Appreciate the Client’s Organisational Structure
How many times have you been shown an organisational heirarchy chart and gulped down a half a mouth full of disinterested vomit? Probably more often than you’d like to admit even to yourself. But that chart tells you a lot about the relationship you’re going to have with this client. It hints at how you will need to approach the people you’re working with on the project and their potential limitations.
This isn’t a difficult concept because I really only want to make you aware of five basic heirarchical structures.
Vertical Functional Organisation Structure
The Vertical Functional Organisation is standard enough for little explanation. Under the managing director you’ll find a general manager responsible for accounting, one for marketing, and one for production. There will be a Human Resources general manager and other similar vertical sectioning of responsibilities. Each section general manager has their own posse of secretaries and admin staff, middle managers and line managers. Therefore, people are generally grouped in departments by common skills and functions.
The thing to take away from this organisational chart is the obvious information silos and segregation inherent in the structure. While there may well be fantastic horizontal communication happening you can’t take that for granted. You can’t take for granted that the middle managers of marketing really have their ears to the ground with regards to their cohorts in Accounting, for example. Just be aware of how their chain of command works via the organisational chart and approach the project from that perspective.
Divisional Organisation Structure
This one is pretty obvious, too. Each division has a general manager which have below them an entirely separate management structure for production, accounting, human resources and marketing. One general manager exists for Mitusbishi cars and another for Mitsubishi heavy vehicles, for example. Therefore people are grouped into separate self-contained divisions.
You have to accept in this structure that separate marketing departments might be totally divorced horizontally from each other. It could just be that Asia and America have totally separate markets and expectations. To some extent it will be like dealing with a Vertical Functional Organisation except this is only one segment of the organisation whole so may not be the big picture in themselves.
Horizontal Matrix Organisation Structure
The Matrix Organisation is one which has both functional and divisional managers who have simultaneous responsibility. Imagine a structure where there are regional managers for Asia, Africa and America running vertically while functional managers for production, sales and marketing run horizontally. You have a structure where the responsibility overlaps with two powerful managers - Asian marketing, or African production. Its reasonably common among global organisations to adopt this structure. The matrix could also be evident where you have general managers for finance, manufacturing and marketing (on the vertical scale) with horizontal managers responsible for specific product lines. This structure is a melding of functional and divisional command lines simultaneously.
One of the things to take away from that heirarchy is that they may require frequent meetings and there is a dual reporting structure. You may be dealing with a dual boss employee who has to answer and report to horizontal and vertical superiors of equal power. This isn’t to say its inherently bad, but you should take that on board when it comes to your own expectations of what people can achieve. Especially when what you’re pushing forward is any change.
Team Based Organisation Structure
A lot of organisations now have moved to the team based approach. When a project comes to life a team is formed to achieve the outcomes and this makes them more dynamic and apt to give you strong feedback much faster than heavier structures. We’ve probably all worked in team environments.
The thing to remember about dealing with teams is that often they have to deal with internal conflict issues and that team members may belong to other unrelated teams at the same time. They may be formed by people from different departments. Teams have quite a few meetings and are difficult to co-ordinate but on the up side they usually don’t have to run to their boss for every little decision.
Network Organisation Structure
This structure is one we’re probably most familiar with in web environments - company A stays small and operates by hiring sub-contractors to perform roles which are not their own core competency. For example, if I need a gun PHP coder to build me something its faster and more effective if I just go out and pay for someone specialised in that solution.
With the network structure you might find that you’re less supervised but they’re running much leaner and are more globally competitive. You will probably avoid having to deal with any serious heirarchy issues, too. On the down side you are just another brick to many of these companies and if they can get the service cheaper, or from a better provider, then you’re about as much worth to them as plug and play underwear. Don’t plan for a pension. But, for many of us, that’s perfectly fine.
Summary
I know this would have bored the pants of most readers of this site but seriously its important to take in certain information the moment you’re shown the organisational chart. Understanding the devil you’re dealing with is an important landmark in setting your own expectations and will save you many hours of grief when you’re trying to get some change that just isn’t going to happen. Hopefully with just this little understanding you can work out how to deal with each of them in turn.
