# Why is it needed?
## Most org design is done by people without training
## Most of the org design frameworks are for execs
[To add: an explainer on the existing models, including their history and use.](#user-content-fn-1)[^1]
The existing models are good, useful tools for diagnosis and design. When cooking this up, I had two main issues that I wanted to address.
1. **The models are all pretty old!** They all predate the information revolution at work, which means they‘re good for understanding the organizations we have today, but less instructive for building the organizations we’ll need tomorrow. I wanted something that spoke to the [animating ideas](https://www.responsive.org/manifesto) of the next generation of work: Purpose; Networks; Empowerment; Experimentation; Transparency. (The even more simplified version of this that we used at August was Open Learning Networks, which I think you’ll see is pretty directly carried through in the model below.)
2. **Each of the attributes in the existing models are important, but othering.** With a few exceptions (e.g. relationships/relating and leadership/leading), they’re about *things*. And those *things* are far from the work. It always seems to set up a dynamic where folks are heckling the organization en masse. *Those* people don't have the right skills. *The* strategy is wrong. *This* process is broken. I wanted a model that could be about *things* and *activities,* to create a new dynamic for OD that gets closer to the work. (Another side note: this is even worse with ideas like “People/Process/Tools,” which almost everyone understands to mean “We need new people, new process, and new tools.”)
We can **decode** an organization or team to find its hidden secrets – revealing what needs fixing, and what should stay the same. We can **recode** an organization or team to get more of what we want and less of what we don’t.
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