In November 2023, the French Court of Audit (Cour des Comptes) published a report (more precisely, its “final observations”) on the Armed Forces Commissariat Service (SCA)[1]. At the heart of the document is the organisation of this service – and more precisely its “matrix organisation”. An organisational model shared by many large organisations in the civilian world. Is it fundamentally unsuited to the armed forces and, more broadly, to high-stakes contexts? Or is it merely – as so often – a crucial question of “implementation”?
“Matrix” organisations formally arrived at what was then the French Ministry “of Defence” in 2008, with the “White Paper” and the reforms that followed. Of course, “functionalisation” already existed, but it was from that point that the term began to be used and to really “stir up” the armed forces.
One may note, for example, the precise and, as always, well-argued criticism by Michel Goya, drawing on the experience of the war between Israel and Hezbollah: “The 2006 confrontation had just shown that this organisation was not made for war”[2]. For him, the matrix system, “disastrous for waging war”, necessarily works in a conflictual way, since each of the stakeholders has different objectives. And in combat, there is of course neither the time nor the resources to wage an internal struggle at the same time… All the more so as the response is inevitably “re-bureaucratisation”, with all the negative connotations that implies, at least for free minds and agile organisations.
This objection is the most “rational” of all. But there are others.
Michel Goya also set out some of them: “A matrix organisation only works properly if the chains converge through a strong common culture, commitment to a mobilising project and the free circulation of information”. And, for deeper reasons (he cites Philippe d’Iribarne’s “Logic of Honour”), France would not be suited to matrix organisations… And indeed, these arguments are heard in many “civilian” organisations confronted with this mode of organisation.
Common culture, commitment to a mobilising project, circulation of information, bureaucratisation: the main ingredients were therefore already set out in that article.
So, has the military world changed since then, or does it still show the same incompatibilities with matrix organisation?
Let us take a short detour through that particular period, which in my view was formative.
The matrix, a bitter pill
It is important to bear in mind that the introduction of matrix organisations at the Ministry of the Armed Forces coincided with the institutionalisation of a reduction in the size of the forces (even though a commitment had been made at the time to “ring-fence” resources), and with an intense wave of unit disbandments, carried out without the slightest protest within the armed forces – whereas the “redundancy plans” carried out in civilian organisations at the time sparked mass mobilisations and heightened attention from public decision-makers and the media.
Yet disbanding units affected not only headcount and the considerable increase in individual relocations[3] (the famous “HR manoeuvre”) – significant “changes” – but also powerful symbols:
- The history of glorious units, whose traditions would sometimes be handed down, but were often “turned into museum pieces” as their colours were deposited with the armed forces’ historical service;
- And, as a result, the drastic reduction in the number of “regimental commander” posts[4], which took away from many officers the prospect of this unique responsibility, the long-awaited high point of their commitment for many[5]. Not to mention the “affective” dimension of this role, since the commander can be seen as a “head of the family”, in a world that strongly values social cohesion, closeness and empathy at every level. And therefore the upheaval for everyone that the disappearance, or at least the dilution, of this structuring reference point meant.
Nevertheless, no protests. But probably already deep wounds.
This period was therefore also one of increasing jointness, and of the arrival of the famous “defence bases”, structuring symbols of these “matrices”: “operational command and support structures have been rationalised, either at ministerial level for general support, or at joint level for purely operational functions and specialised support. The old organisation has therefore given way to a merged organisation with structures that are now joint, streamlined and therefore fewer in number”[6].
With as many human, organisational and symbolic changes.
And in particular because the introduction of support structures and the creation of defence bases made the exercise of command more delicate, in the very particular context of disbanding units, and therefore of supporting personnel who would soon no longer be under the orders of a “regimental commander” – himself disappearing – and who sometimes were already no longer “fully” so.
Let us remember:
- “The notion of the full prerogatives of command is giving way to complex divisions of responsibility”[7]
- “Upending the daily lives of all the ministry’s staff, the irruption of a matrix organisation into a hierarchical world, combined with the concurrent reorganisation of the ministry’s ‘professional’ chains, created an impression of widespread disorganisation”[8]
- “To the known structural reorganisations, namely seven disbandments and four major transfers, will be added the functional reorganisation of general administration and routine support into defence bases. Yet touching processes that are deeply ingrained in habits is more anxiety-provoking than changing or moving structures”[9]
- “When I left my post at NATO, I didn’t think I would still need to be a diplomat as a defence base commander!”[10]
The “defence bases” were therefore the perceived – but also acknowledged – symbol of these upheavals:
- “defence bases will be the cornerstone of the reform of the armed forces”[11]
- “(defence bases are the) most emblematic project of the transformation”[12].
