Modern Business Structures and Workplace Flexibility

Business Structures and Employee Motivation

Businesses come in many guises, from the lonely-sounding self-employed person and sole trader, through the SME (small to medium-sized enterprise), to the multinational with its hierarchy and tens of thousands of employees. However, the questions about what motivates people are basically the same everywhere.

The first question that self-employed people are asked is how they find the self-discipline to work alone and motivate themselves when there is no one telling them what to do. Some companies also seek this trait; job advertisements often talk about the need for recruits to be self-starters. Some organisations, like advertising agencies, want to find ways of motivating their people to be ever more productive and creative. Employees and their managers in this type of organisation are relatively autonomous—they aren't given exact procedures on how to meet objectives.

Centralized vs. Autonomous Cultures

Conversely, other organisations, like banks, need people who can follow rules and apply procedures. You do not want too much creativity when cashiers are counting banknotes. These tend to be organisations with centralised cultures where exact procedures must be followed and are imposed from above.

In organisations of all kinds, the tendency is towards relatively flat structures with only a few levels of hierarchy. This way, senior management remains relatively close to the people dealing with clients.

The Rise of Workplace Flexibility

The current buzzword is flexibility, which has a number of related meanings:

• Flexitime or flextime: People can choose when they work, within certain limits.
• Flexible working: Staff may engage in hot-desking, particularly those who are homeworking, teleworking, or telecommuting and only need to come into the office occasionally.

The number of teleworkers is rising rapidly, thanks partly to the decreasing cost and increasing availability of fast broadband and mobile Internet connections.

The Future of Employment

A third type of flexibility involves recruiting employees on short contracts to work on specific projects, perhaps part-time. Some organisations maintain only a core staff and outsource or contract out work to external people or companies as required. Some management experts suggest this is the future, with self-employment as the norm and portfolio workers who manage a number of different clients.