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SPEAKER: Does leadership change when
a company grows from 8,000 to 137,000 employees?
It does, and Apple shows us how.
Apple's way of organizing by function rather than
traditional business units has led to innovation and success
over the past two decades.
But there have been challenges, especially
with revenues and headcount having exploded since 2008.
As the company has grown, its functional structure
and leadership model have had to evolve.
An example of the challenges posed by organizational growth
is the pressure it imposes on the several hundred
VPs and directors below the executive team.
In 2006, a year before the iPhone's launch,
the company had around 17,000 employees.
By 2019 that number had grown more than eight-fold
to 137,000.
Meanwhile, the number of VPs approximately
doubled from 50 to 96.
This means more details to oversee
and new areas of responsibility that fall outside their core
expertise.
In response, many Apple managers have been evolving and adapting
their leadership characteristics.
Experts leading experts, immersion in the details,
and collaborative debate.
When Apple was smaller it may have
been reasonable to expect leaders to be experts on
and immersed in the details of pretty much everything.
However, they now need to decide which activities demand
their full attention because those activities create
the most value for Apple.
Some of those will fall within their existing core expertise,
they still need to own that.
Activities that require less attention from them
can be pushed down to others and they can
teach others to handle them.
Here's how that works at Apple, as an expert who
leads other experts, Roger Rosner, Apple's
VP of Applications had to contend
with three challenges arising from the company's
tremendous growth.
First, the size of his function had
exploded over the past decade in terms of both headcount
and the number of projects underway at any given time.
Second, the scope of his portfolio had widened.
Although apps are his core area of expertise,
some aspects of these involve matters in which
Rosner is not an expert.
Finally, as Apple's product portfolio and a number
of projects have expanded, even more coordination
with other functions was required.
Rosner had been immersed in details, especially
those concerning the top level aspects of software
applications.
He also collaborated with managers across the company
in projects that involved those areas.
But with the expansion of his responsibilities,
he has moved some things from his own inbox
into his teaching box.
Now he guides and gives feedback to other team members
so that they can develop software applications according
to Apple's norms.
Being an instructor doesn't mean Rosner gives instruction
on a whiteboard, rather he offers strong, often passionate
critiques of his team's work.
This flexibility in the leadership model
is an imperative in any growing functional organization.
Of course, Apple's example is rare, if not unique
among very large companies.
They think different and challenge the prevailing theory
that companies should be reorganized into business units
as they become large but its track record
proves that the rewards may justify the risks.
Under the right leadership and a functional structure
an organization can produce extraordinary results.