Before deciding to change an organization’s structure, leaders must define the issue: What exactly is the organizational challenge at hand? Is communication ineffective? Have funding sources changed? Does the organization need to respond to changing legislation or policy? Are services not aligned with changing community needs? Are stakeholders dissatisfied with the organization? Ideally, there should be a consensus among all parties about challenges and needs.
Once leaders understand the challenge, the next step is to determine the best way to address it. A reorganization may be a solution, but more effective and less disruptive options may be available. Streamlining work processes, engaging stakeholders to identify needed changes, or clarifying roles and responsibilities may be better solutions than a formal change to the organization.
Especially in government contexts, there are myriad ways to organize functions and staff—good arguments can be made to organize around a certain policy area, service recipient, or business-side commonality. In any government reorganization, however, the desire for a more rational or policy-focused organization must be tempered by the need for continued and stable delivery of services.
Reducing costs may be a motivation for reorganizing an organization, but leaders should think carefully about whether and when costs will decrease. Complex fiscal analysis is not always necessary. An organization can make educated guesses about how much time will be lost due to a reorganization and factor those losses of productivity into rough calculations of benefits and costs of a potential reorganization.