One of the many impacts of hybrid working has been a reduced commitment to rituals and routines, which conventionalists still believe is the glue that holds organisations together. Beyond social value, these rituals enabled coordination and collaboration between teams and departments. Now an astonishing 98 percent of employers have implemented measures to persuade employees back to the workplace, while 51 percent of hybrid workers would consider leaving their company, if flexible working was not available. Clearly, Hybrid working has become a lightning rod.

The matrix, where employees report to multiple leaders, remains the most common organisational structure for medium to large organisations1. But leaders continue to ask whether they have the right operating model to deliver on their goals and, in most cases, the answers they are presented with are a variation on the matrix that was already in place. While on paper these structures seem eminently pragmatic and practical, they often have bad press due to fears about lack of clarity and/or autonomy, concerns around navigating multiple reporting relationships and negative experiences of working in poorly implemented matrix structures. Much of this is linked to the high levels of coordination that matrix structures require and here, hybrid and particularly remote working is at a major disadvantage to the conventional workplace hub. This means that businesses have been testing, re-calibrating and trying to balance matrix structures with hybrid working practices, running the risk of damaging the relational fabric of an organisation and impeding employees to work at speed and through constant change. A key consideration is how to ensure that the relational fabric is not only maintained but strengthened. Put simply, there has to be enough coordination in place, both to deliver performance and create a sense of belonging. Thinking deliberately about the right organisational drumbeat is a way of balancing matrix and hybrid working. While a combination of decreased individual flexibility and tight processes and systems runs the risk of feeling bureaucratic, high levels of flexibility and a loose set of processes and systems often feels ad-hoc and inefficient. In order to strike an effective balance, Lynda Gratton2, suggests a “patterned and flexible” approach, which offers employees flexibility, supported by tight processes and systems and regular meetings. This fosters a sense of belonging and inclusion in hybrid teams, as well as enabling them to be productive. In order to reap the benefits of this approach, decisions around processes, systems and meeting cadence need to be taken at a divisional or enterprise level, rather than fully devolved to individuals or teams. A practical example is seen in hybrid organisations with designated on- site team days, creating weekly cadence that supports coordination and makes explicit the organisational benefit of physical presence. Consequently, office days should be designed around optimising organisational benefit, with regular, structured interactions to help maintain team cohesion and feelings of inclusion for when team members are then separated and working remotely. This can be achieved through regular check-ins and team days, transparent communication channels and inclusive decision-making processes, where appropriate and requires much more deliberate thought in a hybrid and matrix world than in mostly co-located set up. What is important is that the interactions are designed to deliberately improve connectedness and create space for conversation, rather than traditional top-down broadcast formats.

Leaders and line managers have an essential role in designing and facilitating these touch points, as well as bringing to life the rationale for the choices around cadence and drumbeats. Matrix organisations, by definition, require individuals to hold organisational tensions and polarities – market customisation vs. global standard, short- term pricing decisions vs longer term value proposition and more. This only works if the individuals in question have enough shared context and have agreed a framework for decision-making. Without this, organisational tensions can rapidly become personal and can turn into turf wars around the business of the day. Leaders and managers therefore need to put ongoing, deliberate attention into role definitions, decision-making and alignment between individuals and teams. This requires explicit, regular conversations around what each party needs from the other and how they experience the process of working together. Ultimately, the conversations need to be had by individuals and it needs to be seen as the expected and default thing to do, rather than something that is at the discretion of individuals. Creating an organisational framework and process which becomes part of the culture to support is critical and leaders role modelling is essential. The following five question framework is a useful starting point: How have we experienced working together over the last quarter? What has worked well and not so well? What are our respective key priorities for the next quarter? What do we need from each other in the next quarter? What changes, if any, do we need to make to how we work together in the next quarter? These questions and approaches set up an adult-to-adult conversation and can be used between line managers and team members and between individuals from different teams. They can help resolve potential tensions “it is perhaps no accident that the concept of psychological safety is felt to be so important at the moment. Without this, defensiveness becomes the norm, with negative consequences on performance and well-being” in an agile and localised manner, rather than through escalation and policy changes. However, individuals cannot create these conversations without system level support. There is a role for digital assistants to prompt here and a potential example of how AI can help humans to be human.

Most leaders and line managers grapple with how to exercise authority and make decisions in a world where things are increasingly contested. You might make decisions about flexible working, but how do you manage it in practice? You might arrange senior team touch points for decision-making, but how do you decide who to include or exclude? How do you judge what meets a standard and what falls short? Ensuring that the underlying rationale is available means that leaders can be transparent with their teams and use their judgement to handle challenges. The notion of “firm but not rigid” is helpful here, not least to help make the distinction between an exception to a rule and undermining intent. For example, recognising the difference between team days to support coordination and a blanket requirement for presence between certain hours – or the difference between key team touch points and expanding meeting invites for the sake of sharing information or inclusion. Being able to stay firm on decisions, within reason, is essential and line managers must have the ability to hold effective and robust conversations about performance and working patterns, both virtually and face-to-face. This may well require some investment and expectation setting, as well as regular calibrating within the leadership community. We increasingly understand humans as social creatures who need to feel significant, competent and liked and it is perhaps no accident that the concept of psychological safety is felt to be so important at the moment. Without this, defensiveness becomes the norm, with negative consequences on performance and wellbeing . Individuals can find themselves clinging to the masts in the stormy seas of matrix and hybrid organisations. However, good organisational drumbeats which create a sense of belonging, regular conversations that allow for connection and appreciation and understandable frameworks, can mean people are not just weathering the storm. Rather, they are actually enjoying working in matrix and hybrid organisations.

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