and even greater organizational commitment.

  Knowledge generated in groups comes from the individual contributions of each member, meaning this knowledge is aveguarded from imitation by the competition. By creating numerous variables, competitor companies are unable to identify the source generating the competitive advantage, destabilizing this system of surveillance.

  In any case, although it may seem the miracle cure for improving productivity, collaboration does not always positively affect performance, as some individuals may present resistance to sharing their knowledge, something which essentially ends up deteriorating the group’s performance overall.

  It is at this point that the working environment comes into play. One of the greatest premises of economics is to achieve a goal beyond mere individual achievements, where work spaces are shared by people with different, complementary experiences, providing a multi-disciplinary training that covers multiple new areas from non-expert perspectives in order to obtain innovative solutions.

  To reiterate, no one individual can perform all these activities alone and generate improvements or innovations.

  Among the negative aspects of collaboration, there is opportunism, the so-called “stowaway” effect. An individual can corrupt other members into thinking that it is more profitable to reduce their performance, as they can still benefit from the system whether they have contributed or not, which would, without a doubt, destabilize the group’s entire operation.

  To conclude, we need to highlight the importance of the working environment as a key aspect within the group in order to encourage the sharing of knowledge and to work towards a common project, as it is a determining factor in internal collaboration among group members. Nor can we forget that ICTs cannot achieve the desired collaboration alone, but must act as a additional resource, since although they may be a necessary condition in some cases, they are not sufficient in themselves.

  Rafael García works as a consultant at Índize and has his own blog in Spanish,
  which at Zyncro we highly recommend: La Factoría Humana.

   
   
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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on July 13, 2012 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: collaborative management ( 25 ), learning ( 4 ), organizational change ( 7 ), organizational culture ( 13 )   

  The dilemmas of learning 

  Estimated reading time: 5 minutes

  Creating new ideas, implementing and updating information systems, controlling technological applications, designing environments and processes are just some of the day-to-day challenges that businesses face.

  All of these challenges have a common denominator, knowledge, which should be integrated in the organization as a source for creating value and competitiveness, helping to differentiate from the rest.

  A fundamental aspect for increasing this knowledge is organizational learning and talent management. In a fluid society such as that of today, adapting to continuous change is essential, and this is where the organization and its employees must stay in touch with reality. Avoiding egocentrism in the organization is a requirement for lasting over time, although sometimes this is no guarantee of success.

  In short, looking around and learning from competitors and collaborators is extremely important and allows the survival of organizations thanks to improvements in their competitiveness.

  These are just some of the consequences of organizational learning in businesses:

  • Learning not only to drive quality, but also as a requirement to create and increase it.
  • Innovation requires a high capacity for effective learning. It also depends on the organizational knowledge base. The more solid this base is, the easier it is to internalize change.
  • Above all, both innovation and learning are processes associated with the individual. This reinforces the idea that improvements in the organization occur with the best people for each situation, strengthening the importance of resident organizational talent.
  • Surroundings influence learning, changes occurring in the markets must be contemplated, not as threats, but as opportunities to learn and improve.
  • Knowledge and learning management should allow the organization to react faster to change, anticipating itself in its culture. Therefore, the importance of a suitable working climate stands out, as do monitoring systems that allow the automation of changes produced.
  • Learning technology influences the way of distributing knowledge and allows new forms of thinking, and of how to process the work, to be developed, with the objective of facilitating employees with it for the generation of new ideas.

  Intelligent organizations sacrifice part of today’s performance to achieve a better performance tomorrow.

  A suitable management of efficient learning will have positive repercussions in the organization, favoring flexibility and openness when faced with change and unexpected events that may occur, because ‘change is the only constant‘. To do this human resources policies should favor both internal and external collaboration that benefits the management of talent together with continuous learning.

  Rafael García works as a consultant for Índize and has his own blog which Zyncro recommends: La Factoría Humana.

   
   
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  Rafael Garcia-Parrado 9:00 am on June 8, 2012 Permalink | Reply
  Tags: collaboration ( 56 ), collaboration networks ( 6 ), collaborative work ( 14 )   

  The new organizational architecture 

  Estimated reading time: 4 minutes

  Editor’s note: This week we’re lucky to welcome another ZyncroBlog contributor! Rafael García holds a degree in Labor Sciences and a Master’s degree in Business Management. Currently he is undertaking a Master’s degree in Economics and Business Organization. He also works as a consultant in the company Índize and has his own blog, which at Zyncro we recommend you check out: La Factoría Humana. Welcome to the Zyncrommunity, Rafael!

  

  Currently we are experiencing a change in the organizational paradigm that has predominated in recent years, where productivity and hierarchy went hand in hand.

  One of the characteristics of globalization and a clearly Western ailment is the speed. Companies are undergoing a period of uncertainty that requires a fast response to adapt to new market conditions and consumer demands.

  To meet these challenges, undoubtedly mobilizing talent will be a key factor, which will have a bearing on organizations’ competitiveness.

  The raw material of organizations is knowledge, allowing them to survive over time. Knowledge is a lasting competitive advantage. It needs to be fed through a collective process where employees must contribute their know-how.

  Organizations need to install a horizontal structure where collaboration is paramount, provided by the right communication among employees. Nowadays, the many technological advances favor collaboration and communication despite the scattered offices and people. All this together with greater employee empowerment enables organizational development, thanks to the creation of a framework for action in organizations.

  Managing talent in organizations is essential in finding those people who meet companies’ requirements, aligning individual goals with organizational ones. Encouraging a collaborative environment will help decision-making as well as innovation, seen as something useful that favors a change in mentality. This systematic search for knowledge ensures a constant update, which improves the organization’s positioning in the market.

  Technological advances will help us to create and establish a framework for collaboration, as well as a network of contributors who will help us to stay abreast of the changes happening by establishing a system to monitor these changes that enables and helps decision-making. And more importantly, it will make companies convert into learning systems: creating, acquiring and transmitting knowledge to improve their competitive position.

  However, the autonomy that this new organizational paradigm seeks to provide, where all employees have decision-making power, on some occasions may be counterproductive, as the lack of filters may cause mediocrity in the actions performed. Hence, it is important to establish some type of filter to ensure the means selected are suitable and are of quality.

  In short, collaboration becomes a key cornerstone and organizations need to oscillate in search for competitive improvement that will enable them to survive in the market.