About Organizational Structure & Culture

Organizational structure is the hierarchical levels of a company; this structure provides guidelines on subordination and employee responsibilities, and affects the workplace culture. An organization’s culture is an informal, collectively held grouping of ideas and values, as well as the types of workplace relationships and ways of doing things within the organization.

Function

Organizational structure impacts workplace culture through controlling, coordinating and motivating employees to work together to accomplish company goals and objectives.

Significance

Organizational structure and culture affect employee behavior, motivation, performance, dedication, satisfaction, cooperation and relationships.

Types

The two basic types of organizational structures are horizontal and vertical, often referred to as flat and tall. These structures are based on the amount of authority levels within the organization. Other more complicated structure types include functional, divisional, matrix and network: functional structures focus on the specific tasks employees perform, divisional structures seperate employees by either market or geographic divisions, matrix structures group employees into multiple divisions, and network structures coordinate all the organizations in a supply chain.

Considerations

The decision on which structure to implement should be based on the organization’s employees, strategy and the type of work performed.

Misconceptions

Implementing the correct organizational structure will not inherently produce a positive workplace culture; even with the correct infrastructure, the organization needs to focus on the smaller cultural issues and topics within the workplace.

References

• Lamar University Industrial Engineering Department: Organizational Structure
• Organizational Culture 101: The Relationship between Organizational Culture and Organizational Structure