For many, then, the matrix seemed a very bitter pill to swallow…
The Commissariat, doubly guilty?
So why this detour through our recent history?
First, because many of the personnel who know the difficulties reported by the Court of Audit lived through that period – and because organisations have a memory, particularly for traumatic events.
But also because, within the defence bases, support for the forces was entrusted to the Armed Forces Commissariat Service (SCA), which is the subject of the report at the origin of this piece…
In 2014, the “defence base support groups” (GSBdD), created at the same time as the SCA, were attached to this brand-new service[13].
From pooled support within the defence bases (which was already a change), this mission was therefore entirely transferred to this “support service”, to use a classic term in organisations.
A new shock, then, even if the intention was good. The aim was to strengthen local structures within the GSBdD, between a fully centralised level (the SCA) and functions internalised within units (the previous organisation). Just as the “next move” would be to set up, even more locally, the “Atlas” spaces (access to support at any time, anywhere), on a “one-stop shop” logic.
But we know that the road to hell is paved with good intentions… And this development was experienced as a new rupture.
So let us take, as new starting points, a few extracts from the Court of Audit document which also bears witness – more than ten years later – to the “irrational” dimensions of the changes experienced, and therefore still present.
On this “complex and unstable matrix architecture”: “The first source of complexity lay in the reform itself and in the support model chosen, with the shift from a hierarchical chain of command to a system of quasi-contractual relations between those providing support and those supported, based on a functional logic. Breaking in this way with the armed forces’ usual ways of working, this change represented, for supporters and supported alike, a genuine cultural revolution”.
A “cultural revolution” no doubt because, more than “quasi-contractual” relations, genuinely “contractual” new practices appeared – heavily charged with symbolism for a world devoted to public service – with the introduction of “environment contracts” and “local service contracts”. “Contracts”… with all that suggests for a world steeped in public service and commitment to a higher cause…
So, beyond the changes to organisations and processes, this “revolution” also had consequences for “perceptions” – two terms far removed from the often very “rational” approaches to organisational analysis: “despite the efforts made to remedy it, the armed forces tended to perceive the integration of support into a specific system, replacing its previous incorporation within the forces themselves, as a rupture generating a distance as damaging as it was irreducible”.
And the report recalls that adjustments were then made: “the crisis of confidence that affected the relationship between supporters and supported in the first period of the support reform led to a new wave of transformations of the service and its activity, launched in 2017 under the ‘SCA 2022’ plan”.
But apparently, the expected results are not there yet…
As the Court of Audit states in its findings, but also in its recommendations:
- “The hypothesis of a major engagement puts the SCA under strain in its ability to meet the needs of the armed forces”
- “While the critical size of the GSBdD remains a real issue, it is above all the concern for qualitative and local responses to the needs of those supported that led to their renovation under SCA 2022”.
- “Moreover, although enriched with additional layers, the still very uniform organic structure of the new architecture does not guarantee that it is optimally adjusted to realities on the ground”
- “(The ATLAS spaces) face risks of overload, forcing the GSBdD into local regulation in line with the reality of the resources available”
- “(A) joint support service that does not have all the levers to carry out its missions”
Is the Commissariat therefore doubly guilty, for having “taken power” without delivering the expected “service”?
Since we are talking about a “cultural revolution”, let us acknowledge that such transformations always take a long time… 20 years, 30 years, often a generation. Because even if individuals move on, the memory of organisations is often stronger, and passes on to newcomers the perception of events they never experienced.
