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Brave New Work: Are You Ready to Reinvent Your Organization?

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"This is the management book of the year. Clear, powerful and urgent, it's a must read for anyone who cares about where they work and how they work."
--Seth Godin, author of This is Marketing

"This book is a breath of fresh air. Read it now, and make sure your boss does too."
--Adam Grant, New York Times bestselling author of Give and Take, Originals, and Option B with Sheryl Sandberg


When fast-scaling startups and global organizations get stuck, they call Aaron Dignan. In this book, he reveals his proven approach for eliminating red tape, dissolving bureaucracy, and doing the best work of your life.

He's found that nearly everyone, from Wall Street to Silicon Valley, points to the same frustrations: lack of trust, bottlenecks in decision making, siloed functions and teams, meeting and email overload, tiresome budgeting, short-term thinking, and more.

Is there any hope for a solution? Haven't countless business gurus promised the answer, yet changed almost nothing about the way we work?

That's because we fail to recognize that organizations aren't machines to be predicted and controlled. They're complex human systems full of potential waiting to be released.

Dignan says you can't fix a team, department, or organization by tinkering around the edges. Over the years, he has helped his clients completely reinvent their operating systems--the fundamental principles and practices that shape their culture--with extraordinary success.

Imagine a bank that abandoned traditional budgeting, only to outperform its competition for decades. An appliance manufacturer that divided itself into 2,000 autonomous teams, resulting not in chaos but rapid growth. A healthcare provider with an HQ of just 50 people supporting over 14,000 people in the field--that is named the "best place to work" year after year. And even a team that saved $3 million per year by cancelling one monthly meeting.

Their stories may sound improbable, but in Brave New Work you'll learn exactly how they and other organizations are inventing a smarter, healthier, and more effective way to work. Not through top down mandates, but through a groundswell of autonomy, trust, and transparency.

Whether you lead a team of ten or ten thousand, improving your operating system is the single most powerful thing you can do. The only question is, are you ready?

304 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2019

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Aaron Dignan

3 books39 followers

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Displaying 1 - 30 of 137 reviews
Profile Image for Alexandra.
799 reviews41 followers
July 20, 2019
I agree with a lot of the practical advice (located in the last third of the book)

BUT IT WAS REALLY ENFURIATING TO HAVE TO READ THE YAWN-INDUCING FIRST SECTION. ugh the whole point of the book is that people won't come round all at once and that it may take a few cycles or hands on work to prove this will work for you org so WHY did the author feel it was necessary to talk ad nauseam about how right he was.

getting away from that: the stuff about complex vs complicated was great. systems thinking - lovely. and the 8 billion conversation starters.

I particularly love talks about strategy - it's so simple: pick one good thing over another good thing.

looping and real retros - I'm a big believer in making things 3% better today instead of thinking about a big plan for a long time before starting anything.

If the book had only been the second half I would have given this 5 stars. but otherwise it rehashed a lot of stories from other same genre books (why yes, I have read all the books you read that made you think you could write a book) and being upset about the status quo over and over. unnecessary.
Profile Image for Tim Casasola.
10 reviews22 followers
August 31, 2018
If you are a leader or change agent who is fired up to drive actual change in your organization, this book is for you. Not only will you nod your head to the fact that our current way of working isn’t fit for today’s world, you’ll be inspired by brave organizations that work in better ways. Most of all, you’ll leave with a clear idea for how to facilitate an organization towards its continuous evolution.
Profile Image for Michal Meško.
17 reviews345 followers
August 26, 2022
Výborná kniha na tému evolúcie organizácií, manažmentu a práce. Ak ste čítali knihy ako Svoboda v práci, Budoucnost organizací alebo Conscious Capitalism, väčšina príbehov a princípov vám bude známa. Autor ich tu len namixoval trochu inak a rozšíril o svoje skúsenosti. Napriek tomu je to písané celkom čítavo, zrozumiteľne, aj s konkrétnymi radami ako na to, ak ste pripravení začať transformovať svoju firmu či tím na organizáciu, ktorá má svoj zmysel (že tým nemyslíme primárne vytváranie zisku je hádam dnes už jasné). Na firmu skutočne tvorenú ľuďmi, ktorí sú schopní úžasných výsledkov aj bez nastavovania a vyhodnocovania plánov, pevných procesov a pravidiel, a kde môžu byť sami sebou. Ak ste zatiaľ nemali možnosť nazrieť do možného sveta takejto budúcnosti, smelo začnite touto knihou.
Profile Image for Sam Spurlin.
10 reviews9 followers
August 7, 2018
This book does an incredible job of laying out an inspirational and rational future for what work could and should be like. Dignan clearly shows how the old ways of working (bureaucracy, command-and-control, rigid hierarchy, etc.) emerged from a particular time and place (the Industrial Era) that no longer applies to the volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world in which we now find ourselves. It makes no sense for our organizations to be running an operating system developed and optimized for the 19th century.

