How to control the complexity of enterprises

First, the "complexity" of enterprise management

At present, although the enterprise system is becoming more and more perfect and rich, employees are still often at a loss in their work; Although enterprise functional managers are busy with various affairs all day, many people don't know what the purpose of doing these jobs is; Although a number of indicators are listed in the assessment of an employee, he still feels that his work has not been properly measured and affirmed. The appearance of these phenomena is essentially that enterprises have suffered from "complex management syndrome" at this time. Its typical characteristics are management for management and assessment for assessment, and enterprise management has gradually deviated from the original intention of enterprise value creation. When the complex management system does not produce positive effects, but makes employees tired of coping, managers will naturally hope that management can be simplified. The core of "simple management" is to grasp the principle and the key. Judging from the evolution of enterprise management practice, the management of no enterprise is complicated from the beginning. It's always easy at first. It is all about mastering principles, grasping key problems and solving key problems. If we can't analyze how the management of an enterprise becomes complicated and just want to return to the era of "simple and beautiful at first", we may fall into a vicious circle of "complex-simple-complex-simple again" in order to make the management messy and more complicated.

(A) the causes of the complexity of enterprise management

For an enterprise, when the scale of the enterprise is relatively small and the personnel structure is relatively simple, the important decisions of enterprise management are basically made directly by the enterprise leaders. At this time, the management was relatively simple and principled, and the leadership of the enterprise was high. Moreover, at this stage, the development speed of enterprises is relatively fast, the promotion space of employees is relatively large, the management work is less controversial, and the management is naturally smoother. With the expansion of enterprise scale, the increase of enterprise personnel, the stability of operating conditions, the continuous enrichment and improvement of enterprise management system, the management work has become increasingly complex until the above-mentioned "complex management syndrome" appears. Investigate its reason, mainly caused by the following four reasons:

(1) For risk control, the system is constantly enriched and refined.

Enterprise management is related to the survival and development of enterprises, and it is very important for enterprises. When the scale of the enterprise is expanding, the time and energy of the enterprise leaders are limited, and many important management decisions must be delegated to subordinates, the enterprise leaders naturally worry that the enterprise will have problems such as "cronyism", "envy of talents", "cronyism" and "perfunctory things", so they hope to restrain the relevant people and things through systems and very specific regulations to prevent the problems that the enterprise leaders are worried about.

(2) I hope to establish a fair assessment and distribution system within the enterprise and constantly revise and improve the assessment and incentive system.

When the scale of the enterprise is relatively small and the development is relatively fast, employees will be encouraged by the development prospects of the enterprise, and there are also a large number of job vacancies within the enterprise, so employees have a greater chance of promotion. At this time, most employees will not care about the gains and losses of immediate interests. However, when the development of the enterprise tends to be stable and the management team is basically established, the development space that employees can see in the enterprise begins to become limited. At this time, it is inevitable to "haggle over every ounce" and compare with each other. In order to reduce employees' grievances, enterprises have begun to attach importance to the distribution mechanism recognized by most employees, constantly modifying and increasing the content, and hope that the performance appraisal of enterprises can comprehensively and scientifically evaluate the work of employees, and through the appropriate assessment of the distribution mechanism and employee performance, the sense of fairness and satisfaction of employees can be improved accordingly.

(3) Many managers are keen on formulating systems and regard them as tools to compete for benefits and evade responsibilities.

Not only the leaders of enterprises, but also managers at all levels are keen on editing systems. On the one hand, because the system management of many enterprises is not perfect, many systems are compiled by relevant departments and signed by enterprise leaders, so many departments begin to compile some systems that are beneficial to their own departments, and then try their best to get them passed, and then "do things according to the rules". As a result, there are many systems formulated by different departments, and their contents conflict with each other, resulting in many disputes; On the other hand, there are various practical problems in the process of enterprise management, and even if the system is written in detail, it is impossible to foresee them all. When confronted with practical problems, especially thorny ones, many departments still "act according to the rules". No matter what the result, no matter what impact it has on the enterprise, as long as it is handled according to the system, all responsibilities can be shirked. Besides, the system itself still has the problem of low quality. It is for this reason that managers at all levels add fuel to the flames and aggravate the "complex management syndrome" of enterprises.

