Managing Change Enquiry and Action

The aims of this chapter are to:

• discuss the relationship between the business environment and the structure of organizations;

• explore the alternative structures that companies can adopt and consider their relative strengths and weaknesses;

• suggest a framework for redesigning structure; and

• enable a critical discussion of a mini-case and of the Oticon case study.

Introduction

LucasArts is the company, headed by George Lucas, that is behind the special effects used in the Star Wars movies, amongst other digital technology products. In the last decade competition in the special effects industry has increased dramatically, but so have the opportunities in line with the increasing quantities and qualities of digital games, some of which use techniques that only companies at the top end of the market, such as LucasArts, can achieve (Jones, 2009). However, LucasArts had a problem. They employed a large number of creative digital artists, who would be well placed to take advantage of new market opportunities, but the digital artists worked independently within departments that focused on specialist activities, often communicating only between departments that were geographically remote from each other via video conferencing systems. Lucas decided that it was necessary to restructure in order to change the process and output of the company. He relocated the digital artists into a single site that was designed to encourage interaction. It included open areas, lounges and high-quality communal facilities. He asked them to develop a common digital platform so that people currently working in different departments could potentially collaborate. The operational leaders introduced temporary project teams and challenged the workers to develop new products for both the film and games industries. The result has been an increase in the sharing of skills between individuals and departments. LucasArts has subsequently been even more innovative, and, in addition to producing the film special effects for which it was famous, it has developed notable successes in the games industry, including products such as ‘Star Wars: The Force Unleashed’.