Not content to make a purely theoretical argument, Dignan dives deep into the case history of what he calls Evolutionary Organizations — the organizations who are bravely charting a new path and a new way of working. Finally, Dignan closes the book by offering profound and applicable advice about how to create change within organizations. The change models you learned in business school need not apply — we’re in a new world now.

Be on the lookout when this book comes out in 2019. It’s going to be a game changer.
Profile Image for Sunny.
771 reviews45 followers
January 16, 2020
6 stars. I knew I was going to like this book because it started off with a quote from one of my favourite writers called Andre Gide. :-)

The book has a few fairly fundamental ideas.

1: That we should look at companies that are “people positive and complexity conscious” and see what they are doing differently to the model that we are used to running our organisations. (see list of these companies at the bottom).

2: The book talks about an Operating System (OS) Canvas comprising 12 areas which it splits and goes into 12 chapters about (purpose, authority, structure, strategy, resources, innovation, workflow, meetings, information, membership, mastery, compensation). Again it gives examples of organisations that are doing things differently in these 12 critical areas.

3: The books key takeaway for me: we don't have to operate as ivory tower HQ organisations that foist the decisions in a centralized manner into our different divisions and countries that we operate in. We CAN operate as decentralised, pseudo “market-place” organisms that operate decentrally and make decisions independently and ultimately with trust and fearlessness. My personal question I often put to friends and colleagues: What would happen if you took fear and greed out of the business equation?”

Anyway, enough rambling from me, here are the best bits from the book:

Deep down I think we all have a pretty good idea of what will happen if we don’t change how we work. We are watching it unfold in slow motion right now. Massive bureaucracy is lacking conscience or purpose. Start-ups meant to disrupt the status quo unintentionally entrenching it. Rampant unequality. Wage stagnation. Work is displaced by technology funded with the profits from the labour of the workers. Nationalism. Hacked and hackneyed democracy. A stock market driven more by policy and punditry then by performance. And the coup de grâce, exhilarating climate change that threatens the safety and security of billions of people. All of it the result of a mindless adherence to the ways of the past, to an operating system that fundamentally misunderstands complexity and human nature. This isn’t the uplifting capitalism of a burgeoning economy, it’s advanced capitalism At best and crony capitalism at worst.

The question that must be asked is what would we do if we were starting with a blank sheet of paper? If the answer is anything other than what we’ve got, we have work to do.

How do you change your complex adaptive system? The city planner in search of more green space in Manhattan could invision An ideal future where a new city Park is built out into the Hudson River. But her chances of realising that vision would be slim to none. Even armed with support and funding construction could take years. The second Avenue subway was conceived in 1919. It didn’t open until 2017. Complexity will surprise you. Alternatively Our planner could look up and notice that an abandoned elevated railway running from the meatpacking district to Chelsea in New York City has been colonised by wild plants, creating what looks like a linear Park in the sky. That’s exactly what Josh and Robert noticed before they founded friends of the highline, a non-profit dedicated to the railways preservation and re-use as a public park. Upon opening, the highline was an instant phenomena and today attracts more than 5 million visitors a year. In an unexpected twist the buildings and real estate around the park have now skyrocketed in value. The areas along the highline are among the most desirable in the city. All because someone started with what was already there.