(4) the role of special classes

Due to specific historical reasons and cultural background, a considerable number of enterprises have been branded as "familial", "politicized" and "humanized". Family relationship, political monopoly and humanized loyalty have all played an important role in the growth of enterprises. For example, the boss's brother has been the boss of the company for many years. Everyone knows that he will never be promoted in this life or even in the next, and it is absolutely impossible to run this enterprise well. But dare you "get rid of" him? Another example is a highly politicized monopoly enterprise. Can you refuse an obvious layman's high-level sent by your superiors? Moreover, almost all directors of private enterprises are family members, and they don't even know what directors are, what they supervise and how to supervise them. Can you replace her if she is unqualified? This is the enterprise situation of China enterprises. The existence of "family", "political" and "people-oriented" employees also adds weight to "the complexity of enterprise management".

(B) the crux of the complexity of enterprise management

Why do enterprises constantly enrich the management system, but the problems have not been solved, instead, they constantly produce new problems? The main reason is that the management of enterprises is easy to enter three misunderstandings:

(1) exaggerates the function of the system.

Many enterprises exaggerate the role of the system, thinking that as long as there is a good system, people are not important and anyone can change; I believe that as long as the system is reasonable, enterprises can operate in an orderly manner and their economic benefits can be improved. In essence, there are bound to be some problems in the system of enterprises, both in formulation and implementation. Moreover, the enterprise and its internal and external environment are always in dynamic change, and the reality is ever-changing. The system can't be perfect and practical. The result of exaggerating the role of the system is to let enterprises constantly formulate the system, but it can't solve the problem well. In particular, the management of human resources is different from the production process of enterprises, with clear standards and processes, and there are great differences between people. If we follow the "one size fits all" system, it will not only simplify the problem, but also cause dissatisfaction among some employees, increase conflicts and contradictions within the enterprise, increase friction and aggravate the complexity of management.

(2) Too much pursuit of internal fairness.

"Efficiency first, giving consideration to fairness" should be the basic principle of enterprise management. Excessive pursuit of fairness will be counterproductive. Business is not a court. The purpose of the court is to maintain fairness and justice, but the purpose of the enterprise is to create value. Many enterprises hope that the assessment system can fully reflect all the work and work effects of employees, which leads to a large workload of assessment itself and takes up a lot of enterprise resources, but the result is that the finer the assessment, the more problems employees think; The wider the scope of evaluation, the more divorced from reality the evaluation results are; Usually, the more you try to win recognition, the more you are opposed; The more you pursue fairness, the more unfair employees feel.

(3) excessive dependence on economic means

Economic means is only one of the means of enterprise management, and there are many means of enterprise internal management, such as cultural guidance, emotional maintenance, on-site supervision, work communication, development prospect encouragement and so on. Trying to collect all management problems into performance appraisal and economic management is essentially to raise the problems that can be solved in the daily management of many departments to the enterprise level and accumulate them at the end of the month, quarter or year, which increases the complexity and controversy of management. The resources invested to settle disputes further increase the operating cost of enterprises, and disputes will also affect the enthusiasm of employees and the operating efficiency of enterprises. It is the lack of other management methods that leads to the lack of long-term and reliable ties between enterprises and employees, which affects the stability of the workforce, the cohesion and centripetal force of enterprises and increases the business risks of enterprises.

Second, break the infinite loop and realize "simple" management.

The above misunderstandings of enterprise management are encountered by every enterprise in the process of development. To truly realize "simple and effective" management, we must jump out of the infinite loop from simple to complex, from complex to simple, and from simple to complex. To break this endless cycle, we must cultivate the core culture of enterprises, clarify the management system of enterprises, straighten out the interest structure of enterprises and improve the internal competition mechanism.

