Hack:
'Small' is desirable in workplaces - How to scale Small to Big without losing the advantages of small? (real case incl.)

I was just giving career advice to a friend who is considering moving from a large corporation (thousands of employees) into a small start-up. I talked about my own experience working at a start-up right after college, where I was able to participate in activities and make decisions that were “above my pay grade,” such as managing major projects and interfacing with top clients. I found my next job at a larger, 30 year old company, although it included a better salary and title, to be a step back. At my new job all of my work was funneled into a couple of projects and I was not allowed to make key decisions. Consequently, I believe the experience at working at a small company was much more valuable to my development as a professional than my work at the larger company. Despite the fact that the culture and solutions you laid out here for this small company are very progressive, they do not necessarily address the issue that employees, especially junior employees, may be less satisfied at a larger company because they are given a less responsibility for tasks and decisions, and less ownership of outcomes. I think the start of a solution might be in your suggestions of “sharing and collaborating internally on ideas on growing together” and “set up a formal structure for entrepreneurship,” but I also feel that something is missing to address the problem I’m discussing. Maybe on the list of solutions could be added something about consciously seeking out ideas from junior/new staff, focusing on career tracks for junior staff, etc.

Great Article this is a very important topic that many companies face as they grow from a start up to a larger company. I worked for a smaller organization and was able to learn a great deal from all the different departments I was able to work in. The entrepreneurial aspect creates this hunger to learn not just about your function but also about whatever maybe required to get your company to the next level. There is a culture difference that is instilled by working for these smaller companies that can play a key role if maintained once the company expanding. I feel one of the ways this aspect is lost is when companies grow faster than they are ready for, which is more often the case. They tend to lose focus on what had gotten them to that point and focusing trying to manage this growth. They are dealing with a heavier workload, more employees and more than likely trying to mimic the structure of larger corporation.

I have gone through an experience in an organization that grew from 150 people to over 800 people in a short span of 4 years. It was a drastic change as this organization tried to maintain the “cozy”, “family”, and “home-grown” identity even as it grew to this size, though it ultimately succumbed to top-down leadership to maintain corporate structure (which isn’t necessarily bad, but just impossible to sustain). I’ve left the organization along with many others largely because of this as it did not match my desire to stay in an organization that evolved dramatically from the original culture it developed and since transitioned away from its roots.
I just wanted to mention that this organization followed almost all of the key elements you mentioned from the beginning: recruitment, creating minimal but necessary structures, observing and mimicking its own success, establishing partnerships in projects, and instilling responsibility for personal development, as it emerged. It heavily recruited additional members, even at its current size, based on the fact that it has developed and maintained a small company culture at a large company size. Why did so many people leave? The main reason is the fact that a top-down leadership / hierarchal system eventually took place due to the organizations sheer size. With the amount of people, the amount of different activities, the organization wanted a way to control its identity in the market, and didn’t want any one employee taint its image, the management team felt it was necessary to maintain complete control. Business is no longer territorial, but having a global impact, the existence of entrepreneurial mistakes, risk taking chances could happen at the organization’s stake. This of course is acceptable, however at the same time the organization “hypocritically” continues to stress the importance of entrepreneurship, collaborating internally on ideas and growing together, and minimal and most necessary structures, creating a very frustrating work environment for the workers that have been recruited and “promised” the flexibility and innovative work environment.
Overall, I believe this is definitely on the right track as a method to maintain a company’s culture as it evolves from a nimble, small company towards rapid growth. These points seems very valid in keeping the employees motivated, it gives them the opportunities to succeed, and it gives them a way to assess their ability to succeed, however I definitely would warn that as the manager of a large corporation, because there simply are more people you are responsible for, how much of the little things affect the business identity? How will a flexible structure affect the uniformity of your products?

"The arrogance of success" I love this. I think many larger company’s rely too heavily on their brand and historical success and forget that you must adapt to a changing business environment for future success. As I read through all of these stories, a few key themes keep popping up: collaboration, innovation, employee and customer feedback, transparency. Clearly these are the things that big companies need to re-focus on to prepare for the future but I wonder if some companies have simply grown too big for their own good (at least in today's environment). Organizational processes that were once put in place to create efficiencies and drive down costs are now seen as a hindrance to innovation. I understand how the proposed solutions work for a small company in growth mode but how does mature companies (the wal-marts of the world) strip out the unnecessary processes already in place? Interesting times. I see this very thing going on in my own industry and wonder if the industry leaders will soon fall from grace.