Language is an interesting aspect of this work because our vocabulary for describing culture and ways of working is limited in popular business culture. Just as the Inuit dialect has 53 words for snow as your teams depth of knowledge grows so too will their vocabulary. Meeting becomes too generic. What kind of meeting? Complaint becomes too passive. Process that attention. Soft words such as safety and sensing and wholeness start to show up. And in many cases the culture makes up a few words and phrases of its own. Go “crazative”with your creation :-). At “the ready” we call our weekly all hands meeting “full circle” which have a specific meaning to us and no one else. If you see the language changing at scale that signals criticality. Because language is how we make meaning.

Meanwhile in Seattle a game developer called valve produces regular hits and industry defining products and platforms. The company generates more than $1 billion in revenue with a headcount of roughly 400 people, making it more profitable per employee then almost anyone else. Valve accomplishes all this with a highly unconventional approach to authority. It simply let’s it’s employees decide what to work on. No bosses. No reporting. No oversight. Just to vote with your feet by choosing projects and tasks that you think are worth your time.

In complexity our job isn’t perfection, it’s building a culture that is always learning.

Overtime the whole thing comes to look more like a marketplace that an organisational chart. Sure hierarchy is still there but they are hierarchies of influence, reputation, and the work itself. They are messy. They are dynamic. And they are held lightly.

What most massive organisations seem to forget is that we can operate as a marketplace of tribes, serving the customer and any one else independently and responsibly.

If you don’t have a compelling vision, a dent in the universe beyond shareholder value, your strategies will fall flat. Because how can we win if we don’t know what winning looks like?

The Black Swan talked about a concept called the barbell strategy. This financial strategy is named for how it distributes risks, to 2 extremes: invest 85 to 90% of your assets in extremely safe investments and place all of the remainder in a highly speculative bets.

If every team isn’t constantly learning and improving in ways big and small, we are missing our chance to pursue our purpose with everything we’ve got.

Data is not information. Information is not knowledge. Knowledge is not mastery. Mastery is not wisdom.

In his research he came across IDEO’s approach to this issue. Instead of fit IDEO hires for cultural contribution. It asks what’s missing from our culture? And then goes and looks for that. Earlier on we may need a handful of colleagues who see the world the same way in order to bring something new and disruptive into existence. But soon after will need to focus on increasing the cognitive and general diversity of the group in order to achieve our full potential.

Discovering what author Stephen Johnson calls the adjacent possible. In his words the adjacent possible is a kind of shadow future hovering on the edges of the present state of things, a map of all the ways in which the present can reinvent itself. As leaders we have to accept that we can’t control whole communities of people, we can nudge them only in directions they are predisposed to go.

Niels pflaeging holds a similar view. He contends that milk in coffee is more helpful a metaphor than the widespread notion of seeing change as a journey from here to there. Like milk in coffee the right kind of change can unfold throughout the system quickly and continuously.

Antoine De Saint Exupéry: it seems that perfection is attained not when there is nothing more to add but when there is nothing more to remove.

The educational revolutionary Sugata Mitra said in his 2013 Ted prize acceptance speech: “we have engineered a system so robust that it’s still with us today, continually producing identical people for a machine that no longer exists.“ (Please take a look at his TEDTalk when he talks about building schools in the cloud)

It’s even possible that something big is missing: something that will reveal itself to us in years to come and irrevocably transform how we organise. I can live with that. Because what I’ve presented here is enough. It’s enough to stoke that disenchantment that you feel. That this can’t be our best. That we are capable of more. It’s enough to get started. Enough to go on. And that’s all that matters. Progress over perfection. Courage over caution. This isn’t business as usual. This is brave new work.

We have precious a few roundabouts in the United States about one for every 1118 intersections. So you would assume that the signal controlled intersection is superior. But which operating system actually produces the best results? - the roundabout.

The genius of the firm was happening not inside people but between people.

