Small Team + Large Middle Office: The Underlying Logic of Enterprise Efficient Innovation in the Digital Age (English Version)
In today's era where the dividends of the mobile Internet are fading, market demands are iterating rapidly, and digital transformation has entered a deep-water zone, enterprises are facing a core dilemma: they need to quickly respond to market changes, boldly experiment and innovate, while controlling R&D costs and ensuring system stability and capability reuse. The traditional "large team + vertical architecture" model, characterized by thick departmental silos, serious redundant development, and lengthy decision-making chains, can no longer adapt to the development needs of the new era.
Against this background, the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model has emerged as the times require. It is not a simple adjustment of organizational structure, but a comprehensive reform integrating organizational management, technical architecture, and business logic. Its core is to achieve the dual improvement of "innovation speed" and "operational efficiency" through "centralized capability precipitation and decentralized agile operations", and it has become the core competitiveness support for top domestic and foreign enterprises such as Alibaba, ByteDance, and Supercell. This article will comprehensively dissect this efficient development and management model from the aspects of model essence, core composition, operation logic, implementation path, typical cases, and common misunderstandings.
I. Essential Cognition: Not "Architecture Adjustment", but "Capability Reconstruction"
Many enterprises have a misunderstanding of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model, thinking that it is just "splitting large teams into small teams and then establishing a middle office department". In fact, the core of this model is the "centralized precipitation and decentralized reuse of capabilities". Its essence is to break the island dilemma of "each fighting on its own", make the core capabilities of the enterprise reusable, iterable, and enabling public assets, and allow front-line business teams to focus on innovation itself.
Simply put, the logic of "Small Team + Large Middle Office" can be compared to an "group army combat system": the middle office is the "rear base camp", responsible for building infrastructure, storing ammunition (core capabilities), and formulating standards; small teams are the "front-line assault teams", with a small number of people, fast actions, and flexible decision-making. Equipped with ammunition from the base camp, they accurately attack specific market scenarios without having to build a supply system from scratch.
Compared with the traditional model, its core difference lies in: the traditional model is "each business line builds wheels from scratch", resulting in redundant development and low efficiency; while the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model is "the middle office builds general wheels, and small teams assemble cars on demand", focusing on differentiated innovation and achieving "one-time precipitation, multiple reuses". The core value of this model is to balance "agile innovation" and "efficiency control" — avoiding the rigidity of large teams and the resource waste of small teams.
II. Core Composition: Two Main Entities, Each Assuming Its Responsibilities and Enabling Each Other Bidirectionally
The core of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model consists of two main entities: small teams (front office) and the large middle office. They have clear boundaries and defined powers and responsibilities, are independent of each other, and form a positive feedback loop of bidirectional empowerment, which are indispensable.
(I) Small Teams: Small, Comprehensive Front-Line Combat Units
Small teams are the "minimum business closed-loop units" facing the market and users, with the core positioning of "quickly responding to needs, boldly experimenting and innovating, and efficiently delivering value". Its core characteristics are "small and comprehensive, self-driven, and end-to-end", which completely break the departmental barriers of traditional enterprises where "product, R&D, testing, and operation each perform their own duties".
Scale and Composition: Usually 5-15 people, it is a "full-function closed-loop" team that can complete the entire process from demand analysis to product delivery without relying on other departments. A typical composition includes: product managers (1-2 people, responsible for demand decomposition and priority sorting), R&D engineers (3-8 people, responsible for front-end and back-end development), test engineers (1-2 people, responsible for quality control), designers (0-1 people, configured on demand, responsible for vision and interaction), and operations (0-1 people, responsible for user feedback and iterative optimization).
Core Powers and Responsibilities: Focus on a single segmented business scenario or user group, and have complete business decision-making power — they can independently determine product direction, iteration rhythm, and trial-and-error plans without layer-by-layer approval; at the same time, they are responsible for business results, such as core indicators such as user growth, retention rate, and conversion rate.
