Subject areaProcess and organisation
Also known asorganisational friction
Organizational friction is the set of internal handovers, delays and disconnects that slow information or a decision before it reaches where it is needed.
It arises when systems, departments and responsibilities do not talk to each other: every manual step, every extra approval and every piece of data copied from one archive to another adds time and room for error.
In the retail marketing article, success is measured precisely by the ability to eliminate the organizational friction "that separates static warehouse data from the real-time perception of the consumer". It follows that the work concerns systems integration and silos first, and outward communication only afterwards.
An example
A retailer updates warehouse stock once a day, while customers check the online store page in real time: the product shows as available and is not. The fault lies in the handover between the two systems, and that is organizational friction.
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Enrico Giubertoni. Licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0: you may quote, translate and adapt this entry with the author’s name and a link, stating any changes. For commercial use, write to info@enricogiubertoni.com
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