The Oticon Case

The Spaghetti organisation was the result of a radical change that undergo the danish hearing manufacturer Oticon. When in 1988 Lars Kolind took over as the CEO, the market share of the company had dropped dramatically. That situation called for a revolution in the company in order to remain competitive. Back then, the company was up against big companies like Siemens, Philips, Sony, M3 and AT&T. It was impossible to compete against them on financial resources, technology or marketing. The only way to remain competitive was to create something that they big companies would never be able to replicate: an innovative fast-moving organisation.

The program of that change was extremely complex due to the numerous parts, interactions and the behaviours produced as a result of those interactions. Therefore, it was crucial a strong leadership in order to create clear directions and ensure effective communication to speed up the "sense-making process". This article aims to analyse the leadership of Lars Kolind in order to highlight which points lead to the successful implementation of the change.