For example, the term “regimental commander” (chef de corps) mentioned above… Formally replaced in official texts by “commander of an administrative formation”[14], it still exists in practice…
But time alone will probably not be enough for a calm and successful implementation of this organisation and the associated practices, given the difficulties mentioned by the Court of Audit – and decoded in the light of long experience of matrix organisations…
To do so, let us start from a few key terms in the difficulties listed in the document: major engagement, quality and proximity, contract, distance, trust, additional layers, local regulation, full set of levers…
The problem of “major engagement”
“Major engagement” or “high intensity”, which (re)appeared with the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the perception of a direct threat to the interests and values of our country, was an opportunity – particularly for Army decision-makers – to revive the criticism described in Michel Goya’s article on “matrices”:
- “In a world where organisations are dominated by a matrix approach, land forces are a notable exception: marked by a need for verticality, their command system is characterised by the cascade of the main effects of the different levels, a guarantee of both coherence and subsidiarity, in planning as well as in the conduct of action.”[15]
- “The organisation of support appears to many observers to be ineffective in the perspective of a high-intensity conflict. ‘The Chief of the Defence Staff (CEMA) has been clear about the capabilities that guarantee [the] operational capacity. Military personnel must have confidence in their military tool. The current matrix organisation is based more on efficiency than on resilience,’ pointed out the deputy chief for land operations.”[16].
Once again, “trust”… A quality and a way of working that cannot be established by rules or organisation – or at least not by them alone.
And these objections echo some of the arguments put forward by Olivier Schmitt in his masterly work on change in military organisations[17].
For him – and while these “matrix” transformations were transposed from the “civilian” world (even though he does not specifically mention these changes) – “the armed forces require a specific approach in order to properly grasp their dynamics of change, for three cumulative reasons”:
- “they hold the means of using force, without defining the conditions of its use (…) a use of collective violence for a political purpose”
- “change in the armed forces is not linked to a single fundamental objective, but to a multiplicity of sometimes contradictory injunctions”
- “the rarity and importance of the event for which they are preparing: major war”
Of course, the first argument is irrefutable. It is indeed a mission and means that make the armed forces incomparable to other organisations.
Nevertheless, the “matrix” transformations affecting the activity of the armed forces were undertaken within the broader framework of the Ministry of Defence (or of the Armed Forces, to use its current name). Which reminds us that most military personnel are both warriors – carrying out this very specific mission – and civil servants – and therefore members of an administrative organisation that, for many, resembles other similar organisations.
It is also an opportunity to remember that the reform launched in 2008 carried an announced goal of “civilianising” the Ministry, particularly for “support” functions; a dimension some observers judged very insufficient, notably with “civilian” functions being taken over by military personnel freshly out of their “warrior” status… Here again, a symbolic dimension full of meaning for many, from one point of view or the other. And a potential source of latent fractures, conscious and unconscious.
So, would it have been possible to envisage a transformation of the Ministry while preserving the specific features of its “armed forces” part? Probably difficult to draw the boundaries, since all the entities are interdependent.
The second argument may raise a smile among the leaders and practitioners of many organisations, particularly large ones (but not only): if their objective were single and unanimously shared (making a profit, for example, or providing a permanent, high-quality service…), their daily lives would be greatly simplified – and my profession would not exist…
The “civilian” origin of matrix organisations was undoubtedly one of the reasons for the mistrust they aroused: “the matrix organisation resulting from the LOLF [the 2001 French law on public finance] and the nearly completed pooling of support must not lead to command losing its sense of responsibility, in a ministry that invented the formula ‘one leader, one mission, resources’, and in which operational effectiveness requires absolute confidence in the leader.”[18]
But this argument cannot be fully accepted, at least as far as “rational” arguments are concerned… though there is of course also the “less rational”, which matters a great deal while being too often neglected.
As for the third argument, other organisations and professionals share this specific feature: those dealing with questions of life and death, major accidents, industrial safety and human factors – in the energy industries, for example, but also aviation, medicine, space… Many of them train and work every day for circumstances that, everyone hopes, will never arise. Not on the scale of the potential consequences of “major conflicts”, of course, but still with dimensions that shape their professional – and often personal – commitment.
That is why the field of safety and human factors also offers sources of inspiration to shed light on our question.
On the side of safety and human factors…
One might object that there is “safety” and there is “security” – which French tries to distinguish as “sûreté” and “sécurité”, without non-experts being quite sure which is which… There are differences, certainly, but also overlaps and, why not, synergies. Because in both worlds, one has to be prepared “to be surprised”[19].
So, since Michel Goya mentioned the inevitable bureaucratisation that accompanies the introduction of matrices, let us also talk about the “proceduralisation” spreading through the worlds of safety and security. Because, as Max Weber already observed more than a century ago, proceduralisation and bureaucratisation go hand in hand[20]. A trend we all know…
And this proceduralisation, which nonetheless starts from a good intention and has many advantages (providing comfort, reducing anxiety in the face of change and uncertainty, protecting against arbitrary orders and bad practices…), can make the system ineffective if people do not know how to go beyond the rules to achieve the objectives and accomplish the mission[21].
