When I worked at Cisco the company went through some experiments to (re)organize its operations around 'boards' and 'councils', with people from different backgrounds working together on very specific opportunities or challenges. It was a test for a distributed organization model. It dramatically failed -officially due to the complexity this system created; in my eyes because the attempt was too shy: it operated alongside the classical model of hierarchy and middle management (of which I was part). You can't have both...
Distributed organization models do have many advantages nevertheless, as stated by Heiko Fischer in the video beneath. It's the best way to stimulate evolutionary and revolutionary innovation, for one. But it's so darn hard to let go of preconceived thoughts about organizational efficiency... For instance, in a distributed model you could have bonuses (or even salaries) depend on peer-to-peer networks, or you could crowdsource the performance reviews.
Brilliant ideas here, just waiting to be applied -if they ever will.
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