Most of this isn't about high-performing individuals so much as about organizational structures: 1) Organizations build up capabilities over time they don't ne

Most of this isn't about high-performing individuals so much as about organizational structures: 1) Organizations build up capabilities over time they don't need. For example, there might be a purchasing department with a complex approval process. Getting rid of that process can cut costs and improve efficiency. 2) There might be opportunities for outsourcing nonessential internal roles into organizations who specialize in those, and can do them at better quality and lower cost. 3) There might be efficiency gains by combining or breaking up units which grew up organically. ... and so on. Once you come up with a good structure, there's a question about how to transition: 1) Good people tend to leave during layoffs, which is the opposite of what you want. How do you protect critical units? 2) People who leave don't necessarily want to train their replacements. 3) Some people just don't want change. ... and so on. You want to minimize morale hit. A lot of that is in the details of how transitions are handled. In some sense, in a best-case, if you're, for example, outsourcing IT to a company which specializes in IT, your top IT employees will seamlessly transition to that company. Your lower-tier IT employees will have some path out which leaves them minimally disgruntled about being laid off, but no opportunity to do damage on the way out. Think about it. You're a competent, qualified executive who grew a 10 person company to 10,000 people. It's no longer competitive, and you realize you need 7,500 people to compete. Would you know how to do that? Or would you like to work with someone who has done it 50 times before, day-in-day-out, and seen things go right and wrong? That's the selling point. How much value does it add? I've seen it go both ways.