Book Review: How Organizations Should Work, by N. Dean Meyer

Simple isn’t easy… but it’s worthwhile!?

Dean Meyer ’s book, How Organizations Should Work, is based on a simple concept:? every group in an organization is a “business within a business” (BWB).?

Building on this foundational concept, Meyer identifies a simple framework of all the lines of business that exist in any organization and seven straightforward principles for assembling them into an organization chart.? He describes a simple process for drawing together teams from among those lines of business, tailored to the needs of each project, process (or service).? He applies market economics internally to align budgets and priorities across the organization. It’s a straightforward concept that we all understand and experience through the way goods and services are bought and sold in our daily lives.? And he addresses culture and metrics to reinforce entrepreneurial thinking.

Meyer's vision aligns seamlessly with the principles of USM as a management system, while also extending beyond it to complete the governance picture. This approach fosters an organizational ecosystem that supports high performance in both initiatives (projects) and ongoing services.

The BWB paradigm ties USM's foundational concepts—separation of duties and clear service definitions—to the way internal groups function and document their services, fostering a systematic and effective approach to service management.

People are not managed by tasks, but rather are commissioned to deliver their products and services – results that are of value to others – just as USM advocates demonstrating measurable value, ensuring that processes are not just operational but impactful.

Like USM, Meyer rejects over-engineering processes, instead offering a simple cross-boundary team-formation process.? Groups view one another as customers and suppliers, consistent with USM’s customer-supplier interaction model.? Teams form as they subcontract with peers for needed components or support services.? Thus, any product or service can be produced by assembling the right internal businesses onto teams – an internal “value-chain.”? And individual accountabilities within these cross-boundary teams are clear.

Like USM, this method enables dynamic and adaptive processes through its standardized team-formation “meta-process.”? Its flexibility lies in maintaining a non-redundant, universal structure, while allowing localization at procedure and work instruction levels.? It's a simple, scalable method for managing the “social circuitry” of an enterprise, aligning diverse teams and stakeholders.

Performance is encouraged by metrics, including competitive benchmarks and internal customer satisfaction.? This embodies the embedded feedback loops (metrics) in the USM process model.

BWB organizations are stable as they evolve, as they must with an ever-expanding array of practice frameworks. ?These frameworks, while valuable, often lead to the need for never-ending "process realignment."? But in a BWB organization, each line of business can evolve its methods while internal value-chains remain essentially the same; or when new capabilities create new possibilities, new value-chains are defined dynamically as people subcontract for different things.

Like USM, BWB applies seamlessly in IT and non-IT contexts alike. Like USM, BWB is an application of systems thinking to organizations.

Meyer’s book offers insights that are both profound and actionable.? It challenges traditional approaches like product silos, matrix, and process-aligned structures.? BWB organizations are agile, scalable, innovative, results-focused, and empowered. ?

How Organizations Should Work is a must-read for leaders who aim to design accountable, functional, and scalable organizations.?

Many initial USM deployments often start "bottom-up," focusing on a particular line of business (LOB). However, Meyer's work can be leveraged as part of a "top-down" transformational change program, where USM becomes a central component. For USM advocates, Meyer's insights provide an invaluable guide to aligning service management practices with the broader organizational ecosystem. USM experts can apply these principles to embed their processes within a cohesive and effective operating model.

For those with a more ambitious outlook, Meyer’s book offers a strategic perspective that enables USM practitioners to elevate their work from focusing solely on process improvement to influencing organizational design.

By integrating the structural clarity of Meyer’s model with the operational discipline of USM, organizations can achieve a rare balance of simplicity, flexibility, and effectiveness in today’s increasingly complex environments.

John Worthington, USM Coach