And we all know – including in environments that are supposedly highly regulated and have high safety and security stakes – those small local adjustments, those mutual commitments, that make it possible to accomplish the mission…
Because “even in an apparently very disciplined structure, there are many ways of not really applying orders”[22].
As Michel Goya then argues, to avoid an “intellectual defeat” – which paves the way for strategic defeat – it seems essential to guard against excessive exploitation at the expense of exploration, “legalism” at the expense of “entrepreneurship”, watching the path at the expense of watching the environment…
One may then wonder whether the cumbersomeness, or even the deadlocks, experienced or feared in the military system when facing major challenges stem from dysfunctions intrinsic to matrix organisations, or from a “bureaucratic” and “procedural” drift, related or not… Because proceduralisation can lead to defensive reflexes of the “No rule, no use”[23] type: if it isn’t written down, I don’t do it… And in that case, the whole system seizes up. With varying arguments, from “protecting the institution” to “covering oneself”…
So let us take the example of another support service, which apparently satisfies everyone: the Armed Forces Health Service.
The Health Service and the Commissariat, in the same boat?
The Armed Forces Health Service (SSA) has been a joint service – and therefore a pooled one – since 1964. Schools and personnel come under it, with the exception of the administrative corps of commissariat officers assigned to this service, who, like others, belong to the Commissariat service (our famous SCA).
Its mission is medical support for the forces: “The most important thing is to be there when there is a medical problem”.[24]
And as Chief Medical Officer Luc Aigle, director of studies at the Lyon-Bron military health schools, points out, this mission is carried out in operations, of course, but also through permanent medical support. Including decisions on unfitness, when “both for the person and for the institution, it is time to know how to say no”.
The parallel with the SCA is interesting here.
One imagines that, in direct support of an armed conflict, the Health Service’s support is unanimously appreciated.
But when an individual is declared unfit outside operations, the decision can be harder to take, and above all to implement:
- for the person, who can no longer carry out an activity that often gives meaning to their professional, even personal, commitment;
- but also for their unit, which can no longer count on them. In a context of increasingly scarce human resources, moreover.
We thus reach a situation typical of “matrix” organisations, in which a “support” service can come into conflict with an “operational” service. For the person? Or for the institution? This brings us to the definition of the “general interest”, or to the conditions for success in matrix working set out by Michel Goya: “a strong common culture, commitment to a mobilising project and the free circulation of information”.
Will the logistics follow?
In an entity where there is “only one boss”, one imagines that he or she would arbitrate between subordinates’ conflicting interests or points of view. But in organisations where this tension is expressed institutionally, who prevails?
Through the previous formulation, one can guess that the “general interest” – and therefore the one that legitimately prevails – is carried by the medical service. “Support”, then, against the “operational”.
Enough perhaps to make the “personnel support” staff of the Commissariat’s services and functions (pay, routine purchasing, road transport, legal support, housing, clothing, food…) dream.
Because without medical support, there are no operations: the implicit authority of the support corps, even in a matrix organisation, is recognised.
But without food, clothing, without pay[25], can operations be conducted either?
It is likely that, in this respect and unlike the Health Service, the Commissariat suffers from the traditional French adage that “the logistics will follow” (l’intendance suivra)…
All the more so as the Court of Audit report also mentions, for the SCA, the difficulties it encounters with this same mission of checking fitness, notably medical fitness: “The fitness of military personnel for deployment is a real management issue for the SCA. It must take three factors into account: personnel who are medically unfit, whether temporarily or permanently, personnel whose qualifications are not up to date, and personnel unavailable for family or professional reasons”[26].
And as regards medical fitness, the question that emerges is how personnel are employed – a question raised well beyond the SCA alone:
- for a given mission, which may justify particular criteria, less specific to general military employment (think, for example, of the “geek” whose physical and behavioural caricature may be far removed from the military world, but whose skills may be essential to cybersecurity missions);
- or to serve “at any time and in any place”, and therefore with a fitness common to all (apart from very specific jobs which are even more restrictive in terms of fitness).
Who decides, in the end?
And indeed the SCA, together with the Court of Audit, proposes changing the fitness criteria, at least for reservists. Who, by their nature, are employed for a given job, without necessarily the prospect of being employed elsewhere later…
Beyond a “category” question (reservists, a very particular “bestiary”), this example reveals an implicit hierarchy between the different support corps. One prevailing over the other, and even over the employing functions.