Core Advantages: Extremely short decision-making chain, enabling "weekly or even daily" response from demand discovery to implementation and iteration; extremely low trial-and-error cost, because of the small scale and low investment, even if the innovation fails, the direction can be quickly adjusted without causing significant losses to the enterprise; strong team cohesion, which can quickly form a collaborative force due to clear powers and responsibilities and consistent goals.
(II) Large Middle Office: A Support Platform for Capability Sharing
The large middle office is the "capability base" of the enterprise, with the core positioning of "precipitating general capabilities, providing standardized services, and supporting small team innovation". It does not directly face the market or participate in specific business decisions, but integrates the core resources within the enterprise, standardizes and modularizes reusable capabilities for all small teams to call on demand, avoiding redundant development and ensuring system consistency and stability.
According to the type of capabilities, the large middle office is usually divided into four modules, and different industries can adjust their focus according to their own needs:
Technical Middle Office: The most basic technical support of the enterprise, responsible for precipitating cross-business and reusable technical capabilities, reducing the technical development threshold of small teams. The core includes: basic architecture (servers, databases, cloud services, etc.), general components (user authentication, payment interfaces, audio and video rendering, message push, etc.), DevOps tool chain (code management, automated testing, deployment and release, etc.), and security protection (data encryption, risk control, anti-attack, etc.).
Data Middle Office: Responsible for the integration, governance and analysis of the enterprise's full amount of data, providing data support for small teams, helping small teams accurately insight into user needs and optimize product decisions. The core includes: data collection (full-channel data burying points), data governance (data cleaning, standardization, deduplication), data storage (data warehouse, data lake), and data analysis tools (reports, dashboards, user portraits, algorithm models, etc.).
Business Middle Office: Responsible for precipitating general business capabilities within the enterprise. These capabilities are needed by different business lines and do not require small teams to develop repeatedly. The core includes: user center (unified account, membership system, permission management), commodity center (commodity listing, inventory management, pricing strategy), transaction center (order placement, payment, refund, logistics docking), content center (content distribution, review, label management), etc.
Organizational Middle Office: Responsible for building the organizational mechanism, process standards and cultural atmosphere that support the operation of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model, and solving the problem of "collaboration efficiency". The core includes: standardization of collaboration processes (docking processes between small teams and the middle office, demand feedback processes), goal management mechanism (OKR system, aligning enterprise strategy with small team goals), talent training and allocation (middle office talent reserve, small team talent supply), and cultural construction (encouraging trial and error, transparent communication, and rejecting internal friction).
(III) Core Relationship Between Small Teams and the Middle Office: Bidirectional Empowerment and Positive Cycle
Small teams and the middle office are not in a "superior-subordinate" relationship, but a "partner" relationship. They form a bidirectional feedback loop of "small teams put forward needs, the middle office provides support, and small teams feed back to the middle office":
Middle Office Empowers Small Teams: Small teams do not need to invest energy in developing general capabilities. By calling the standardized interfaces/components of the middle office, they can quickly build core product functions, focus on differentiated innovation, and shorten the R&D cycle;
Small Teams Feed Back to the Middle Office: New needs and problems found by small teams in business practice are fed back to the middle office, promoting the middle office to optimize existing capabilities and develop new general components, making the middle office capabilities more in line with business reality;
Collaborative Win-Win: The more perfect the middle office capabilities, the higher the innovation efficiency of small teams; the more timely the feedback from small teams, the more valuable the middle office capabilities, and finally form a closed loop of the enterprise's core competitiveness.
III. Operation Logic: Four-Step Closed Loop to Achieve Efficient Innovation and Capability Reuse
The efficient operation of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model does not rely on "people-oriented management", but is built on a standardized process closed loop. From capability precipitation to small team innovation, and then to middle office iteration, the entire process is divided into four steps, forming a replicable and implementable operation system.
Step 1: Capability Precipitation and Standardized Encapsulation (Core Action of the Middle Office)
The core work of the middle office is to identify the "highly reusable and cross-business" core capabilities within the enterprise, separate them from specific businesses, standardize and modularize them, and form callable services or components. The key to this step is "de-businessization" — the encapsulated capabilities must be separated from specific business scenarios and have universality. For example, the "user login interface" can be directly called by small teams whether they are making e-commerce Apps or education Apps.
