Shamrock organization

The shamrock leaf shape is a symbolic representation of an organization with three types of workforce, having a main body and connected lobes that together form a whole.

The term was invented by Irish academic and management author/philosopher Charles Handy. He believed that people were the most important resource within any organisation, unlike F.W. Taylor who believed in tall hierarchical structures where workers were closely supervised. Handy believed in meeting the needs of workers through job enrichment. He did not believe in jobs for life but contracts or short-term jobs were more appropriate. He suggested that non-essential work should be contracted to specialist people who could work more productively and efficiently. In his book The Age of Unreason he uses the shamrock design to demonstrate three types of people linked to the organisation with different expectations and managed and rewarded differently. This style is known as "The Shamrock Flourish".