WASHINGTON — Jim Yong Kim, the genial American physician who took over as the president of the World Bank last year, recently conducted a survey of its 10,000 employees. The survey revealed a “culture of fear,” pervasive “fear of risk” and a “terrible” environment for collaboration at the huge development institution, which lends more than $30 billion a year and works in more than 100 countries.

The bank, which provides a range of services to developing countries, from infrastructure loans to health grants to budget advice, was in danger of becoming a series of regional banks rather than a world bank, Dr. Kim said in an interview at its headquarters, two blocks from the White House. Worse, he feared its internal culture and structural organization might hamper its progress toward its newly made goals of eradicating extreme poverty by 2030 and ensuring inclusive growth.

“We could become less than the sum of our parts,” Dr. Kim said.

With the survey concluded and the bank’s two headline goals named, Dr. Kim has planned a sweeping reorganization. He intends to present his plan at the bank’s annual meetings, conducted in concert with the International Monetary Fund at the end of this week.

The reorganization, the first in nearly two decades, is meant to encourage collaboration across the sprawling, Balkanized and in some cases demoralized bank, which is conducting more than a thousand projects around the globe.