What about when outdoor retailer R E I decided to close on Black Friday? Or when Patagonia ran a full page ad that stated “don’t buy this jacket” and introduced an initiative to repair reuse and recycle garments it has already sold?

You could introduce the concept of a red team in your own organisation. A red team is charged with one mission: putting you out of business. Gather any groups of colleagues and ask them to design the competitor that would bury you.

The brain trust is a part of pixars special sauce, the magic pixie dust that has enabled the company to produce 19 number one box office openings 15 Academy Awards and an average RottenTomatoes score of 88.5%. The concept of the brain trust meeting is simple. It’s like a massive brutiful conversation. The film in whatever condition it’s in is screened in front of a handful of Pixar’s most seasoned storytellers directors writers heads of story people who have been there before. What follows is a two hour free-form discussion a feedback session known for what author Kim Scott calls radical candor. That’s what happens when we challenge one another directly but make it clear that we are caring for each other personally. The brain trust leaves egos at the door, pulls no punches, and puts all the energy into making the movie better. As Ed Catmul the co-founder and president of Pixar says the film not the filmmaker is under the microscope.

Some cultures are awful to work in. In one example employees were constantly looking over their shoulders, waiting for someone to change the game on them. In a team checking one Monday morning one employee actually said “I considered getting into a car accident this morning on my way to work just so that I would have an excuse not to come in.” There was not a drop of sarcasm in her voice. Those are the moments when you know you have triage to do. Because the system in trauma can’t transform. If you’re not safe we can’t trust. If we’re not safe we can’t risk. And nobody does their best work scared.

Ricardo Semler’s sentiment is that “if you’re giving back, you took too much”. Instead they build social impact right into their business model.

This book lists a group of evolutionary organisations that are examples of organisations which show people positivity and are complexity conscious. Here is a list of some of those incredible organisations which I strongly encourage you to do some further research on:

AES, Askinosie chocolate, Automattic, base camp, black lives matter, Blinkist, Bridgewater, buffer, burning man, buurtzorg, BVDV, charity: water, crisp, David Allen company, DM drogerie markt, eldbudler, Enden Berg electro technique, Enspiral, Equinor, Evangelical School Berlin centre, Evaleen, FAVI, GINI, GITLAB, gum Road, H a I Er, Handelsbanken, Haufe-umantis, heuligenfeld, hengeler mueller, Herman Miller, holicracyone, Ian Martin group, incentro, Joint special operations command, kick starter, Lumiar schools, medium, Menlo innovations, Mondragon, morning star, near soft, Netflix, Nucor, Orpheus chamber Orchestra, Patagonia, Phelps agency, Pixar, promon group, Red hat, school in the cloud, Schuberg Philis, semco group, STok, sun hydraulics, Treehouse, USS Santa Fe, valve, Whole Foods, WL Gore, WP Hatton, zalando technology, Zappos, zingermans, chipotle, etsy, lyft, Quicken loans, slack, stack overflow, Warby Parker, we work, Wikimedia, Zapier.
Profile Image for Lars Plougmann.
60 reviews10 followers
February 23, 2019
Improving how work gets done is a supremely interesting question. The work most of us are engaged in represents the primary economic value creation mechanism in society. So why does it feel so staid? Why are we not constantly questioning our approach, constantly tinkering in order to eke out improvements and constantly throwing ourselves at experiments to discover better ways?

Perhaps Taylorism has landed us in a local maximum whence we look to far away peaks to admire the 37Signals, Slack, Gore & Associates, Automattic and a handful of other type Y organizations of the world that have successfully set themselves apart because of a different approach to work.

By examining twelve domains of the "operating system" of modern organizations, the author elegantly brings a body of recent ideas and theories into context. It is clear that there are improvements to be made, and some suggestions are made, both practical and philosophical.

A part of the book is devoted to advice for the change agent. How do we make the brave new world of work happen? Although the chapters are well intentioned and offer good basic advice, this is where it loses traction. Through two hypothetical companies, the scenarios of being perceptive and averse to change are examined but it is far from a solid approach.

