The Key to Organizing Your Business and Making it Work:

Structure vs. Function

by Michael Rinaldi,

President, Avail Consulting, Inc.

An external look at a busines---just observing it from an outsider's viewpoint---will yield interesting information about how the business is organized.  And from that you can gain insight into how it functions and ultimately, if it is doing well. 

Do things flow well for it?

Are there confusions, backlogs, bottlenecks?

Is communication fast and accurate?

Such things can be traced back to a company's basic organization structure, which is typically found on their organization chart.  That is, if the company has one and it is known and actually used as a tool.   

Many small businesses do not  have or use one or do not make it widely known to employees to use as an integral part of company operations.   Employers or managers either do not see it as important or do not want to confront the task of developing and maintaining one.

Big mistake. 

Why? 

Many reasons.  First, organization is the backbone to a company or any group for that matter--- it is the essential  framework on which a foundation is built.   It is a blueprint to a company's design.  It dictates it's functionality.  Imagine a builder trying to construct a twelve-story office building without having consulted an architect.  

Second, an organization chart maps out  hierarchy.   "So what!",  you say?  Okay, try going to work when there's no one in charge, when there's nobody around to make decisions or give orders, and no one knows where to put things let alone what to do next to keep the business going. 

That's only fun for so long. 

Third, an organization chart delineates flows within the company.   Flows give a company direction along which things move---from assembly lines to communication, to ALL functions.  Flows are vital signs of a business that needs periodically checked.   Don't think so?

Blood has a flow, doesn't it?  What happens when it is restricted, cut off, sluggish, or requires excessive pressure to circulate?   Yeah, you get problems elsewhere in the system.  Sometimes, problems big enough to shut a system down.  

Ask anyone who has ever worked on any kind of assembly or distribution line when it gets shut down for a while.  

Get the picture?

So, how do we use this information?  Read on and find out.

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