Specific actions include: 1. Sort out the common needs of each business line and identify reusable capability points; 2. Conduct abstract design on capability points and formulate unified interface standards, data formats, and calling specifications; 3. Encapsulate capabilities into components or API services and upload them to the middle office's "capability market" for small teams to query and call; 4. Establish a version management mechanism for capabilities to ensure that upgrades and iterations do not affect the products of small teams that have already called them.
Step 2: Small Teams Call on Demand and Quickly Build Products (Core Action of Small Teams)
After receiving business needs, small teams do not need to develop from scratch. Instead, they first query and screen the required general capabilities in the middle office's "capability market", quickly build core product functions by calling middle office interfaces, and then focus on differentiated scenarios to develop personalized functions. The core of this step is "modular development", which is analogous to "building a house with Lego blocks" — the middle office provides general blocks, and small teams assemble houses of different styles according to their own needs.
Specific actions include: 1. Decompose business needs and clarify core functions and differentiated functions; 2. Call the required general components (such as user login, payment, data statistics, etc.) from the technical middle office and business middle office; 3. Focus on developing differentiated functions (such as interactive design for specific user groups, exclusive services, etc.); 4. Combine the data analysis tools of the data middle office to insight into user needs and optimize product details; 5. Quickly launch the test version and collect user feedback.
Step 3: Small Teams Trial and Error Iterate and Feedback Business Needs (Bidirectional Interactive Action)
After small teams launch the test version of the product, they enter the stage of rapid trial and error iteration — constantly adjusting the product direction and optimizing the function experience according to user feedback and data indicators. In this process, two situations will be encountered, both of which require interaction with the middle office:
Middle office capabilities cannot meet business needs: For example, a small team needs a "personalized recommendation function", but the existing algorithm model of the data middle office cannot be adapted. At this time, the small team submits a demand to the middle office, explaining the specific business scenario and demand details;
Middle office capabilities can be optimized: For example, when a small team calls the "payment interface", it finds that the process is cumbersome and affects the user experience. At this time, the small team feeds back the problem to the middle office and puts forward optimization suggestions.
The key to this step is "quick feedback and efficient docking". The middle office needs to establish a special demand docking channel to ensure that the needs of small teams can be responded to and handled quickly.
Step 4: Middle Office Iterates and Optimizes to Empower More Small Teams (Core Action of the Middle Office)
After collecting the needs and feedback of small teams, the middle office iterates and optimizes existing capabilities or develops new general capabilities. After the optimization is completed, it updates the middle office's "capability market" for all small teams to call. The core of this step is "precipitation and reuse" — the needs of one small team, after optimization, can empower all small teams, achieving "one-time investment, multiple returns".
Specific actions include: 1. Sort out the needs and feedback of small teams and screen out general needs (avoid developing exclusive capabilities for a single small team); 2. Iterate and optimize existing components/services or develop new general capabilities; 3. After completing the test, update the version, synchronize it to the "capability market", and notify the relevant small teams; 4. Track the calling status of capabilities, collect subsequent feedback, and form a closed loop of continuous iteration.
IV. Implementation Path: From 0 to 1, Avoid Traps and Advance Steadily
Although the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model seems promising, not all enterprises can implement it smoothly. Many enterprises follow the trend blindly, either building a "large and comprehensive" middle office that becomes a "formalism", or splitting small teams into "small and scattered" ones lacking core capabilities, and finally giving up halfway. Combining the implementation experience of domestic and foreign enterprises, this paper summarizes the implementation path from 0 to 1, with the core of "focus first, then precipitate, and then expand".
Step 1: Clarify Strategic Positioning and Focus on Core Scenarios (1-3 Months)
The premise of implementation is to clarify the enterprise's strategic goals — why do we need to implement the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model? Is it to speed up product iteration? Or to reduce R&D costs? Or to incubate new businesses? Only by clarifying the strategic goals can we avoid blind investment.