Among the “support” functions, then, there is also an implicit “hierarchy”.
As far as “high intensity” is concerned, the Commissariat’s support seems to have been adapted to these particular contexts. With the creation of specific directorates (Commissariat directorates for overseas operations and joint Commissariat directorates) and dedicated GSBdD, “reporting directly to the central directorate and placed at the disposal of a command”[27] – that is, coming directly under the authority of the commands engaged in these situations.
A matrix organisation, then, that does not prevent adaptation to particular circumstances. As does, for example, the Centre for Planning and Conduct of Operations (CPCO), at the heart of operations, which has also adopted this organisation: “The centre’s matrix organisation by geographical area and professional office makes it possible to set up dedicated cells on demand according to circumstantial needs”[28]
And this is a clear sign that the rejection of matrix organisation reflects difficulties and conflicts that go beyond the unsuitability of the organisational model for the armed forces.
The matrix as a revealer of “power” conflicts
This rather widespread hostility is often expressed through the impossibility of having “all the levers”. For the forces, as we have seen. But also for the Commissariat, which also mentions – in the Court of Audit report – the same difficulty in managing its human resources, since most of its staff are only assigned to it for a time, and therefore depend on the armed services: “The SCA’s talent pool managers therefore have neither the legitimacy nor the levers to take action for personnel of whom they are neither the employers nor the managers”.
With each side claiming to need “all the levers”, we have all the ingredients for an “escalation” of tension between two organisations, synonymous with inevitable deadlocks and programmed “revenge”…
This is the heart of what makes matrix organisations specific. Because behind the “levers” lies the sharing of power.
And what Michel Goya describes as an inevitable “conflict” can be seen, from another point of view, as an indispensable “cooperation”. Because it all depends on how one conceives “power”:
- “Power over”, as described by Max Weber and in historical forms of “leadership”;
- Or “power with”, which Hannah Arendt’s work helps us understand.
Matrix organisations certainly come from another organisational culture, one that recognises the benefits of a “balance of power” that some, in France in particular, consider ineffective (for example, the famous “shutdowns” in the United States that paralyse federal institutions until a compromise is found…).
And it is perhaps this difference that lies behind the “cultural” dimension of this transformation (even though the “culture” of organisations, or even more so of geostrategic groupings, is a complex notion that should not be oversimplified).
The introduction of a distributed sharing of “power” at the Ministry of the Armed Forces had in fact preceded the creation of the GSBdD and the build-up of the SCA: “Whereas the Chief of the Defence Staff (CEMA) was traditionally regarded, according to the formula then in use, as ‘primus inter pares’, and essentially had powers relating to the employment of forces, decree no. 2005-520 of 21 May 2005 marked a real break (…) With nearly ten years’ hindsight, it is now possible to measure how completely this reform upended the internal balance of the ministry, leaving the three service chiefs of staff, who had had general powers outside the operational field, with only specific delegated powers”[29]
With the GSBdD and the SCA, we were then in the “implementation” of a profound transformation – probably insufficiently explained beyond its purely organisational dimensions. A classic…
Flexibility, for shrinking but also for growing
Yet matrix organisation, by making it easier to express interests sometimes perceived as divergent, but always serving the general and shared interest, enables innovation and creativity.
Of course, it is not simple, as we can see – and often still, in civilian organisations too.
Olivier Schmitt discusses this in relation to “competition” between the armed services, but his statement can no doubt be applied to that between an “operational” entity and an equally essential “support” entity: “the role of the joint level is complicated because it must strike a balance between healthy competition between the services, which is a factor of innovation, and the risk of fragmentation to the detriment of unity of operational effort”[30].
But as the description of the CPCO’s matrix organisation puts it, this organisation also allows flexibility:
- Flexibility for shrinking, which is how the armed forces experienced the arrival of this new organisation, and how they still identify it, consciously or not.
- But also flexibility in building up, to carry out new missions without creating a complete entity.
This is in line with the principles of joint and allied organisations, serving as a “framework nation” integrating other forces drawn from “force pools”, or contributing to what were called, as early as the 1990s, “CJTFs” (Combined Joint Task Forces). An approach already tried and tested, then…
And this is precisely why civilian organisations adopted this mode of organisation: to bring together support resources and expertise in the service of “operational” entities whose size and diversity are adapted to external challenges (countries one prospects or withdraws from, products one develops and others one stops supplying, entities one acquires and others one sells…).
