The Organization Design Practitioner: Building Operating Models That Deliver

The definitive field guide for organization design practitioners―where decades of proven methodology meet the tools and insights needed to lead transformation in today's complex world.

The Organization Design Practitioner: Building Operating Models That Deliver is the new book from two of the best-known thinkers in the field of organization design, providing practitioners with a well-tested methodology and a fresh set of accompanying tools for navigating today’s business challenges.

Greg Kesler and Amy Kates are operating model authorities who have advanced Jay Galbraith's foundational theory connecting all design elements of an organization to its strategy. This capstone to their careers brings to the topic the wisdom of more than 60 combined years of experience working with many of the best global companies in the world.

In this fifth book together, they speak directly to the organization design practitioner with a clear and practical narrative, rooted in their consulting, writing, and teaching experience. Amy and Greg share the Five Milestone design process, used in hundreds of companies today, where they have trained more than 5,000 practitioners in the Kates Kesler methodology.

Readers will find:

• Guidance on how to create designs that are built to deliver the benefits of both scale and agility.
• Insights into becoming a trusted advisor at every step of the design process.
• Methods for integrating AI tools to accelerate and augment design work, while preserving human judgment.
• Ways to engage leadership teams that result in more effective activation of the new operating model.
• A roadmap to develop the skills and impact needed by today’s organization design practitioner.

The book includes a robust appendix that delivers more than 75 frameworks and tools that the authors have found most useful in their work, whether at the enterprise business unit, geographic region, or function level. All of the tools will be available electronically to those who purchase the book, a valuable benefit for both the seasoned and the aspiring practitioner.

An essential resource for organization design practitioners, organization development professionals, and HR leaders, this new book equips both internal and external consultants with the human-centered strategies needed to transform organizations in an era of unprecedented complexity.

GREG KESLER is a leading consultant, author, and educator in the field of global organization design. Greg has worked with the leaders of scores of successful multinational companies over decades, co-creating a methodology and practice that became the standard for rigorous organization design. He has co-written four previous books on the topic.

AMY KATES is an independent organization design advisor to CEOs and senior executives at companies and nonprofits at all stages of growth. She has a passion for teaching and coaching the next generation of designers and is globally recognized for developing Jay Galbraith’s foundational work into the standard tool kit used by the profession today.