Filip Poposki

Team Networks – The Driving Force behind Today’s Companies If someone were to ask you to break down the organizational structure of a large company’s workforce, you’d probably name every employee ranking from top to bottom. We have the CEO, followed by the board of directors, the managers, local managers, workers and so on. That’s pretty much how a large organization’s structure is rounded up – a list of employees ranging from top to bottom that form a company’s hierarchy. While all this is true in a traditional sense, research shows that over 80% of today’s modern companies encounter serious obstacles when it comes to their organizational structure due to the vastly redesigned way in which today’s modern companies are working. This ‘struggle’ has presented many obstacles that prevent modern companies from working as efficiently as their potential allows them due to the restraints in communication which are presented when there’s a multitude of assigned individuals and people working for the benefit of one company. This is why many if not all of today’s successful modern companies have developed a network of teams that manage their respective spheres of production and work together in unison for the good of the company. Team networks are what makes up today’s modern companies and they’ve essentially broken down the out-dated practice of ‘reporting to the superiors; If let’s say, 20 years ago, companies were made up of a hierarchy of groups with each team in charge of the one below it, today companies rely on a receptive flow of information carried out by their network of teams in order to keep them running like a well-oiled machine. Let’s take the modern transportation service company known as ‘Uber’ as an example; Uber has multiple teams set up for each large metropolitan district in the US. These teams, under the supervision of a regional manager, run all the local operations within their district while simultaneously coordinating with those in charge of their online operations. (because in 2016, anyone with access to internet can order an ‘Uber’ driver.) Would Uber operate as well as it is if all the information it sends and receives was being reviewed by ONE superior factor in charge? Absolutely not. Rather, Uber relies on multiple teams to create a ‘freeflow’ of receptive information that always reaches the individuals it needs to thanks to the teams in charge of the organizational aspect of the company. The main obstacle that today’s leaders face with companies like Uber is how to coordinate and align those teams to form a productive network that actually works. Furthermore, team leaders must always be aware of how to motivate, reward and promote individuals in a system which heavily depends on rewarding individuals based on their skills and what they bring to the table rather than handing out essentially pointless positions and titles that give one power over others. Being an effective team leader means knowing the ins and outs of today’s companies and how to operate within them, so remember to expand your leadership knowledge daily with www.eleadership.com