With a mass effect – and therefore economies of scale – for support functions whose growth or decline is then not strictly proportional to the activity of the forces supported, while maintaining quality of service.
For example, Naval Group adopted a new organisation at the end of 2022 with five product and service divisions, three operational divisions and five functional divisions… A three-dimensional matrix, then[31].
And this flexibility is an asset, not only in terms of savings, but also of the capacity to absorb variations. As Olivier Schmitt points out: “the degree of flexibility of the military organisation is an important variable for understanding the resilience capacity of the forces”.
So, which offers the best resilience: the pillar, vertical and monolithic, or the network?
How to bring about your own misfortune
That is why some of the adjustment solutions identified in the Court of Audit report risk not only being ineffective, but may even prove counter-productive. Because they respond to the reflex of “more of the same”… whereas, faced with recurring difficulties, one needs to do things “differently”[32].
Alternating?
One might be tempted to propose, for military organisations, an “alternation” between a “classic” – and therefore reassuring – way of working and this new way of working, for very localised situations: “the organisation of the Ministry of Defence now requires decision-makers to know how to switch alternately from a hierarchical system (one leader, one mission, resources) to a matrix system that favours a cross-cutting approach to meet specific needs (one person responsible, one contract, one performance)”[33]
In this case, pretending to change so as not to change… More of the same. And above all, a way of placing the people concerned in a schizophrenic situation hardly compatible with a more than heavy workload and vital stakes.
Going backwards?
The Court of Audit report also mentions “experiments” aimed, without calling the SCA’s prerogatives into question, at “relocating” certain HR functions within units.
This “relocation” might, at first sight, mean a simple move. But it would probably also be a signal of restored authority for the supported unit…
One might then be surprised by this proposal to “go backwards”, since pooling these functions meant having mixed, integrated teams for all the services… Which would have to be separated and reorganised again…
But, who knows why – IT systems, the specific features of different statuses, implicit hierarchies… – it could happen that this “pooling” was merely the transfer to the same place – and therefore far from the supported units – of functions that kept their own staff, their own practices, even their separate offices… In that case, there were no gains in scale, expertise or synergies, only a loss of proximity to the supported units…
Lose-lose… and therefore an argument for preserving the status quo, to the perceived “benefit” of one and the detriment of the other: more of the same, here again…
More bureaucracy?
Finally, when it comes to imposing one’s will on the other in an organisation, the classic bureaucratic reflex is to increase one’s human resources and the procedures one controls – which can only operate in “standardised” environments.
These two avenues also emerge from the Court of Audit report:
- Strengthening the SCA’s human resources. And thus giving up the goals of optimising available resources that justified the new organisations, by obtaining an inflation in headcount? Or obtaining them at the expense of others, in a conflict of “powers”?;
- And seeking to standardise the organisations managed: “despite the initial stated intention, the characteristics of the different GSBdD are in fact very disparate, both in terms of their geographical and functional scope of intervention”[34]. Because, indeed, procedures only really apply in “ideal”, standardised systems – which complex human organisations never are.
The collaborative necessity
Fortunately, for these two avenues, the “authoritarian” temptation seems to be counterbalanced, either by reality or by an understanding of the collaborative attitudes and practices essential to the effective functioning of matrix organisations.
As regards HR resources, the SCA – lacking power over the armed services that provide the personnel – is encouraged to develop its influence through more collaborative practices: “More generally, a more cooperative dialogue must be established with the personnel managers on the volume of recruitment, the posting plan and the qualifications required”[35]
But for the procedural temptation, nothing is formally stated, except the obligation of permanent dialogue (“a dialogue between the stakeholders several times a year”) – which marks the desired return to more collaboration and adaptation rather than to vain “standardisation”. But is this deliberate, or “for want of anything better”?
Doing things “differently” from a vertical organisation is therefore a necessity for working in a matrix organisation. Notably because matrix organisation itself is not a break with organisation, but an enrichment of it, with a continuum that is “more or less” collaborative and “more or less” directive, allowing adaptation to circumstances.
And which favours initiative and responsibility – qualities sought in the armed forces – rather than the bureaucratic norm.
The balance of power does not shift from one stakeholder to another, in favour of one and to the detriment of the other. It is shared between them, in proportions that vary according to circumstances and the stakeholders’ capacity for cooperation.