My advice about the book's epilogue is to skip it. It feels like the author took a bunch of ideas for blog posts and threw them together in a final chapter. Generally, the book is well-researched and makes a great case for moving beyond the status quo. The epilogue, however, makes the reader question all the ideas. Another oddity is that the book was published in 2019, but it feels like the content was locked in about three years ago.
April 2, 2021
Super useful as an overview of practically all aspects of an organization, from the perspective of the paradigm of so-called teal/evolutionary organizations. Could be easier to follow if you've read about Holacracy, Open Allocation, Scrum, Kanban and related concepts beforehand, as they're referenced in summary here.

Part three was especially interesting in terms of describing a hands-on approach to changing an organization and its culture, which is something I've almost never seen in books like this.
Profile Image for Agnė V..
114 reviews
December 29, 2022
Į darbo organizavimą galima žiūrėti kaip į sankryžas - eismas reguliuojamas arba šviesaforais, lentelėmis, spalvų kodais, kur tau viską pasako procesai, arba kaip į žiedais, kur kiekvienas eismo dalyvis prisiima atsakomybę ir visi pasiekia turimus tikslus.
Nuo šios metaforos prasideda knyga ir to neapleidžia, man kilo daug minčių apie mano santykį su dabartine darbo aplinka, įsitraukimą, pora skyrių susišaukė ir su riešutėliais, gliaudomais darbe šiuo metu, tai visai aha momentai buvo.
Gal epilogas toks kažkoks futuristinis labai, bet nesugadino visko. Patinka, kad autorius akcentuoja mažus žingsnius, o ne grandiozinius pokyčius.
Šiaip duočiau šitą knygą valdžios aparato atstovams paskaityt, kaip tik buvo paakcentuota, kad startupą galima sukurti per savaitgalį, bet kai nemokam dirbti su kompleksinėmis sistemomis, tai kenčia ir švietimas, ir sveikatos apsauga, ir visos kitos svarbios sritys.
Profile Image for Sheena.
217 reviews16 followers
February 19, 2022
idk why i read this capitalist book.
3 stars because what it's saying is pretty valid....if you enjoy being merely a cog in a wheel.
Profile Image for Joonas Kiminki.
40 reviews2 followers
September 5, 2019
Maybe I’ve read too many books of this kind, but I felt like the book talked down on me like it assumed I was a little slow in the head. I think I’ve read most of the 30 or so books that the author summarized and this book added little to the mix.

There were many positives, too! The book has a nice flow and the content _is_ interesting, even if much of it was repetition. The third star in my review comes from the uplifting last chapter on the future of corporations, competition, social justice and the environment.

For me the book was a good read, but I’m not sure whether I’ll remember much of it in a year.
Profile Image for Stephanie.
1,148 reviews
March 15, 2019
At its best in the early pages, where Dignan does a fantastic job of painting a compelling picture of how we need to rethink organizational structure. Far weaker (and less interesting to read) as he gets into his ideas of a new operating structure, where there's simply not enough guidance to help those needing guidance and where those of us already on board will find little that's new.
8 reviews
June 22, 2019
The book spends 80% time explaining why you should reinvent your organization when I already agreed with them. I was really hoping for more real-world scenarios. It lacked in this area since they are trying to get you to hire them to come in for consulting.
Profile Image for Nicky Shields.
40 reviews
March 6, 2019
OMG. I hope nobody else wasted their life reading this fluff piece of megalomania.
10 reviews
January 21, 2024
Jaučiuosi panašiai kaip pirmą kartą perskaitęs “Drive” by D. Pink. Labai patiko! Kažkur pradėjo formuotis klausimai ir atsakymai apie nepavykusius pokyčius ir mirusias idėjas (nors dievaži buvo geros).

Tad tiems kam įdomu organizacijų ir komandų dinamika, kultūra ir iš esmės organizacijų būdai “būti” ir realizuoti save - rekomenduoju. O jei dar galios daryti įtaka siais klausimais yra, tikiuosi, kad patiks ir rasit ką užsirašyti ir įgyvendinti. Aš tikiuosi turėsiu šansą bent kažkiek šios knygos paversti praktika.

