On Haier’s Ecosystem Micro-Communities
Loose interdependencies between the members of an ecosystem are a source of strength, not a flaw.
Haier has developed an organizational model based on ecosystem principles, a departure from traditional hierarchical models. This topic was explored by Gary Hamel and Michele Zanini in The End of Bureaucracy (for a summary, see my analysis, Hamel and Zanini on The End of Bureaucracy).
One way to differentiate ecosystem-based organizations is to consider them as horizontal and loosely-aligned networks of self-organized, self-driven, self-optimized organizational units, which Haier calls micro-enterprises. However, microenterprises still operate within the principles and managerial environment of Haier, and therefore their autonomy is not absolute. This may sound like a weakness, but the loose interdependencies between the members of an ecosystem are a source of strength, not a flaw in organizational design.
Most critically, the Haier model stands in sharp contrast with vertical hierarchies of top-down, tightly-aligned, non-autonomous organizational units which are the general case across the industrialized world, and which have their foundations in early industrial models. The era of siloed, top-down, command-and-control organizations is over, and the decentralized…
