What Is an Organizational Chart?

An organizational chart, or org chart, graphically represents an organization's structure by detailing the roles, responsibilitie🉐s, and relationships between individuals within the organization.

Understanding Organizational Charts

Organizational charts either broadly depict an enterprise organization-wide, or drill down to a specific department or unit. It's one way to visualize a 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:bureaucracy.

Organizational charts graphically display an employee's 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:hierarchical status relative to other individuals within the company. For example, an assistant director will inv🍷ariably fall directly below a director on the chart, indicating that the former reports to the latter. Organizational charts use simple symbols such as lines, squares, and circles to connect different job titles that relate to each other.

Regardless of an organization's structure, org charts are extraordinarily useful when an entity is contemplating 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:restructuring its workforce or changing its mܫanagement complex. Most importantly, org charts let employees transparently see how their roles fit ♏into the overall company structure.

Hierarchical Organizational Chart

This m🌌ost common model situates the highest-ranking individuals at the top of the chart and positions lower-ranking individuals below them.

For example,ཧ a public comp🍎any typically shows shareholders in the highest box, followed by these stakeholders in descending vertical order:

• Chair of the board of directors
• Vice-chair of the board
• Board members
• Chief executive officer (CEO)
• Other C-suite executives (joined to one another by horizontal lines)

Oౠther job titles that may follow c-suite execs include:

• President
• Senior vice president
• Vice president
• Assistant vice president
• Senior director
• Assistant director
• Manager
• Assistant manager
• Full-time employees
• Part-time employees
• Contractors

Many formal organizations are organized hierarchically and can be shown in chart form. These include corporations, 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:nonprofits, governments, schools, universities, and the military (as the chart below illustrates).

Other Types of Organizational Charts

• Flat: also known as a horizontal chart, the flat org chart positions individuals on the same level or on only a few levels. This may indicate that the organization has more power equality and that there is room for more autonomous decision-making than is typical with hierarchical organizations.
• Matrix: This complex organizational structure groups individuals by their common skill-sets, the departments they work in, and the people they report to. Matrix charts often interconnect employees and teams with more than one manager, such as a software developer who is working on two projects—one with their team manager, and another with a product manager. In this scenario, the matrix chart would connect the software developer to each manager they are working with, with vertical lines.
• Divisional: This chart subdivides the company based on some specific criteria. It could be by product lines or by geographic regions. An example would be an auto manufacturer organizing its company by product type.

The Bottom Line

Organizational charts allow you to visually understand an organization's structure and hierarchy. This shows how information spreads through organizations, whether that's a governmental department, school system, nonprofit, corporation, or the military. The most senior positions typically appear at the top of the chart with subordinate roles falling under them. The chart will vary depending on an organization's size and how its roles are arranged.