At the formal level, we find Enablement and Assistance —which makes for Tangible Influence: This is the direct way in which an employee or members of a team can benefit others in the organization and, more specifically, contribute to the success of other projects. At the informal level we find Encouragement which is a form of Intangible Influence: These are the indirect ways in which individual employees and teams can be champions or ever-present “colleagues” to others in the organization. These valuable members of an organization can be motivating cheerleaders and admiring observers on the sidelines.
Span of Support: [External Locus of Control] [Supply Element]: This fourth span concerns the amount of help a project team can expect from teams and individual people in other organizational units – how much commitment from others the team needs in order to implement strategy. Simons notes that wide spans of support become critically important when customer loyalty is vital to strategy implementation or when organizational design is highly complex because of sophisticated technologies and a complex value chain.
Teams cannot adjust an employee’s span of support in isolation —for the span is largely determined by people’s sense of shared responsibilities, which in turn stems from an organization’s culture and values. For a leader to narrow the Span of support they can use leveraged, highly individualized rewards, and clearly single out winners and losers. For them to widen the Span, leaders must build shared responsibilities through purpose and mission, group identification, trust, and equity-based incentive plans.
True and enduring support in an organization comes not just from connecting with and receiving tangible or intangible support from other people, another project, another initiative or another agency in the organization. It comes from a Triangulation, wherein both you and the other entity link positively with a third entity (a shared mission, a shared vision, a shared commitment to and capacity to enable a more general and critical project in the organization). A triangulated structure is always stronger (able to withstand powerful external forces) than a structure with only two anchor points (or two sets of anchor points: a four-sided structure).
We find formal levels of support in acts of Investment. This is the way in which Tangible Support is offered. Unwavering and specific contributions of resources arrive from elsewhere in the organization to you and your work. At the informal level, support is offered through Encouragement. This form of (Intangible Support is conveyed through the sustained and honest best wishes of others in the organization for your success in your current job or team.
Job and Team Design
When adjusting the design of individual jobs and teams, the first step for a leader is to set the span of control to reflect the resources allocated to the team—especially if the team and its project plays an important role in delivering customer value. Next, the executive can determine a specific level of entrepreneurial behavior and creative tension for the team by widening or narrowing spans of accountability and influence. Finally, an executive must adjust the span of support to ensure that the team will get the informal help it needs.
