{"id":20376,"date":"2008-07-13T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-07-13T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/global2020prd.wpengine.com\/insights\/matrix-organization-blamed-for-problems-at-hmrc\/"},"modified":"2020-03-21T08:35:33","modified_gmt":"2020-03-21T08:35:33","slug":"matrix-organization-blamed-for-problems-at-hmrc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.global-integration.com\/insights\/matrix-organization-blamed-for-problems-at-hmrc\/","title":{"rendered":"Matrix organization blamed for problems at HMRC"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">Is matrix management to blame for problems at UK Customs &amp; Excise?<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">When HMRC, a UK government department lost computer discs carrying the personal data of 25m people\u00a0last year, the incident was blamed on mistakes by junior officials. But a report just published focuses its criticism not so much on individuals as on the &#8220;unsuitable organizational design&#8221; of HMRC.<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">The article mentions various criticisms<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">&#8220;[HMRC] is not suited to the so-called &#8216;constructive friction&#8217; matrix type organization [that was] in place at the time of the data loss.&#8221;<\/font><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">&#8220;matrix management&#8221; led to\u00a0lack of accountability, ownership of issues and clarity of vision. <\/font><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">&#8220;proliferation of committees&#8221; and &#8220;the complex management structure&#8221;.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<li>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">A system of 37 business units created huge duplication, no common direction and no clear lines of accountability up to board level.<\/font><\/p>\n<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">Read more at the <a target=\"_blank\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ft.com\/cms\/s\/0\/a4008a5a-4edf-11dd-ba7c-000077b07658.html\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">financial times <\/a>\u00a0website<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">So it seems HM Revenue &amp; Customs experienced all the typical symptoms of a mismanaged matrix &#8211; (see our survey below left)\u00a0I wonder if they got any training in how to operate the new system? <\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">It isn&#8217;t the structure that makes the decisions and the mistakes &#8211; certainly not the one of losing data disks, it is the way people work together &#8211; is lack of security acceptable in any organizational form?<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">I also wonder how many of these symptoms existed before the merger and the more complex organization structure \u2013 the matrix makes a handy scapegoat when things go wrong.<\/font><\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\">&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p style=\"margin: 0pt\" class=\"MsoNormal\"><font face=\"Arial\">Does your matrix structure get the blame when things go wrong, is it really the structure?<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Is matrix management to blame for problems at UK Customs &amp; Excise? &nbsp; When HMRC, a UK government department lost [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-20376","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","type-blog"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v27.6 (Yoast SEO v27.6) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-premium-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Matrix organization blamed for problems at HMRC - Global Integration<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Is matrix management to blame for problems at UK Customs &amp; Excise? &nbsp; When HMRC, a UK government department lost computer discs carrying the\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.global-integration.com\/insights\/matrix-organization-blamed-for-problems-at-hmrc\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Matrix organization blamed for problems at HMRC\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Is matrix management to blame for problems at UK Customs &amp; Excise? 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