Reinventing Organizations

What Hacker News says

1. dilipdasilvaJun 2026
   I just finished the book. It took a while, but was well worth it. Thanks for writing it.

   I founded a company that grew from 1 person 26 years ago to 850 people and is now 270. I think about the topics in the book quite a bit. And a while back I reached the same conclusion that companies need a different governance structure to not succumb to financial gravity.

   I feel your book overlaps with Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux. His book explores how organizations can move beyond traditional command-and-control management toward self-managed, purpose-driven, and more human-centered ways of operating. It gives a number of examples of companies operating in this way. But it does not focus on governance structure. In fact, one of the companies died because of a change of ownership.

   Your book also provides many examples of which I was not aware. It is always inspirational to hear of other companies trying to do things differently, even if it is not directly applicable to your business.

   I like your use of gravity as a metaphor and particularly that you can harness it to your advantage. I also believe strongly that we should not accept the way things are and we can change them.

   You mention in the book that companies in the s&p 500 live about 18 years, when in the past they would live 60 years and one of the reasons for this is financial gravity and in particular the change that happened in the 1980s where companies started solely serving investor interests. In thinking about companies, I use the metaphor of waves and surfing. I feel 100 years ago the waves were very infrequent. What has happened in the last several decades is that the time between waves has shortened. Companies have had to deal with changes like the internet, smart phones and social media, and now AI.

   Alvin Toffler in Future Shock (written in 1984) argues that the accelerating pace of technological, social, and economic change can overwhelm people's ability to adapt. Toffler calls this condition "future shock"—a state of stress, confusion, and disorientation caused by too much change in too little time. He predicted exactly what we are experiencing now. I think companies are also going through this kind of shock and likely the average life span of companies will continue decreasing.

   Going back to the waves and surfing. A company is a bunch of people on a surf board and the waves are coming faster and faster. Waves can be opportunities or they could kill the company. And so we need to think about how to structure a company so that it is agile and can catch waves or get out of the way of waves. I feel companies need to be much more fluildly structured so they can adapt to fast moving changes in the environment. Most companies are structured too rigidly.

   Another metaphor for thinking about companies is as a multicellular organisms, where individual cells are people. As with multicellular organisms, companies will need to evolve into more advanced organizations. The way this happens with organisms is through death and mutation and can take millions of years. The same thing happens with companies, they die, and people leave to join or start another company, taking some of the lessons with them. This rate of evolution is very slow, so we need to think about how we can change the dna of an existing company. I feel structure and environment within the company can play a role here.

   Also, I feel gravity applies to individual self-interest of which financial is a subset. With any organizational group, you are trying to take individuals with their own self-interest and are trying to align them to achieve something that is greater. If you can pull it off, each individual can realize much more of their potential and the group can achieve far more. But the force of self-interest is always pulling to break things apart, and for this you need to put in structures that maintain integrity.

   Again, thanks for writing the book. I enjoyed it.

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2. cybrexalphaNov 2024
   I disagree with the implication that flat structures "don't scale" or can never work. To be effective in a flat environment requires a fundamental shift in perspective. Hierarchy is so baked in to every other company, organization, and education system that people just don't know how to operate absent it.

   ICs will need time to adjust to a flat structure, and some people will do anything to fight the absence of the restrictions they've always known. Hiring a bunch of senior ICs from traditional industry roles and saying "we're not going to have managers!" is always going to fail.

   For a CTO/founder it's even easier: If you're building a VC-funded start-up where the plan is to grow fast exit in a few years — what's the point? Why invest the effort and energy to making flat work when the moment you get bought out the hierarchy is back anyway.

   There are examples of stable large companies with flat org charts that do work, they're just not the hypergrowth scale-ups. The book "Reinventing Organizations" covers several in depth, and is a good intro to the topic. So my objection is the implication that a flat structure can never work, or that there is something fundamental about a flat org and human nature that means it's unstable. It is simply that it requires long-term investment to get right, and the market isn't setup to reward long-term investment.

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3. pdfernhoutJul 2024
   I put together a "High Performance Organizations Reading List" which includes a reference to "Reinventing Organizations: A Guide to Creating Organizations Inspired by the Next Stage of Human Consciousness" by Frédéric Laloux. You and "LeFantome" who wrote about Creo might find that book and other resources there of interest. Laloux's book provides examples of various companies with better management. https://github.com/pdfernhout/High-Performance-Organizations...