Specific actions: 1. Sort out the enterprise's core business lines and select 1-2 core scenarios that most need "agile innovation" (such as "new product incubation" for e-commerce enterprises, "segmented course R&D" for education enterprises); 2. Clarify the pilot scope. Do not promote it in the whole company at the beginning. First select a core business line as a pilot, focus on a single scenario, and avoid "spreading too thin and achieving nothing"; 3. Establish a special team, led by the enterprise's senior management, clarify the powers and responsibilities of the special team, and be responsible for overall planning and resource coordination to avoid departmental buck-passing.
Step 2: Split Pilot Small Teams and Clarify the Boundaries of Powers and Responsibilities (1 Month)
After the pilot scenario is determined, split the pilot small teams. The core is "small and comprehensive, clear powers and responsibilities" to avoid "small teams relying on the middle office and the middle office interfering with small teams".
Specific actions: 1. Select core personnel from existing teams to form a 5-10 person pilot small team, ensuring that the small team has full functions such as product, R&D, and testing; 2. Clarify the business boundaries and core goals of the small team — focus on the pilot scenario, such as "incubating a lightweight education App for college students", and clarify core indicators (such as breaking 100,000 users within 3 months); 3. Endow the small team with complete business decision-making power, clarifying that "the small team independently determines the iteration rhythm and trial-and-error plan, and the special team is only responsible for goal alignment and does not interfere with specific decisions"; 4. Formulate the assessment mechanism for the small team, focusing on business results rather than R&D workload, such as taking user growth and retention rate as core assessment indicators.
Step 3: Build a Minimalist Middle Office and Precipitate Core Capabilities (2-3 Months)
The core of middle office construction is "start with minimalism and improve gradually". Do not pursue "large and comprehensive" at the beginning. First precipitate the general capabilities most needed in the pilot scenario to meet the basic needs of small teams.
Specific actions: 1. Sort out the core needs of the pilot small team and identify reusable capability points (for example, if the pilot small team is making an education App, the reusable capabilities include "user login, course playback, data statistics"); 2. Build a minimalist technical middle office and business middle office, prioritize encapsulating the most core and urgent capabilities, form standardized interfaces for the pilot small team to call; 3. Establish a small middle office team (5-8 people) responsible for the development, maintenance and docking of middle office capabilities. The core responsibility of the middle office team is to "support small teams, not control them"; 4. Establish the docking process between small teams and the middle office, clarify the time limit and standards for demand feedback, interface calling, and problem handling to ensure efficient collaboration.
Step 4: Pilot Operation and Optimize Collaboration Mechanism (3-6 Months)
After the pilot small team and the minimalist middle office are built, enter the pilot operation stage. The core is to "find problems and optimize processes in practice" and form replicable experience.
Specific actions: 1. The pilot small team quickly promotes product R&D, launch and iteration by calling middle office capabilities according to the logic of "modular development"; 2. The special team holds regular review meetings to collect feedback from small teams and the middle office, such as "cumbersome middle office interface calling" and "delayed feedback from small teams"; 3. Optimize the collaboration mechanism, such as simplifying the middle office interface calling process, establishing a priority mechanism for middle office demand response, and improving the communication channels between small teams and the middle office; 4. Iterate middle office capabilities, optimize existing components according to the feedback of small teams, precipitate new reusable capabilities, and gradually improve the middle office system.
Step 5: Summarize Experience and Promote Comprehensively (6-12 Months)
After a period of pilot operation, if the core goals are achieved (such as 50% improvement in product iteration speed and 30% reduction in R&D costs), it indicates that the model is feasible and can be gradually promoted in the whole company; if the core goals are not achieved, review the problems, adjust the direction, and then carry out pilot optimization.