(A) to cultivate the core culture of enterprises

Corporate culture is not a slogan hanging on the wall, nor is it a slogan hung by leaders, but a value recognized by employees and a core principle embodied in the enterprise's employment concept and management system. Many enterprises have designed gorgeous and passionate corporate culture, but in essence, the key to corporate culture is "standing at attention and keeping upright". The so-called "emphasis" is to ensure that the corporate culture is positive and complementary to the core interests of the enterprise; "Keeping the middle" emphasizes balance, neither too radical nor too conservative, otherwise it will be "excessive". In addition, the corporate culture represents the core values and management concepts of the enterprise and embodies the normative requirements of the enterprise. Attention should be paid to maintaining the balance of interests within the enterprise, so that the enterprise can develop stably for a long time.

(B) a clear enterprise management system

Enterprise management is not only a human resource management system, but also the whole enterprise management system needs to be clear. Defining the management system does not mean that the simpler the system, the better. Sometimes "complexity" is also a kind of simplicity. For example, the manuals of some cooking companies are very complicated and detailed, but they make employees feel very simple at work. On the contrary, the instructions of many China cooking companies are very simple, such as "add a little salt and steam for a few minutes", which makes employees feel that the operation is complicated and difficult to master. This is the spirit of "refined management" demanded by enterprises in recent years. To realize the clarity of management system, it is necessary to systematize and concretize first. Enterprise system must be managed centrally, which conforms to the core value system of the enterprise. The introduction of any new system must go through a strict audit-evaluation-approval procedure. The very important purpose of enterprise management system is to control risks, and the first thing is to control systemic risks, so as to eliminate the systemic risks of enterprise management through management system. Secondly, it is hierarchical and hierarchical control. It can't all be "one pole to the end", regardless of the details. I want to grasp too much and too tightly, and I can't grasp anything well. Business risks cannot be completely eliminated, but can only be effectively controlled.

(C) straighten out the interest structure of enterprises

The performance appraisal of enterprises mainly corresponds to the short-term and direct economic benefits of employees. The interest relationship within the enterprise includes both current interests and long-term interests; It includes not only the actual economic interests, but also the interests of emotions, feelings and personal development. The key to straighten out the internal interest structure is to build a clear internal interest relationship framework, so that every department and employee can know what benefits or conveniences they want to provide for enterprises, other departments and other employees, to what extent, what benefits they can get, and what is the basic corresponding relationship between their contribution and income. The structure of internal interest relationship in an enterprise does not need to be as detailed and accurate as the performance appraisal system, but it must ensure that all employees' understanding and efforts are consistent with the core interests of the enterprise.

(D) Improve the internal competition mechanism

When an enterprise develops to a certain stage, it will almost fall into the dilemma of relatively solidified management team members. Without the mechanism of "promotion and demotion" of cadres, old employees will regard their current income as rigid welfare, and they hope to get more benefits regardless of whether their contribution to enterprise benefits has improved or not. At the same time, solidified managers are also prone to problems such as cliques, which affect the enthusiasm of work and the stability of the workforce. Due to the influence of old employees, new employees will feel that their career development space is limited. All employees should have a sense of crisis, and only by having "danger" and "opportunity" can we maintain the vitality of the workforce, make the enterprise develop better and make employees get benefits; Lack of crisis will make employees, especially old employees, comfortable with the status quo, and will inevitably care about immediate interests, even if it is only a little profit, which will complicate simple problems and reduce employee satisfaction.

Third, about management methods.

In the future, management must be simple, effective and refined. Traditional extensive management will be greatly challenged. In the future, the competition among enterprises must be management competition, which is also the foundation of achieving first-class enterprises. An enterprise that can become a world-class brand is rooted in its first-class management concept. But at this point, many local enterprises, especially small and medium-sized enterprises, are still far behind. It can even be said that a large part of enterprises simply don't know what management is.