   Better and healthier organizations are possible, as Laloux writes about. They are rare though -- and difficult to sustain in our current Western society. As with Creo, you definitely need enlightened management or enlightened major shareholders to "hold the space" as Laloux writes.

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4. josephgJul 2024
   Right. In one sense, what we're talking about is different ideas on how companies / teams work. There's a wonderful book called "Reinventing Organizations" by Laloux that I recommend to basically everyone. In the book, the authors lay out a series of different organisational structures which have been invented and used throughout the ages. The book talks about early tribes where the big man tells everyone what to do (eg mobsters), to rigid hierarchies + fixed roles (the church, schools) to modern corporations with a flexible hierarchy, and some organisation structures beyond that.

   The question of "who is ultimately responsible" changes based on how we see the organisation. In organisations where the chief decides everything, its up to the chief to decide if they should place blame on someone or not. In a modern corporation, people at the bottom of the hierarchy are shielded from the consequences of their actions by the corporation. But there's also a weird form of infantilisation that goes along with that. We don't actually trust people on the ground to take responsibility for the work they do. All responsibility goes up the management hierarchy, along with control, power and pay. Its sort of assumed that people who haven't been promoted are too incompetent to make important choices.

   I don't think thats the final form of how high functioning teams should work. Its noble that you're willing to put your head on the chopping block, but I think its also really important to give maximal agency to your employees. And that includes making people feel responsible and empowered to fix problems when they see them. You get more out of people by treating them like adults, not children. And they learn more, and I think that's usually, in the long run, better for everyone.

   I agree that if a company has a bad process, employees shouldn't be fired over it. But I also think if you're an employee in a company with a bad process, you should fight to make the process better. Never let yourself be complicit in a mistake like this.

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5. JackMorganMay 2024
   Wow, this is interesting, very few books I've read more than once! Even fewer are non fiction, but they sure do explain a lot about me:

   - Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving by Pete Walker helped me process a number of assaults that happened to me as a child

   - Designing Data Intensive Applications by Martin Kleppmann helped me understand intuitively how databases work and how to use eventual consistency to handle workloads

   - The Highly Sensitive Person: How To Thrive when the World Overwhelms You by Elaine Aron this helped me process my and my families neurodivergence.

   - Structure And Interpretation of Computer Programs by Ableson and Sussman. Great book, it's how I learned to love Lisp. I felt like I grew 10x in skill from completing all the homework.

   - Starting Strength: Basic Barbell Training by Mark Rippetoe. This is the book that got me into powerlifting as a regular part of my fitness. I used this to heal my back, neck, and wrist pain. Changed my life.

   - Color and Light: A Guide for the Realist Painter by James Gurney. The GOAT of plein air painting himself teaches so much about how light works on complex forms. I've dog-eared this book.

   - Reinventing Organizations by Frederic Laloux. A great look into how to build and run a self organizing team. Very insightful for when I was leading several teams and needed inspiration for something other than the typical chain of command.

   - The Classroom Management Book by Harry Wong. This book taught me so much about how humans work. I still apply lessons from this book 20 years later.

   - Real World Haskell by O'Sullivan, Goerzen, Stewart. This taught me a lot about Haskell, and got me into all the neat effects needed to make a function pure but still handle IO/async, etc.

   - Peopleware by DeMarco, Lister. My go to book for people management and a philosophy of project management

   - Science of Trust: Emotional Attunement for Couples by Gottman. I love this book for teaching me how to be a better spouse and friend.

   - The Bogleheads' Guide to Investing by Larimore, Lindauer. A great guide to building a permanent portfolio that will return consistent gains with the market. Simple in hindsight, thanks to this book. Best book on investing I've ever read.

   - How to Take Smart Notes by Ahrens. Introduces the zettlekasten system for thinking and creativity. Very inspiring, got me to start a personal file that I keep going to this day, five years later.

   - Twenty Small Sailboats to Take you Anywhere by Vigor. I read this book over and over, dreaming of buying a small boat and sailing around the world. Maybe this year...

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6. billibillNov 2023
   If you're looking to understand how some companies are ditching the old school pyramid for a more modern and flat structure, check out 'Reinventing Organizations' by Frederic Laloux.

   It's packed with real-life examples of companies doing things differently and practical tips on how you can too.

   And if you’re on the hunt for more books that tackle change in the workplace, check out this list: https://www.readupnext.com/list/best-change-management-books

   It's a great resource for finding similar reads!

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