Mgt230 Week 4 Organizational Structure

Organizational Structure Paper

Tina L. Kraft

MGT/230 Management Theory and Practice

Feb. 09, 2015

Kathleen Dominick

Introduction

Running a business or corporation is comparable to a well-oiled machine. There are numerous parts that individually would not work or survive on its own, but put the parts in the correct order and you have something amazing. Each part has its own specific job to do which carries over to the next part making the machine run smoothly. Businesses can run along the same idea. There are different departments with responsibilities that need to be done. Once those tasks are completed, and then the next department can complete their tasks until the complete job is done. For a business to run smoothly it has many key factors to figure out how and when tasks will be completed.

One essential component to these factors is the organizational structure of the business. Organization structures help businesses accomplish their different goals. “Organizations large and small can achieve higher sales and other profit by properly matching their needs with the structure they use to operate” (Writing, 2015). There are two main organization structures, vertical and horizontal. Both structures exist in every business, vertical being in essence the chain of command from the CEO/President to the front line managers. Larger businesses usually will then have to utilize the horizontal structure when the business becomes complex thus dividing work into different units called departmentalization. There are three main structures a business may follow: functional, divisional, and matrix structures.

First of all, “functional organization jobs (and departments) are specialized and grouped according to business functions and the skills they require” (Bateman & Snell, pg. 287, 2011). In a divisional organization the business groups its units “…around products, customers, or geographic regions” (Bateman & Snell, pg. 289, 2011). The last...