Specific actions: 1. Summarize the pilot experience and sort out replicable small team splitting standards, middle office capability precipitation methods, and collaboration mechanisms; 2. Gradually split more small teams to cover the enterprise's core business lines, with each small team focusing on a single segmented scenario to ensure "small and comprehensive, clear powers and responsibilities"; 3. Expand the scale of the middle office, improve the capabilities of the technical middle office, data middle office, and business middle office, and precipitate more general components to meet the needs of different small teams; 4. Establish an evaluation mechanism for middle office capabilities, regularly count the reuse rate and calling efficiency of capabilities, eliminate useless components, and optimize core capabilities; 5. Improve the organizational middle office, build a unified collaboration process, goal management mechanism, and cultural atmosphere for the whole company to support the long-term operation of the model.
V. Typical Cases: Enterprises That Have Perfected the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" Model
The success of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model has long been verified by top domestic and foreign enterprises. The practices of these enterprises provide us with valuable reference experience, with the core of "based on their own business, focusing on capability precipitation, and flexibly adjusting the model".
Case 1: ByteDance — Middle Office Empowers Small Teams to Quickly Incubate Blockbusters
ByteDance is a benchmark enterprise of the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model. Its huge product matrix (Douyin, Toutiao, Xigua Video, Fanqie Novels, Doubao, CapCut, etc.) is all incubated based on this model.
ByteDance's Middle Office Construction: Focusing on "content distribution" and "technical support", it has built a strong technical middle office and data middle office — the technical middle office has precipitated core capabilities such as audio and video rendering, algorithm recommendation, unified account, and international adaptation; the data middle office has precipitated user portraits, content labels, data analysis and other capabilities; the business middle office has precipitated general business components such as information flow distribution, live interaction, and content review. These capabilities are standardized and modularized for all small teams to call.
ByteDance's Small Team Operation: ByteDance's small teams usually have 5-7 people, known as "ByteTeam". Each small team focuses on a segmented scenario or product direction and has complete decision-making power. For example, the early small team of Douyin focused on the "short video social" scenario, called the algorithm recommendation and audio and video rendering capabilities of the middle office, quickly iterated the product, and became an industry blockbuster in only one year; the Doubao small team focused on the "AI dialogue" scenario, called the large model interface and user system capabilities of the middle office, quickly launched the product, and seized the AI track.
ByteDance's Core Advantages: The middle office capabilities are highly reusable, and the small team's innovation efficiency is extremely high, which can incubate new products in a very short time to respond to market changes; at the same time, the rapid feedback of small teams drives the iteration of the middle office. For example, the live broadcast demand of Douyin promotes the middle office to develop live interaction components, which in turn empowers products such as Xigua Video and Lark, forming a positive cycle.
Case 2: Supercell — Small Team Operations, Middle Office Supports Blockbuster Output
Supercell is a world-renowned game company, famous for "small teams and high output", and its core secret is the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model.
Supercell's Middle Office Construction: Its "middle office" is called "Tribe", which focuses on the general capabilities of game R&D, including game engine, art resources, server architecture, data analysis tools, operation tools, etc. These capabilities are encapsulated into standardized components for all game small teams to call. Small teams do not need to invest energy in developing underlying game technology, but only focus on game gameplay innovation.
Supercell's Small Team Operation: Each small team has only 5-7 people, called "Cell". Each small team is responsible for the entire R&D process of a game and has complete decision-making power — it can independently determine the game gameplay, art style, iteration rhythm, and even decide to "abandon a game". For example, blockbuster games such as Clash of Clans and Clash Royale are all developed by a single small team, with a short R&D cycle and low trial-and-error cost.
Supercell's Core Advantages: Small teams focus on gameplay innovation, and the middle office supports technical implementation, forming a closed loop of "efficient innovation + stable support". According to statistics, Supercell's small teams can incubate a blockbuster game every 1-2 years on average. Although the failure rate is not low, due to the small size of the small team, the failure cost is extremely low, and the successful blockbuster can bring huge benefits.
Case 3: Alibaba — Middle Office Strategy Reconstruction to Support Business Diversification
Alibaba is one of the earliest enterprises in China to propose the "middle office strategy". It launched the middle office strategy in 2015, aiming to solve the problem of "redundant development and low efficiency caused by business diversification". Through the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model, it supports the development of multiple business lines such as Taobao, Tmall, Alipay, and Cainiao.
