‘How Apple Is Organized for Innovation’

Speaking of Joel Podolny, I somehow neglected to link to this piece he co-authored with Morten T. Hansen a year ago for Harvard Business Review, describing — with remarkable openness — how Apple is organized:

Apple is not a company where general managers oversee managers; rather, it is a company where experts lead experts. The assumption is that it’s easier to train an expert to manage well than to train a manager to be an expert. At Apple, hardware experts manage hardware, software experts software, and so on. (Deviations from this principle are rare.) This approach cascades down all levels of the organization through areas of ever-increasing specialization. Apple’s leaders believe that world-class talent wants to work for and with other world-class talent in a specialty. It’s like joining a sports team where you get to learn from and play with the best.

★ Tuesday, 14 December 2021