(A) "post management" method

"Enterprise management" is actually mainly the management of "people". However, anyone who has engaged in management knows that almost all organizational design theories tell us that in the process of management reform, the primary principle of organizational design is to "set posts according to things and allocate people according to posts", and to "put the right people in the right posts" and never "set posts according to people". And almost all managers have encountered such management embarrassment: "people-post matching" can not be implemented in enterprises at all. First, almost no one in the enterprise can meet the job requirements, and the possibility of external recruitment is even smaller; Second, some people obviously fail to meet the standards, but they have to use them, and they have to put them in a position that even they think is impossible. Due to specific historical reasons and cultural background, a considerable number of enterprises have been branded as "familial", "politicized" and "humanized". Family relationship, political monopoly and humanized loyalty have all played an important role in the growth of enterprises. This is an inevitable business situation in China. Therefore, in the process of organizational design, we must not turn a blind eye to this actual situation, nor can we copy the western organizational design theory. Ignoring this actual situation will often lead to potential management contradictions within the enterprise and will certainly hinder the management reform of the whole organization. When managing change and organizational design, we must face the reality of "mismatch of human resources". Only under the existing organizational resources, we should not only design post standards according to standards, but also design organizational processes according to special circumstances. We should not only "set posts according to events", but also "set posts according to people", "select people according to posts" and "give consideration to balance", otherwise we will only leave full regrets. The relevant measures are: if you are under an obviously incompetent "leader", you can assign a more professional assistant or deputy. The assistant can carry out specific management affairs, and the leader can give orders specifically. You can also put obviously unqualified but very "special" people in a post first, then formulate norms, implement assessment, strengthen training, give time, let "special" people gradually improve, and then let them "self-eliminate"; We can also establish an internal human resources mechanism to train young knowledge workers as the "third echelon" and slowly "substitute posts".

(B) "Cultural Management" Law

In today's management, we often encounter some problems of management standards and methods. For example, managers and employees get along too closely, thinking that it is convenient to manage and communicate with subordinates, but the closer they are, the more difficult it is to manage. Lose prestige, act at will, disobey orders. In severe cases, employees feel too harsh, resistant and inefficient. Enterprise management at this time, might as well learn from the wisdom accumulated in China's historical and traditional culture. "Rule the world by legalism, rule the world by Confucianism and rule the world by Taoism". Make the enterprise team create a harmonious and powerful enterprise management model and cultural atmosphere. Legalists advocate "ruling the country according to law". Legalists advocate: reward for merit, punishment for fault, and a clear system of reward and punishment; Advocate equality between people and "divide without fighting". "Law is not from ancient times, not from now on", and the application of legalist thought to today's enterprise management is of great reference significance. In China, Confucian culture prevailed for more than two thousand years. Confucian culture values benevolence and harmony, and teaches people how to behave, how to do things, harmonious relations and benevolence. Taoism advocates "doing nothing without doing anything" and "governing by doing nothing". The philosophical connotation of Taoism is flexible and firm, taking retreat as progress and strong toughness. In the atmosphere of observing rules and regulations, we can live in harmony with everyone and create emotional management based on law. Do it with strength, fear the world, and rely on morality to protect the world. Legalists, Confucianists and Taoists have their own characteristics and cannot be used independently in enterprise management. Relying too much on the law to govern enterprises will easily lead to employees' lack of sense of belonging, low loyalty and even feeling unequal and oppressed, which is entirely driven by interests. Once such enterprises encounter a major crisis or predicament, they will easily collapse and fall apart. Paying too much attention to Confucianism and "harmony is precious" will easily lead to the lifelessness of enterprises. The application of Taoist thought can only be introduced on the basis of corporate governance according to law and professional ethics education. When enterprises don't even have a mature and perfect reward and punishment system, talk about doing nothing. At this time, if you want to do nothing, it can only be chaos in the world.

Four. conclusion

No matter how the enterprise reforms, no matter what kind of asset portfolio and operating mechanism the enterprise implements, it needs "management". Only by cultivating the core culture, clarifying the enterprise management system, rationalizing the enterprise interest structure and improving the internal competition mechanism, and applying the methods of "personnel post management" and "cultural management" can enterprises manipulate a management reform without bloodshed. Consciously avoid management misunderstandings, master core principles, grasp key issues, reduce the vicious circle of simplicity and disorder or complexity and ineffectiveness, and change "complexity" into "simplicity". Only in this way can we truly realize "simple and effective" management and improve the management efficiency of enterprises.

Author: Luo Work Unit: Yuyao General Instrument Co., Ltd.