Alibaba's Middle Office Construction: Alibaba has built three major middle offices: "business middle office + data middle office + technical middle office". The business middle office has precipitated core business capabilities such as user center, commodity center, transaction center, and payment center, realizing "one set of business capabilities to support multiple business lines"; the data middle office integrates the data resources of the whole group to provide data analysis and decision support for each business line; the technical middle office has built a unified technical architecture to support the technical development of each business line.
Alibaba's Small Team Operation: Alibaba splits each business line into multiple small front-office teams, and each small team focuses on a single business scenario, such as Taobao's "live broadcast team" and "new product team", and Alipay's "convenient service team". Small teams call the general capabilities of the middle office to quickly promote business innovation. For example, Taobao's live broadcast team calls the user center, payment center, and content distribution capabilities of the middle office to quickly build a live broadcast e-commerce system, which has become the core growth engine of Taobao.
Alibaba's Core Advantages: Through the construction of the middle office, it has realized the centralized precipitation and reuse of business capabilities, reducing the cost of redundant development. At the same time, the agile innovation of small teams supports the diversified development of business lines, enabling Alibaba to quickly respond to market changes in multiple fields such as e-commerce, finance, and logistics.
VI. Common Misunderstandings and Avoidance Methods: Avoid These Pits and Take Fewer Detours
Many enterprises fail in implementing the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model because they fall into some common misunderstandings. Combining practical experience, this paper summarizes 4 of the most common misunderstandings and gives corresponding avoidance methods to help enterprises take fewer detours.
Misunderstanding 1: The Middle Office Construction is "Large and Comprehensive" and Becomes Formalism
Many enterprises believe that the middle office should cover all capabilities, so they blindly invest a lot of resources to develop various general components, regardless of whether these components have reuse value. Finally, the middle office becomes bloated and slow to respond, becoming a "vase" that cannot provide effective support for small teams.
Avoidance Method: Adhere to "starting with minimalism and precipitating on demand". The middle office construction does not pursue "large and comprehensive", but only focuses on the "highly reusable and cross-business" core capabilities; prioritize precipitating the most needed capabilities in the pilot scenario, and gradually iterate and improve according to the feedback of small teams; establish an evaluation mechanism for middle office capabilities, regularly eliminate components with low reuse rate and no value, and keep the middle office lightweight.
Misunderstanding 2: Small Teams are Split into "Small and Scattered" and Lack Core Capabilities
Some enterprises blindly split small teams, dividing large teams into multiple small teams, but the small teams lack a full-function closed loop. For example, lacking product managers or test engineers, the small teams cannot complete business delivery independently and can only rely on other departments, losing the core advantage of "agility"; at the same time, there is a lack of collaboration between small teams, each fighting on its own, and even redundant development occurs.
Avoidance Method: The splitting of small teams must follow the principle of "small and comprehensive, clear powers and responsibilities", ensuring that each small team has full functions such as product, R&D, and testing, and can complete the business closed loop independently; clarify the business boundaries of each small team to avoid business overlap between small teams; establish a collaboration mechanism between small teams, encourage small teams to share experience and reuse results, and avoid each fighting on its own.
Misunderstanding 3: The Middle Office is Disconnected from Small Teams and Lacks Bidirectional Feedback
After some enterprises build the middle office, the middle office team works behind closed doors, does not understand the business needs of small teams, and the developed capabilities cannot meet the actual needs of small teams; while small teams cannot feedback problems in a timely manner when using the middle office capabilities, or the middle office does not respond after feedback, leading to the disconnection between the middle office and small teams, and the model cannot operate normally.
Avoidance Method: Establish a bidirectional feedback mechanism between the middle office and small teams. The middle office team should go deep into small teams to understand business scenarios and needs, avoiding working behind closed doors; set up special demand docking personnel to receive the needs and feedback of small teams, and clarify the time limit and standards for feedback processing; hold regular collaborative review meetings between the middle office and small teams to summarize problems and optimize processes to ensure that the two resonate at the same frequency.
