This is a management framework developed by McKinsey consultants Robert Waterman and Tom Peters in the late 70’s. Although the business world evolved a lot since then, the tool is still quite commonly taught in university; and proved to be extremely useful for organisational analysis to access and monitor internal changes happening / to be happened within a complex company. Sample use cases :
- Improve the performance of a company.
- Examine the likely effects of future changes within a company.
- Align departments and processes during a merger or acquisition.
- Determine how best to implement a proposed strategy.
The 7s elements are :
Hard Elements
- Strategy: the plan devised to maintain and build competitive advantage over the competition.
- Structure: the way the organization is structured and who reports to whom.
- Systems: the daily activities and procedures that staff members engage in to get the job done.
Soft Elements
- Shared Values: called “superordinate goals” when the model was first developed, these are the core values of the company that are evidenced in the corporate culture and the general work ethic.
- Style: the style of leadership adopted.
- Staff: the employees and their general capabilities.
- Skills: the actual skills and competencies of the employees working for the company.
And the suggested workflow using the model :
- Have a clear understand of the 7s elements individually. You may start with the sample checklist prepared by mindtools.
- Conduct one for the current situation (as-is) and one for the future / target state (to-be).
- Then, review the alignment between the 7s elements using a matrix analysis. Again, you can refer to a sample worksheet created by mindtools.
- Identify gaps and inconsistencies.
- Define changes required to ensure alignment and reinforcement among the 7s elements.
Reference
- Explanation from McKinsey
- Practical guideline from mindtools.com
- Another template from Aurelien Domont on slideshare
- Wikipedia