P.s. Kiek pasirodo mažai aš žinojau kodėl ir nuo kada struktūros, biudžetai ir verslo planai tapo toki vienodi įmonėse.
Profile Image for Zoë Routh.
Author 7 books44 followers
July 3, 2021
Very practical handbook for leading a post conventional business

I loved this practical showcase of the key principles of leading a workplace that encourages greater autonomy and flexibility for its employees.

If you struggle to build buy-in, feel like the business is mired in too much process, worry that you are lagging behind the competition, then this book offers really practical approaches of learning a new way of working.

Not for those who struggle with giving up control!
Profile Image for Larkin Tackett.
540 reviews4 followers
January 5, 2020
This is the first management book I've read in 2020 and I hope it both transforms our small business and the way I think about managing people and projects. Aaron Dignan is the author of an organizational design and strategy firm, who outlines an approach to creating evolutionary organizations that are "intentional but full of serendipity, decentralized but coherent." There are so many practices and approaches to consider adopting. I'm excited to get started.
Profile Image for Helen Southwell.
50 reviews
November 8, 2022
Some great content to ponder on as to how all organisations could function differently in the future.
Profile Image for Tyler.
17 reviews27 followers
November 12, 2019
One of my top books of the year. If you’re interested in working differently, you should read this book.
Profile Image for Kara.
481 reviews27 followers
October 23, 2022
Although I’m not the main intended audience of this book, I enjoyed it and got a lot out of it. It’s aimed at executives and business leaders, but there are lots of ideas for anyone interested in a different way of working or organization design based around less bureaucracy.
Profile Image for Tõnu Vahtra.
564 reviews87 followers
May 21, 2019
Another book that generated mixed feelings during various parts. I very much identified with the problems and challenges that were raised in the beginning (how organizations are stuck in their inefficient ways of working and the natural tendency is to apply more controls continuously to aim to control risks and make the output more predictable which leads to a downward spiral). The history of work (which could not get around Taylor and scientific management of course) following chapters discussing the solutions to those challenges were not novel though and I was afraid that this was just another book combining sections from other books. The book kept relating everything to two core principles: “People Positive” and “Complexity Conscious” whereas I was not that impressed by some of those links made, where the plain obvious was stated.

I have to say that it got better towards the end, the things that earned 4 stars to the book:
*The first "mainstream" book that tried to bring in key principles of Cynefin (explaining simple, complex, complicated and chaos situations and which approaches should be applied in each situation, it even tried to explain concepts like liminal spaces). Yet I feel that the people not familiar with deeper background of Cynefin framework where just shrugging their shoulders for those parts. Besides that reminder of the book exampled systems thinking (based on "The Fifth Discipline" by Peter Senge) and I do know from direct experience what Snowden is saying about systems thinking... (I will not even mention the few references to Malcolm Gladwell which is considered a capital sin in cynefin forums).
*There was other references from Senge's systems thinking theory, i.e there were several references to tensions in organization (today I discovered that Holacracy also refers to those base terms yet made no strong reference to Senge). I did like the collection of 78 types of tensions across the organizations as they are quite comprehensive and a good conversation starter when talking about organizational improvement (I'm definitely planning to use them).
*Some new concepts were explained in more depth that I had not thought about explicitly before: AMA (ask me anything) meetings concept, publishing an user manual on how to best work with you, establishing internal coaching guild for people passionate about new ways of working (with reference to the liminal spaces), also some general agile philosophy in author's own words (principles over procedures... et al).

"As we learned at the beginning, all models are wrong, but some are useful. So let me say this before we depart: this book is not perfect. Mistakes were made. Perhaps I portrayed an organization differently from how you (or the organization) would. Perhaps I failed to describe a concept or distinction as well as another expert might. It’s even possible that something big is missing — something that will reveal itself to us in years to come and irrevocably transform how we organize. I can live with that. Because what I’ve presented here is enough. It’s enough to stroke that disenchantment that you feel. That this can’t be our best. That we’re capable of more. It’s enough to get started. Enough to go on. And that’s all that matters. Progress over perfection. Courage over caution. This isn’t business as usual. This is brave new work."

