This week, I interviewed Zack Holloway, a Senior Account
Manager at Protingent Inc.
Protingent Inc. is a high tech consulting engineering staffing
company. The company has seven
offices throughout the United States with the corporate headquarters located in
Redmond, Washington. Zack’s
manager works out of the Portland office and communicates with Zack via
telephone, e-mail, and their own instant messenger program.
In my conversation with Zack, I learned that his company,
like mine, has a functional organization structure (Nohria, 1995). There is a division of the
labor—account management, recruiting, marketing, IT, accounting and planning,
and human resources. Zack’s boss,
Eric, acts as the general manager, who as Nohria (1995) puts it “is also
required to mediate the conflicts that may arise among the functions.” (p.
5). Whenever there is an issue
within the business or across function, Eric acts in the “liaison role” and as
the leader on the team (Daft, 2007).
Zack must defer to Eric for office purchases, office management, client
contract alterations and discrepancies, and whenever issues arise.
Protingent Inc. utilizes decentralized decision-making where
the decision-making occurs at the individual office levels (Daft, 2007). While Zack reports to Eric, he still
has the authority for most business decisions. Within day-to-day functions, Zack has autonomy, but when it
comes to cross-functional needs, he must contact Eric.
When asked if this were the ideal structure for the company,
Zack felt that for the current size that it is the best structure. However, as the company grows,
specifically across time zones, Zack thought that the company should move
towards a matrix structure (Daft, 2007). In that case, when a time sensitive issue occurred,
there would no delay in resolution.
As local offices continue to grow, onsite liaisons with the same
function and authority that Eric possesses will also be essential to streamline
business processes.
References:
Daft, R. (2007). Fundamentals of organizational
structure. Organization Theory and Design, (9th ed.).
Nohria, N. (1995). "Note on Organizational
Structure." Harvard Business School.
Cathryn, interesting example. It seems like the functional structure is a good fit for Protingent at the moment. However, did Zack see any challenges associated with this structure? For example, Nohria (1995) notes that a key weakness of the functional structure is "its inability to respond to environmental changes that require coordination between departments" (p.5). Another disadvantage is that employees can have a restricted view of the overall goals of the organization. Are either of these challenges that Protingent faces?
ReplyDeleteCathryn,
ReplyDeleteDid Zack indicate how fast his company is growing? Do you know if they intent to make organizational changes now as they foresee the company's growth? I would think that restructuring would be better if done before all employees are hired and the expansion of personnel has been done so that organizational structure changes do not affect the productivity and effectiveness of the employees. Just wondering.
Hi Cathryn,
ReplyDeleteIn speaking to Zack, did he mentioned if he still experiences a delay in sign off from Eric or upper management? I ask because although Zach has some authority himself, he mentioned still getting approval from Eric on some stuff. Also, I agree with Xiomara that if the company has a set time of when it will expand, then it should start preparing its current employees for a structural change before the expansion.