Systems

Ross Woods, 2018

Most organizations have the systems listed below.

Governance Organizational chart | Business structure | Accountability and delegation | Legals and legislation compliance | Risk | Policy development
Strategic business planning Assessment of organizational capability | Trend identification and analysis |Strategic risk management
Operational planning  
Finance Bookkeeping | Debt recovery| Asset management | Purchasing and expenditure | Budgeting | Payroll | Financial auditing | Monitoring and reporting to CFO and board | Reporting to government | Antifraud systems | Financial risk | Taxation
Facilities management Buildings | Vehicles | Aquisitions
Human resources (HR) Recruitment and selection | Onboarding/induction | Training and professional development | Staff relations | Pay and conditions | Performance and talent management
Marketing Product/service design | Advertising and selling | Public relations
Information management Software and IT | Data security | Document control
Workplace health and safety  
Knowledge management Confidential and private information regarding staff and clients | Patentable products in development | Commercial in confidence information (I.e. information that would disadvantage the organization if it were known to competitors, such as negotiations of contracts, mergers, and takeovers)
Quality Assurance (QA) Customer feedback | Internal auditing or checking | Licensing and accreditiaton | Continual improvement

Of course, if the organization is very small, then the systems are very simple, and some kinds of organizations some don't need some systems. But some kinds of systems are mission-critical for some kinds of organizations and take quite sizable effort and attention.

Systems normally have the following characteristics:

  1. They have lines of accountability
  2. They can be inspected or audited
  3. They can be improved
  4. They work in the same way for each case; they are not haphazard or "make it up as you go along."

Even the simplest systems normally have the following components:

  1. Inputs
  2. Origination of data
  3. Decisions to be made
  4. Assigned roles to make decisions
  5. Criteria for decisions
  6. A way of monitoring effectiveness and making improvements
  7. Outputs
  8. Data is archived or destoyed.

Systems can be expressed as neat flowcharts or procedures if decisions must be based on clear criteria and definable results; they might even be candidates for automation and computerizaton. Other kinds of decisions, however, are too complex and require professional judgement. They typically involve personal factors, possiblity of unexpected circumstances, or competing theroretical models of what must be done.

Some systems, such as risk management, workplace health and saftey, finance, business planning, governance and quality managment are described separately in WU materials.