Move Like Starlings

Move like starlings.

Nature, specifically a murmuration of Starlings, can teach us a lot about simplifying organisational structures to help make innovation happen.

Each starling is in direct contact with the 6 or 7 birds around them. This enables tens of thousands of birds to move in unison with no need for one “leader” or hierarchy.

By placing trust in small teams, empowered to make decisions and being supported by a network, you can avoid getting stuck in large-scale, slow, bureaucratic programmes and decision-making.

This gives teams the ability to move quickly and adapt rapidly to new learnings and situations.

As humans we place importance on scale, we are drawn to it - we think bigger means better. The big boss, with the big budget and the big team often has kudos. However, we all know from personal experience that the more people are involved in a project or programme, the harder it is to get things done. We find ourselves bogged down in updates and comms with little energy for being agile and making progress.

What is my role as a leader?

Set up small teams with a clear goal, and get out of their way

Encourage and support them to build their network

Empower them to make decisions as they go

As a leader, you are in a unique position of influence when it comes to simplifying structures. You can take a birds eye view, and see where your colleagues might be struggling to move because of bureaucracy and set them up differently; with more autonomy and access to the resources they need to move forward .

You can also look at your own involvement and opt to step back where you might be adding unnecessary complexity and hierarchy, to enable the work to be more streamlined.

Simple ideas to get you started

What if you…

Set up a small team around a challenge that needs progressing and allocated 100% of their time on it for a ‘sprint’ of two weeks?

What if you…

Stepped OUT of a big project team as an experiment to test if more value is created without you?

What if you…

Hosted a monthly lunch/dinner for small team leads to informally meet up and exchange ideas and seek/offer support?

Excited and intrigued by this bold move? Let’s talk on hello@andus.co or 020 3411 5502