What the Brave New Work "Operating System" is supposed to consist of (each aspect related to the above mentioned two principles):
Purpose — How we orient and steer?
Authority — How we share power and make decisions?
Structure — How we organize and team?
Strategy — How we plan and prioritize?
Resources — How we invest our time and money?
Innovation — How we learn and evolve?
Workflow — How we divide and do the work?
Meetings — How we convene and coordinate?
Information — How we share and use data?
Membership — How we define and cultivate relationships?
Mastery — How we grow and mature?
Compensation — How we pay and provide?

Continuous Participatory Change and six patterns that support it:
()Commitment: When those in power and influence commit to moving beyond bureaucracy.
()Boundaries: When a liminal space is created and protected.
()Priming: When the invitation to think and work differently is offered.
()Looping: When change is decentralized and self-management begins.
()Criticality: When the system has tipped and there’s no going back.
()Continuity: When continuous participatory change is a way of life, and the organization is contributing to the broader community of practice.
Profile Image for Robert Gistvik.
97 reviews1 follower
September 8, 2023
This is probably the best book I have ever read. Dignan combines the expertise from multiple different authors, researchers and experienced leaders into a "framework" (in lack of a better word) that puts them all in a context. I have read Pink, Laloux, Snowden and many of the other references and really liked their ideas, but putting them all in context and relation to each other in this rather simple way is really next level.
Descriptions of the theory behind each part is short and clear and with references for anyone that want to dive deeper in that area. I cannot recommend this enough and it is a must-read for anyone that wants to change their organization or how they lead.
Profile Image for Frank Lindt.
222 reviews10 followers
September 4, 2022
Contemporary and relevant advice on how to run an organisation. I liked the cleanness of the structure the author introduces and the practical examples he ties into them.
Profile Image for Soundview Executive Book Summaries.
232 reviews30 followers
March 26, 2019
Think about your job and your average work week for a moment. How much time would you estimate is wasted in unproductive meetings or endless emails, reports, and documentation? Just imagine what you could do with all that lost time.

In his new book Brave New Work: Are You Ready to Reinvent Your Organization?, Aaron Dignan presents detailed case studies of organizations that have moved beyond imagining and actually asked that question of their employees. Declaring an open season on anything that doesn’t add value to the organization has the potential to be a transformative act for the “fundamental principles and practices that shape their culture.”

Doing the Best Work of Your Life

The author admits that many of these issues are familiar terrain for the endless stream of business gurus who offer custom-built solutions. Build trust, remove bottlenecks, break-down silos, empower teams, engage employees, and remove short-term thinking. There are dozens of books available on each of these topics.

The missing element, Dignan argues, is the recognition that organizations aren’t machines with upgradeable components. They are “complex human systems full of potential waiting to be released.” Only by embracing a complete reinvention of your organization can you hope to enable your employees to do the best work of their lives.

The True Cost of a Meeting

If you add the number of hours of preparation for a meeting – research, preparing summary reports and PowerPoint presentations – to the number of hours in that meeting, and the number of hours in email follow-ups, and multiply that by the number of people in that meeting, the true cost can be astronomical. In Dignan’s opening example, the organization identified the annual cost of “one [crappy] meeting” as three million dollars – for one meeting.

Organizations that are willing to take the leap of faith of cancelling that meeting and waiting to see what happens (typically nothing) quickly move-on to other opportunities for elimination – budgets, approval processes, rigid structures. You can call it a lightbulb moment or a removal of the blinders of preconceived notions, but the list of what else should be up for grabs can grow very quickly.

Dignan, who also wrote Game Frame: Using Games as a Strategy for Success , offers diverse examples that underscore the message that such transformations are possible in any industry. A bank that abandoned the traditional budgeting process and still outperformed its competition. A healthcare provider that embraced decentralization with a head office of only fifty people supporting a field workforce of over fourteen thousand.

