Signal One firm duplicated 35% of decisions and spent over 1,000 hours a month on manual reporting

Summary

McKinsey describes one company whose diagnosis revealed how much effort was lost to poorly designed workflows. The firm was duplicating 35 percent of its decisions across functions. It held 60 percent more meetings than its peers. Data took about two months to cascade through the organization, and staff spent more than 1,000 hours each month on manual reporting. The report uses the example to show why structural redesigns, cost cuts, and flatter hierarchies often fail to sustain gains when processes and data silos remain untouched. It serves as evidence for the argument that productivity depends on how work flows rather than on the organization chart.