Target Operating Model
A Runnable Target Operating Model
A target operating model usually leaves the workshop as a slide. Boxes for the functions, arrows for the handoffs, a footnote about the systems. Six months later the slides are still the target, and the company is running on whatever people remember. The deck cannot tell a new hire what to do on a Tuesday, and it cannot tell software what it is allowed to do.
An operating model you can run is smaller and stricter. Roles, processes, rules, and the systems that carry them. One description. The slides, if you still want them, are a view of it.
The Operating Model
The board is one company, compiled from its genome. Roles report the way the work does. The process names the step, the role, and the operation. Rules sit on the step they govern. Systems are the cells that carry the data.
Roles
Operations director
Owns end-to-end fulfillment performance, carrier relationships, and SLA commitments.
Order manager
Processes incoming orders, validates payments, and sets warehouse priority.
Warehouse lead
Directs pick-and-pack, owns inventory accuracy, and oversees outbound shipments.
Customer support lead
Handles delivery inquiries, manages returns, and resolves post-shipment exceptions.
Merchandising manager
Owns the catalog — what is listed, how it is priced, and when it goes live.
Systems
Storefront
Customer-facing catalog and checkout.
Order service
Order lifecycle and payment verification.
Inventory service
Stock positions and reservations.
Fulfillment worker
Runs the pick, pack, and dispatch steps against carrier APIs.
Commerce db
Orders, catalog, inventory, shipments.
Process
Order fulfillmentOwned by the operations director
Placement through delivery confirmation, across catalog, inventory, and fulfillment.
- 1Receive orderOrder manager
ReceiveOrder
Ingest the order, validate line items, and confirm the SKUs are sellable.
- 2Verify paymentOrder manager
Verify paymentOrder
Confirm authorization; hold or decline anything the processor flags.
- 3Reserve inventoryWarehouse lead
ReserveInventory item
Hold stock at the fulfilling location and trigger replenishment if it goes short.
Payment clears before stock moves. No stock is reserved until payment authorization has cleared.
- 4Pick & packWarehouse lead
PackShipment
Retrieve the items, verify quantities, and package for the carrier.
- 5Dispatch shipmentWarehouse lead
DispatchShipment
Generate the label, hand off to the carrier, and publish tracking to the order.
Only warehouse dispatches. Dispatch is the warehouse’s call. Support can ask; it cannot ship.
- 6Confirm deliveryCustomer support lead
ConfirmOrder
Verify carrier confirmation, close the order, and open the post-purchase follow-up.
Rules
Payment clears before stock moves
No stock is reserved until payment authorization has cleared.
Only warehouse dispatches
Dispatch is the warehouse’s call. Support can ask; it cannot ship.
Returns are supports to approve
Only support authorizes returns, so refund exposure has one owner.
Catalog goes live through merchandising
Nothing reaches the storefront without merchandising publishing it.
How to Build an Operating Model
Start from a process the company already runs badly, not from a blank org chart. Name the roles that touch it. Write the steps in the order the work actually moves, and write the rule that people currently enforce by nagging. Then name the systems that hold the data those steps need. That is operating model design. The rest is keeping the model when the workshop is over.
A slide deck cannot stay current, because nothing reads it. A model that the procedure, the permissions, and the agent all read will get corrected the first time it is wrong. That correction is the whole point.
The Playground shows what a filled genome looks like, industry by industry. The waitlist is how a team puts its own model on the same footing.