In each case, the transformation began not with a flavor-of-the-month guru, but with a simple question to the employees: “What gets in the way of the best work of your lives?” The responses may be a little timid at first, but if the leaders are willing to display the trust and confidence to let their employees figure out better alternatives, the growth potential is truly unlimited.

Brave New Work challenges the traditional mandates of a top-down organizational matrix, providing detailed examples of transformations based on autonomy, trust and transparency.

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Profile Image for Andreas Holmer.
21 reviews6 followers
April 20, 2019
I loved this book. Inspirational and practical all at once. Highly recommended for anyone interested in the Future of Work and organizational design.
Profile Image for Breck Wightman.
56 reviews1 follower
December 14, 2019
Dignan has created a masterpiece that will most likely become THE management book of the decade. I’ll admit this book confirmed all my priors in a way no other book has. He commands the org theory literature with the mastery of a PhD and expounds with the practical wisdom of a tech entrepreneur.

Here’s what you’ll find here that you won’t find in other books:

1) A rejection of Taylorism for a “complexity conscious” mindset. The tenants of scientific management that views organizations as complicated problems to be solved was created 100 years ago for factories and is outdated for handling the complexity and uncertainty of today’s organizations. His model for org change reflects this new outlook.

2) A “people positive” approach to organizations. Do yourself and your organization a favor - throw Nudge in the trash and adopt this model instead. Treat your employees with human dignity and the belief that they can achieve conscious awareness of their own subconscious behavior. Treat them as experts in their own sphere. Trust them and give them the opportunity to do what is best.



Profile Image for Everson Luis de Campos Moura.
80 reviews1 follower
July 5, 2022
Provocative and useful read for leaders

This book does a great service to humankind by shining some light in very important subjects. Most ideas are not new at all. Actually, they are well known and, despite being so obvious that they need no further explanation, the vast majority of world's leadership prefer to ignore them. For instance: the usefulness of annual budget, five year plans, Gantt charts, centralization, hierarchies and so on. The author arguments are interesting and provocative. However, I don't think them enough to change much. The "Legacy OS" is so deeply rooted in the leaders of today that I'm afraid I'll not live enough to see any level of change that signs the world is in fact operating in a new way. Unfortunately. But the book still is worth reading. It is an easy, interesting and quick reading.
Profile Image for Andy.
173 reviews
October 19, 2019
I was left wondering about the purpose of this book. It does not address the real issues with the modern workplace such as the increasing specialisations in roles and functions which leads to isolation and narrow perspectives, or the sheer scale and size of some corporations which necessarily leads to much administration and coordination. Instead we are given a template for the psychotherapy of the organisation as if they are in a mid-life crisis.
To be fair, work related problems of employee cynicism, lazyness, being ineffective, being politically motivated or being asked to perform a role that is just not useful, are all incredibly difficult questions to address.
If you are looking for answers and seriously do wish to find a new way of working.....this is not the book for you.
Profile Image for Evelina Rimkute.
Author 2 books21 followers
July 11, 2022
📖 Brave new Work by Aaron Dignan 🙌

👉The author discuss effective way of organizing work in companies using real examples, writings of influantial thinkers, old fashioned but still alive doctrines and agility mindset.
The book is full of inspirational ideas and practical guidelines, mostly advocating self-organized and empowered teams💪

👉I think our enterprises are facing tough decisions while tackling after pandemic work models, team diversity, high customer expectations towards sustainability and so on.

If I have to choose particular insightful idea, I will stick to this one:

📌"You can't blow up bureaucracy with bureaucratic change process. You can't build a culture of trust with a programa full of oversight and verification. Start the way you mean to finish."
108 reviews2 followers
April 12, 2022
An Ok book. It covers quite a lot of ground, pulling together a lot of thinking and perspectives covered in better detail. As a starting point to look at organisations in a different way it’s probably a good read. If you’re already thinking in this different way then there’s probably not a huge amount of insight, despite being packaged up nicely. I do wonder why Cynefin is never mentioned by name, but much of the terminology is used. Dave Snowden is mentioned in relation to some of his other work, but not that with which he is perhaps the most famous… odd.
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