Save to My Latticework unsave

Directly Responsible Individual
Directly Responsible Individual
Directly Responsible Individual
save0 saved view10.8K views
Share this with your network
Share this with your network
Overview

There’s no denying the central role of collaboration in our connected world. But there’s also no denying that you’ve li ...

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Quis suae urbis conservatorem Codrum, quis Erechthei filias non maxime laudat? Mihi enim satis est, ipsis non satis. Collatio igitur ista te nihil iuvat. Respondent extrema primis, media utrisque, omnia omnibus. Duo Reges: constructio interrete. Quis est, qui non oderit libidinosam, protervam adolescentiam? Sed quanta sit alias, nunc tantum possitne esse tanta.

Nonne igitur tibi videntur, inquit, mala? Ex quo, id quod omnes expetunt, beate vivendi ratio inveniri et comparari potest. Non est igitur voluptas bonum. Sint modo partes vitae beatae. Pugnant Stoici cum Peripateticis. Tecum optime, deinde etiam cum mediocri amico. Istam voluptatem perpetuam quis potest praestare sapienti?

Miserum hominem! Si dolor summum malum est, dici aliter non potest. Tum ille: Tu autem cum ipse tantum librorum habeas, quos hic tandem requiris? Dolere malum est: in crucem qui agitur, beatus esse non potest. Invidiosum nomen est, infame, suspectum. Sed quae tandem ista ratio est? Vitae autem degendae ratio maxime quidem illis placuit quieta.

Share this model with your network to be smarter, faster, together!
Actionable Takeaways
  • Assign DRIs to projects and parts of projects. 

Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Nunc haec primum fortasse audientis servire debemus. Aut unde est hoc contritum vetustate proverbium: quicum in tenebris? Illis videtur, qui illud non dubitant bonum dicere -; Quis suae urbis conservatorem Codrum, quis Erechthei filias non maxime laudat? Nam de isto magna dissensio est. Duo Reges: constructio interrete.

Beatum, inquit. Quaesita enim virtus est, non quae relinqueret naturam, sed quae tueretur. Bork Dic in quovis conventu te omnia facere, ne doleas. Nam et complectitur verbis, quod vult, et dicit plane, quod intellegam; Quare obscurentur etiam haec, quae secundum naturam esse dicimus, in vita beata; Quid est igitur, cur ita semper deum appellet Epicurus beatum et aeternum? Quantum Aristoxeni ingenium consumptum videmus in musicis? Quae in controversiam veniunt, de iis, si placet, disseramus. Cuius ad naturam apta ratio vera illa et summa lex a philosophis dicitur.

Sed quae tandem ista ratio est? Duo enim genera quae erant, fecit tria. Et quod est munus, quod opus sapientiae? Rhetorice igitur, inquam, nos mavis quam dialectice disputare? Bonum incolumis acies: misera caecitas. Itaque eos id agere, ut a se dolores, morbos, debilitates repellant. Tuo vero id quidem, inquam, arbitratu. Quia dolori non voluptas contraria est, sed doloris privatio.

Limitations

DRIs mean a single point of responsibility, but not necessarily a single point of thought or work. The risk with this model is that if someone is not the DRI for a task or project, they might not contribute as much, and instead focus on their own DRIs. In that sense, the risk here is inadvertently creating greater silos under the pretense of individuals taking responsibility.

In Practice

Cross-functional practice. 

Gloria Lin, a previous employee at Apple, advocated DRIs and implemented them at Flipboard. In a response originally posted on Quora, she explained the value to cross-functional teams: 

You want a DRI who is responsible for driving the team's sleuthing until the issue is solved. Often this is an engineering lead or an engineering program manager. Say it's mostly a mechanical engineering issue with a little bit of HW involved. Then usually a PD (product design) engineer will be the DRI, and they will work with the HW engineers to resolve the problem. If something keeps failing on the prototype testing lines, then you could have a TPM (test program manager) as DRI, working in conjunction with the Apple engineering teams, testing equipment vendor, and contract manufacturer teams.”

MobileMe and accountability.

In 2008, Apple launched MobileMe, an email system aimed to provide a seamless experience and knock BlackBerry from its business user lead. What’s that? You haven’t heard of MobileMe? That’s because it was a complete failure. 

The story goes that Steve Jobs promptly gathered the MobileMe team to a Town Hall where the relevant DRI was fired and replaced. It should be noted that advocates of DRI point out that firing those responsible is not the main purpose, practice or pay off for using it.  

Build your latticework
This model will help you to:

d

Origins & Resources

When Steve Jobs returned to Apple in 1997, one of the major changes he made was to get rid of traditional business divisions, with their separate Profit and Loss (P&L) responsibilities. Jobs fired the general managers of these abolished business units and instead moved to a functional organisation approach under a single business-wide P&L, and this structure remains today. 

This runs against standard business wisdom that tells us that large corporations must be organised through multiple divisions, essentially run as independent business units, to promote accountability. Instead, Apple has focused on functional expertise and greater cross-functional teaming — which some argue is a key contributor to their culture of innovation. 

It might be argued that DRI grew in Apple because of the gap in accountability that grew from the lack of divisional responsibility. Either way, it’s an approach that can be adopted in any organisational size and structure. 

My Notes

    Nothing here yet. Join ModelThinkers and login to be the first to comment.
Already a ModelThinkers member? Please log in here.

Oops, That’s Members’ Only!

Fortunately, it only costs US$5/month to Join ModelThinkers and access everything so that you can rapidly discover, learn, and apply the world’s most powerful ideas.

ModelThinkers membership at a glance:

Small mark
UNLOCK EVERYTHING
Access all mental models and premium content.
Small mark
BUILD YOUR LATTICEWORK
Save models to your personal list.
Small mark
QUICKLY MEMORISE MODELS
Use our Learn function to embed models to memory
Small mark
PERSONALISE MODELS
Add your own notes and reminders.
Small mark
BUILD YOUR ‘EXTERNAL BRAIN’
Discover a new idea? Capture it by adding a new model.
Small mark
JOIN THE MT COMMUNITY
Rate models, comment and access exclusive events.

“Yeah, we hate pop ups too. But we wanted to let you know that, with ModelThinkers, we’re making it easier for you to adapt, innovate and create value. We hope you’ll join us and the growing community of ModelThinkers today.”

Arun Pradhan & Shai Desai
CoFounders, ModelThinkers.

You Might Also Like:

- Actionable summaries of the world's most powerful ideas.