In the same way that our “relational styles” adapt to circumstances: a particularly “participative” parent, keen on dialogue with their child, will show clear and immediate authority when the child crosses the road at a green light while a car is approaching at high speed…
This adaptation to circumstances is found notably in “sociodynamic” approaches, suited to management styles (participative, negotiating, directive) as well as to modes of organisation (mechanistic, tribal, mercenary).
An adaptation that allows an unstable balance, characteristic of organisations in motion: “Every organisation faces the dialectic of stability and change: how to adapt to a changing context while maintaining regular and stable functioning, a guarantee of predictability? (…) Consequently, the ability of the armed forces to reconcile the tendency towards organisational inertia with the imperatives of change determines a state’s military power”[36].
Flexibility and dialogue are also essential to working in matrix organisations because, while the capacity for innovation and adaptation lies rather in “horizontal networks”, spreading it across a large structure also depends on a central structure driving and nurturing these assets. What Lindsay, cited by Olivier Schmitt in his book, calls “adaptive management”. And which matrix organisations practise with functional structures whose role is not only to centralise expertise (still less to hold authority over it), but also – and above all – to nurture these skills and practices throughout the organisation (something sometimes forgotten when their role is reduced to a purely “authoritarian” practice).
Finally, because they are by nature “agile” and therefore imperfect, and governed by human interactions more than by fixed norms[37], matrix organisations remind us that there is no ideal organisation. Only reference practices that need to evolve, within the complex socio-technical environments – beyond the reach of any single model – that our human organisations are.
One may tell oneself that, under the pressure of tragic events, the armed forces will demonstrate their capacity to be “combat learning organisations”[38]. But should we really wish to have our “backs to the wall” in order to “adapt to win”[39]?
Of course, these observations and proposals come from a civilian, by nature poorly informed about military affairs… Are they therefore legitimate, and relevant?
Beyond their application to the case of the SCA, and therefore to the Ministry of the Armed Forces, they are intended to apply to all organisations struggling to bring these dreaded “matrix organisations” to life.
And as for their application to military organisations, I will conclude with Olivier Schmitt’s fine words, who hopes, in order to foster “positive developments” in the armed forces, that: “this requires civilians who take an interest in military questions and do not shift their responsibilities on the subject onto the military themselves (…) even if it is inevitable that this will cause concern among some military personnel, particularly in countries where the military profession is associated with a specific (social or professional) status”.
This, then, was an attempt at a contribution.
[1] Observations définitives (Article R. 143-11 du code des juridictions financières). Le Service du Commissariat des Armées (SCA). Cour des Comptes, October 2023. https://www.ccomptes.fr/fr/publications/le-service-du-commissariat-des-armees-sca
[2] Michel Goya, « Dans la matrice », 2012, https://lavoiedelepee.blogspot.com/2012/
[3] In 2008, changes of residence numbered 27 for officers, 589 for non-commissioned officers and 206 for other ranks. In 2009, these figures were 1,072, 4,336 and 3,334 respectively.
[4] Between 2008 and 2012 alone, the number of Army regiments fell from 98 to 81, and the Air Force closed 12 air bases.
[5] “For the ranks of colonel, captain (navy) and equivalents in the services, there were 3,468 posts in 2011 for a number of commands in the forces limited to around 150 (the Army’s 87 regiments and main units, the Navy’s 32 first-rank ships and the 24 air bases)”, Cour des comptes, « Le bilan à mi-parcours de la loi de programmation militaire », July 2012
[6] Admiral Édouard Guillaud, Chief of the Defence Staff. Hearing on the 2011 finance bill. Minutes of the National Defence and Armed Forces Committee. Assemblée Nationale, 6 October 2010
[7] Jean-René Bachelet (army general, 2S), « Éditorial » in « L’armée dans l’espace public », Inflexions no. 20, La Documentation Française, 2012.
[8] Information report on behalf of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Armed Forces on the implementation of the defence base reform. Gilbert Roger and André Dulait, senators. Sénat, 11 July 2012
[9] Hearing of General Elrick Irastorza, Assemblée Nationale, 20 October 2010
[10] Information report on behalf of the Committee on Foreign Affairs, Defence and Armed Forces on the implementation of the defence base reform. Gilbert Roger and André Dulait, senators. Sénat, 11 July 2012
[11] Hervé Morin, Minister of Defence, at the press conference launching the 11 experimental defence bases. Quoted in La Lettre de la modernisation no. 9, December 2008
[12] Admiral Guillaud, Chief of the Defence Staff, in his New Year address to the military community in 2011.
