The Benefits Of Messy Hierarchies: Inspiration From Flat Organizations

Forbes

13-05-2025

Flat-inspired organizations are inherently a bit messy, but they allow for agility, efficiency, and adaptability to both expected and unexpected change.
When I took over as CEO at Rayburn Electric Cooperative in 2017, we faced numerous major projects with hard deadlines. I realized pretty quickly that if we wanted the company to succeed, I couldn't be involved in every decision everyone made. It was less about delegating and more about rethinking the purpose and role of authority.
For me, the practical first step was to make sure the people getting work done had the authority to do their jobs well without having to navigate unnecessary bureaucratic approval chains. This meant giving people the freedom to make decisions in their area, the ability to purchase supplies and resources they needed, and the trust that they would use that freedom responsibly.
What emerged was a permanent cultural shift. Rayburn intentionally deviated from the traditional, pyramid-shaped hierarchy structure that we always see in our industry toward what I call a 'flat organization mindset.'
The concept of flat organizations surfaced in the 1960s when management theorist W.L. Gore founded his company, GORE-TEX, with a radically new structure: no titles, no bosses, and a commitment to direct communication between all employees.
By the 1980s and 90s, companies continued to experiment with different hierarchies, hoping they would foster creativity and improve innovation cycles. The video game company Valve Corporation is perhaps the most famous example of a truly flat organization, where employees choose their own projects and have no formal managers or titles—a system they've maintained with their motto 'Boss-free since 1996.'
Less austere are 'holocratic systems,' which are highly structured systems with specific rules and formalized processes. These organizations eliminate traditional management roles but replace them with a constitution-like governance system where authority is distributed through self-governing 'circles' focused on specific functions.
And then there are 'flatarchies,' a blend of all the above for a dynamic structure that shifts between the structure of traditional hierarchy and the flexibility of flatness as needed. Companies like Spotify and Airbnb have embraced this model to help them be adaptive while still maintaining necessary organization.
At Rayburn, we've created a hybrid structure‚ not because we couldn't decide which model to follow, but because we intentionally chose elements that work for our specific needs. We're less concerned with fitting neatly into a textbook definition and more focused on empowering our people to make the best decisions quickly. I have a natural aversion to formality, so our employees don't need to consult an organizational chart to know what to do.
In my book Status Quo is Not Company Policy: Empowering Innovation Through Adaptive Leadership, my coauthor interviewed our Engineering Manager, who described his experience prior to coming to Rayburn. For something as simple as a 30-minute software problem, it could take weeks of wasted hours of bureaucracy to work up and down a chain of command. This is not an uncommon phenomenon in corporate America.
In contrast, a short time ago, one of our linemen identified a need for side-by-side off-road vehicles to drastically improve efficiency in the field. He didn't draft a formal requisition that would languish for months awaiting approvals. He just called our CFO directly after spotting the previous year's models on sale, got a verbal authorization, and made the purchase. This kind of agility is next to impossible in traditional hierarchies.
I recognize that this isn't as clean and simple as most people prefer, and there is often anxiety about the chaos that can happen without a clear line of authority. But flat doesn't mean leaderless. At Rayburn, we try to always make sure leadership is distributed where it's needed, when it's needed, with even the newest employee's ideas being as valued as those from senior positions.
We accept that our unique structure can't be neatly defined. Flat-inspired organizations are inherently a bit messy, but they allow for agility, efficiency, and adaptability to both expected and unexpected change. You have to trust your team to make decisions, speak up, and lead from wherever they sit.
In our business, you can't afford bureaucracy. The electric grid doesn't wait on a chain of command.