Your Organization is not a Tree

Have you ever noticed that almost every organization has a “tree” diagram to visualize its structure—and that no organization actually functions that way?

The traditional org chart exists more out of tradition than usefulness. Or perhaps to perpetuate the illusion of control and dominance for those at the top of the hierarchy. Yet, because it persists, it remains a powerful frame for how we think organizations ought to work. That creates more than a visualization problem; it’s a source of enduring dysfunction.

This is one of the insights I came to when exploring city planning as a way to look at organizational design. I happened upon a 1966 article by Christopher Alexander, an academic trained in architecture and mathematics, “A City Is Not a Tree.” Alexander was looking at why meticulously planned urban areas were often less vibrant than those that developed more spontaneously. Everything looked great on the plan, but in practice the results were less than satisfying. Does it remind you of your latest reorg?

Alexander compared two types of structures: the tree and the semi-lattice. A tree is a simple, hierarchical structure where each part is connected to only a few others, much like traditional organization charts where field offices report to regional headquarters and so on. However, Alexander argued that real cities and organizations function more like a semi-lattice, where there are countless connections between different parts, most of which are informal and spontaneous.

In essence, Alexander argued that cities were dynamic, living systems not static structures. Successful ones evolve and adapt to changing conditions, desires, and aspirations.

Organizations, much like cities, are designed as tree structures on paper, but they function as semi-lattices in practice, with informal networks and spontaneous interactions. While leaders often attempt to create order through matrix reporting structures, they overlook the inherent complexity that resists such simplification. According to Alexander, the human brain (at least the conscious brain) simply can’t design structures at the level of complexity found in a semi-lattice.

To illustrate this, Alexander suggested an exercise: Draw random dots on two pieces of paper. On one, draw circles around subsets of dots without any overlaps — this represents a tree structure. On the other, allow the circles to overlap — this is a semi-lattice. While a tree structure with 20 dots can only have up to 19 subsets, a semi-lattice with the same number of dots can have more than a million. This demonstrates the complexity and interconnections in real-world systems.

Instead of trying to force order through rigid rules and hierarchies, leaders should embrace emergent self-organization to unleash human potential. That means creating as few rules as absolutely necessary and focusing on establishing clarity in three areas: purpose, values, and performance.

Purpose, in this context, means understanding the customer the job they are looking for you to help them do—what hole would be left in the universe if your organization disappeared? Values refer to the enduring commitments made in conducting business—guiding principles that define the playing field and relationships with and responsibilities to stakeholders. Performance encompasses financial metrics as well as measures for customer satisfaction and value alignment. Clarity in these three areas creates a “true north” for coherence while allowing flexibility and freedom of action to solve problems and create value.

Ultimately, an organization is not a tree and treating it as such leads to frustration, disengagement, and suboptimal performance. Recognizing and embracing the complexity of a semi-lattice structure will enable your organization to be more effective, nimble, and adaptive.

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