Organisational design and structure

The structure of an organisation is the sum total of the ways in which it divides its labour into distinct tasks and then achieves co-ordination among them (Mintzberg, 1979). 

Structure is the most significant thing for any organisation, whatever its size. However, I would state that something that works for one organization may not works for another. Lets consider two examples Google and Oticon:

 

Google has a flat organizational structure. It defines as few management layers with a wider span of authority. Such structures often have fast decisions, more control and a lasting communication.

During the 1980s the Oticon’s market share dropped because of high level of competition. Lars Kolind decided to change an approach of work and created new organizational structure, which is called “Spaghetti”. The main characteristics of this structure are choice (staff initiated projects & assemble teams), multiple roles (employees do different types of work) and transparency (knowledge is shared throughout the organization).  

Despite the fact that such organizational structure helped Oticon to overcome the crisis in 1990s, there are few disadvantages. Firstly, it is difficult to understand who operates each part of organization. Secondly, there are could be conflicts with decision making. In addition, subsequently employees will not satisfy a job because it will be hard to get a promotion.

In my point of view, the Google’s organizational structure is productive because it is flat. The employees can communicate faster and easier between each other also decisions making are quicker. For instance, if director Sergey Brin passes a sort of work to the first level of organization his message achieve it quickly because there is a short chain of command. Moreover, because of a great size of span of control there is a less bureaucracy.