[13] « Pourquoi la réforme du Service du Commissariat des Armées va-t-elle réussir ? », Antoine De Coster. Revue Défense Nationale 2017/3 (no. 798)
[14] « La transformation du ministère de la Défense, entre cohérence et vigilance », Jean-Robert Rebmeister, Revue Défense Nationale 2015/3 (no. 778)
[15] Concept d’emploi des forces terrestres (CEFT) 2020-2035, RFT 3.2.0, CDEC-DDO, Ministère des Armées, https://www.c-dec.terre.defense.gouv.fr/images/documents/documents-doctrine/20210929_NP_CDEC_DDO_RFT_3-2-0-CEFT.pdf
[16] Information report submitted by the National Defence and Armed Forces Committee at the conclusion of a fact-finding mission on preparation for high intensity, presented by Patricia Mirallès and Jean-Louis Thiériot, members of parliament. Assemblée Nationale, 17 February 2022
[17] Olivier Schmitt, « Préparer la guerre. Stratégie, innovation et puissance militaire à l’époque contemporaine », PUF, 2024
[18] « La transformation du ministère de la Défense, entre cohérence et vigilance », Jean-Robert Rebmeister, Revue Défense Nationale 2015/3 (no. 778)
[19] See in particular the book edited by Corinne Bieder and Kenneth Pettersen Gould, “The Coupling of Safety and Security – Exploring Interrelations in Theory and Practice”, Foncsi – SpringerOpen, 2020
[20] Mathilde Bourrier and Corinne Bieder, “Trapping safety into rules: an introduction”, in “Trapping safety into rules. How desirable or avoidable is proceduralization?”, edited by Corinne Bieder and Mathilde Bourrier, Ashgate, 2013
[21] Ibid.
[22] Michel Goya, « S’adapter pour vaincre. Comment les armées évoluent », Perrin, 2019
[23] Isabelle Fucks and Yves Dien, “No rule, no use? The effects of over-proceduralization”, in “Trapping safety into rules. How desirable or avoidable is proceduralization?”, edited by Corinne Bieder and Mathilde Bourrier, Ashgate, 2013
[24] Chief Medical Officer Luc Aigle, in the podcast “Defcast” on Podcastics and listening platforms, Season 1, episode 14, 15 February 2024
[25] Even if the armed forces “survived” ten years of the Louvois pay software…
[26] Final observations of the Cour des Comptes, op. cit.
[27] Order of 28 February 2019 on the organisation of the Armed Forces Commissariat Service
[28] « Le commandement : dans les coulisses du CPCO », https://www.cheminsdememoire.gouv.fr/fr/le-commandement-dans-les-coulisses-du-cpco
[29] « La transformation du ministère de la Défense, entre cohérence et vigilance », Jean-Robert Rebmeister, Revue Défense Nationale 2015/3 (no. 778)
[30] Olivier Schmitt, op. cit.
[31] « Naval Group fait évoluer son organisation pour accompagner son ambition de croissance », press release of 15 December 2022.
[32] What are known as “type 1 changes”, suited to “adaptations”, and “type 2 changes”, which are needed for transformations of this kind.
[33] Jacques Roudière, Director of Human Resources of the Ministry of Defence, on the twentieth anniversary of the Defence Management Training Centre (CFMD), in « Le journal de l’année 2011 », SGA
[34] Final observations of the Cour des Comptes, op. cit.
[35] Ibid.
[36] Olivier Schmitt, op. cit.
[37] It is worth noting, at a time when many organisations want to become more “agile”, that the four key values of the 2001 “Manifesto for Agile Software Development” – formulated by software development specialists, admittedly, but surely an inspiration for many – are: “Individuals and interactions over processes and tools; Working software over comprehensive documentation; Customer collaboration over contract negotiation; Responding to change over following a plan. That is, while there is value in the items on the right, we value the items on the left more”. Are their principles of action consistent with these four values?
[38] Olivier Schmitt, « La victoire en changeant ? Faire des armées des ‘organisations apprenantes de combat’ », Défense et Sécurité Internationale, Hors-série no. 92, October-November 2023
[39] On these questions of how military organisations evolve, I can of course also only recommend Michel Goya’s remarkable book, « S’adapter pour vaincre. Comment les armées évoluent », Perrin, 2019
Leave a Reply