Misunderstanding 4: Unclear Powers and Responsibilities, Decision-Making Buck-Passing
Although some enterprises have split small teams and built a middle office, they have not clarified the boundaries of powers and responsibilities between the two. As a result, when problems arise, small teams accuse the middle office of insufficient capabilities, and the middle office accuses small teams of unclear needs, passing the buck to each other; at the same time, small teams lack sufficient business decision-making power, and everything needs to be reported layer by layer, losing the advantage of "agility".
Avoidance Method: Clarify the boundaries of powers and responsibilities between the middle office and small teams — the middle office is responsible for "capability precipitation, standardized services, and demand response", and does not interfere in the specific business decisions of small teams; small teams are responsible for "business innovation, product delivery, and result responsibility", and have complete business decision-making power; formulate a clear responsibility investigation mechanism, and when problems arise, clarify the responsible subject to avoid mutual buck-passing; endow small teams with sufficient autonomy, simplify the decision-making process, and enable small teams to quickly respond to market changes.
VII. Future Outlook: Small Team + Large Middle Office, Adapting to the Long-Term Trend of the Digital Age
With the development of technologies such as AI, AIGC, and low-code, the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model will usher in new upgrades, gradually moving towards "intelligence, lightweight, and flexibility", and becoming the core support for enterprise digital transformation.
Middle Office Intelligence: AI technology will be deeply integrated into the middle office to realize automatic precipitation, automatic optimization, and automatic matching of capabilities. For example, the data middle office will automatically identify reusable data rules through AI algorithms and generate personalized data analysis reports; the technical middle office will automatically generate general components through AI tools to reduce the development cost of the middle office; the middle office will be able to automatically recommend suitable capability components according to the business needs of small teams, improving the calling efficiency of small teams.
Small Team Lightweight: The popularization of low-code and no-code technologies will further reduce the development threshold of small teams. Small teams can quickly build products by dragging components without relying on professional R&D engineers, realizing "no-code innovation"; the scale of small teams will be further reduced, and even "3-5 people" micro-teams can be realized, with higher innovation efficiency and lower trial-and-error cost.
Ecological Extension: The "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model will extend from the inside of the enterprise to the outside, forming an ecological system of "enterprise middle office + external small teams". For example, enterprises can open their own middle office capabilities to attract external entrepreneurial teams and partners to develop personalized products based on the enterprise's middle office capabilities, forming ecological collaboration and achieving "win-win development".
Organizational Agility: With the implementation of the model, the enterprise's organizational structure will be further flattened, departmental silos will be completely broken, forming an agile organization "centered on users and taking capabilities as the core"; talent training will focus more on "compound talents", requiring employees to have cross-post and cross-field capabilities to adapt to the full-function closed-loop needs of small teams.
Conclusion: The Core of the Model is the Balance Between "Capability Reuse" and "Agile Innovation"
In the final analysis, the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model is not a fixed structure, but a way of thinking "centered on users and taking capabilities as the core" — it requires enterprises to break the island dilemma of "each fighting on its own", enable front-line small teams to lighten their burden and focus on innovation itself through centralized precipitation of general capabilities; enable enterprises to quickly respond to market changes and seize development opportunities through decentralized agile operations.
For enterprises, there is no need to follow the trend blindly or pursue "one-step到位" (one-stop completion) in implementing the "Small Team + Large Middle Office" model. The key is to base on their own business characteristics and strategic goals, start with pilots, and gradually precipitate capabilities, optimize processes, and improve the system. When enterprises can truly achieve "reusable middle office capabilities, rapid small team innovation, and closed-loop bidirectional feedback", they can have sustainable core competitiveness in the competition of the digital age and achieve high-quality development.
Future competition is not only a competition of products and technologies, but also a competition of organizational efficiency and innovation speed. And "Small Team + Large Middle Office" is one of the optimal solutions for enterprises to achieve efficient innovation and respond to market changes.