Ignoring the social structures of your organization comes at a price

All organizations have social structures that do not resemble their formal structures. Cliques of employees that hang out during lunch breaks, or even after work. Tribes of people that support different agendas inside and outside the workplace. Shadow organizations that perform the work of the functional organization, because they are less bureaucratic, and an effective shortcut. Networks of people that know, trust, and help each other. All these social structures hold the key to unleashing fortunes in the form of employee productivity.

In this article, we show how organizations are wasting fortunes by ignoring their social structures, we provide the business case, and we share four steps companies need to follow to harvest the value of their social structures.