How to start with OrgRefactoring?
Every organization wants to improve—but where do you begin?
The best starting point for organizational refactoring is often right in front of you: the problems and frustrations you experience every day. These, what we call “bad smells”—such as slow decision-making, unclear responsibilities, or teams working at cross-purposes—are valuable signals that something in your structure could be improved.
Start with What You Experience
Begin by identifying the current pain points in your organization. These, what we call “bad smells” are not just annoyances; they are indicators of misalignment, inefficiency, or friction in your structure. Examples include:
- Teams overloaded or unclear on their responsibilities
- Slow handovers and decision-making
- Unclear ownership of products or processes
- Repeated bottlenecks or dependencies
Self-Assessment: A Lightweight, Holistic Scan
For larger organizations, OrgRefactoring offers a practical self-assessment. This assessment looks at key alignment factors such as:
- Funding and budget ownership
- Product management and backlog integration
- Portfolio governance and delivery structures
- Architecture and technical dependencies
- Operational support and tooling
- Team interfaces and knowledge sharing
The assessment is designed to be lightweight and non-intrusive, giving you a holistic view of where your organization is well-aligned—and where refactoring could deliver the most value.
Expert Validation & Enablement
After your self-assessment, it’s good practice to have an OrgRefactoring consultant review your results. This quick validation helps ensure that the findings are accurate, the “bad smells” are correctly interpreted, and the most promising opportunities for improvement are identified.
At first, the OrgRefactoring consultant will take the lead in guiding your organization through the first refactorings. However, a key part of our service is to train and enable your teams to apply refactorings themselves. Through hands-on coaching and access to the OrgRefactoring library, your organization will build the skills and confidence to continue improving independently.
Choose and Apply Refactorings
With a clear view of your organization’s alignment, you can select the most appropriate refactorings from the OrgRefactoring library. Each refactoring is designed to be small, safe, and reversible—so you can improve flow and collaboration without disrupting what already works.
Integrate and Share
It’s best practice to inject these refactorings into your existing improvement structures and governance processes. By sharing successes and learnings across teams and departments, you can tune each refactoring to fit your organization’s unique structure and culture—amplifying the benefits and building momentum for further improvement.
Ready to get started?
Explore our assessment tools, browse the OrgRefactoring library, or schedule an introductory call to discuss your organization’s challenges and opportuniti