article thumbnail

When to Decentralize Decision Making, and When Not To

Harvard Business Review

As Henry Mintzberg noted in The Structuring of Organizations in 1979, “The words centralization and decentralization have been bandied about for as long as anyone has cared to write about organizations.” radical innovation); Investments in initiatives whose benefits are contingent on everybody’s participation (e.g.,

article thumbnail

5 Strategy Questions Every Leader Should Make Time For

Harvard Business Review

The CEO of a large, global bank once told me: “It is very easy for someone in my position to be very busy all the time. As famous management professor Henry Mintzberg has described, much of strategy is “ emergent.” Because it means that you don’t have much time to think and reflect.