What is a matrix organization chart?

Matrix organizational structure \ x0d \ x0d \ The emergence of matrix structure is a leap in enterprise management level. When the environment needs professional technical knowledge on the one hand, and the product lines can change rapidly on the other, the management of matrix structure is needed. As we said before, the functional structure emphasizes vertical information communication, while the business department structure emphasizes horizontal information flow, and the matrix is to realize these two information flows at the same time within the enterprise. \ x0d \ x0d \ In practice, it is very difficult to establish and maintain this dual management structure, because the powerful party often occupies the dominant position. Therefore, the mature matrix management mode is a functional organization with the nature of project/product team. Functional departments exercise management functions as usual, but the company's business activities exist in the form of projects. The project manager is fully responsible for the project, and he asks the functional manager for appropriate human resources. During the project, these employees are managed by the project manager. The function manager's duty is to ensure the rational and effective use of human resources. \ x0d \ x0d \ is different from the first two structures, and the matrix structure can rarely be judged from the organization chart, which needs to be judged according to the specific management behavior of the enterprise. Whether enterprises should implement matrix management should be judged according to the following three conditions: \ x0d \ x0d \ Condition 1: There is pressure between product lines to enjoy resources. Organizations are usually medium-sized and have a moderate number of product lines. There is great pressure for organizations to use personnel and equipment flexibly in different products. For example, the organization is not large enough to arrange enough engineers for each product line, so engineers are assigned to undertake product services in the form of part-time project services. \x0d\\x0d\ Condition 2: The environment needs two or more important products. For example, the requirements for technical quality and rapid product update. This double pressure means the need to maintain a balance of power between the functions and products of the organization. In order to maintain this balance, a structure with dual functions and powers is needed. \x0d\\x0d\ Condition 3: The environmental conditions of the organization are complex and uncertain. Frequent external changes and high interdepartmental dependence require a lot of vertical and horizontal coordination and information processing. \x0d\\x0d\ According to the above conditions, it can be seen that the company providing consulting services is most suitable to adopt the matrix structure. For example, a medium-sized consulting company has dozens to hundreds of people, and consultants can be divided into different functional teams according to their professional expertise, such as financial consulting, production, engineering consulting and management consulting groups. Due to the high cost of consultants and the relative scarcity of excellent consulting resources, consulting companies have no unified products and need to carry out secondary design according to the specific conditions of customers. Every project is a brand-new product, which cannot be completed by assembly line operation. In addition, the quality of products needs to be jointly controlled by the project manager and the functional manager. Matrix structure can best meet the above conditions. The advantage of \ x0d \ x0d \ matrix structure is that it can flexibly allocate resources such as manpower and equipment among different products/services, and the organization can adapt to changing external requirements. This structure also provides employees with skills to acquire functions and general management. In a matrix organization, the role orientation of key organization members is very important. These key organizational members include: senior leaders, matrix directors and employees. \ x0d \ x0d \ The main responsibility of senior leaders is to maintain the balance of power between functional managers and product managers. Senior leaders must also be willing to make decisions and encourage functional managers and product managers to contact directly to solve problems together, which will help information sharing and coordination. \ x0d \ x0d \ The problem of matrix directors is how to control subordinates. Because subordinates accept the leadership of two supervisors at the same time, unconscious employees will take advantage of this opportunity to take advantage of the loopholes and create a vacuum in the management of supervisors. Therefore, functional departments and product supervisors must work together to solve the problem. The functional supervisor mainly solves the technical problems of subordinates, and the project supervisor specifically manages the behaviors, work results and performance of subordinates on this project. These activities require a lot of time, communication, patience and cooperation skills with others, which are all part of matrix management. \ x0d \ x0d \ Employees accept dual leadership and often experience anxiety and stress. The orders of his two direct managers often conflict. At this time, dual-supervisor employees must be able to face the instructions of product managers and functional managers, form a comprehensive decision, and decide how to allocate their time. An employee must maintain a good relationship with his two supervisors and show double loyalty to them. \ x0d \ x0d \ matrix structure was first used in aircraft manufacturing and aerospace equipment production projects. Functional departments include R&D, engineering, installation and testing. Every project needs brand-new products, such as new planes and space rockets. Now, matrix structure has been widely used in multinational companies, and the most representative company is "the world's electrical giant?" ABB Company ABB has 250,000 employees all over the world, and adopts a matrix structure in every country to divide the company into regions and business dimensions. This is done to ensure the localization characteristics of the company's products, as well as the scale effect and technological leadership. ABB local managers are responsible for developing new products, developing markets and solving key problems with the government, while business managers are responsible for global product strategy decisions. According to this structure, ABB has established joint ventures all over the world, and each joint venture is very small (ABB has 65,438+0,200 joint ventures worldwide), but the general managers of about 65,438+0,654,38+0,000 joint ventures report to regional managers and global business managers. Through such management, ABB is still a company with overall strategy and has become a world electrical giant. Through the matrix structure, ABB effectively combines globalization strategy with localized products, and combines the scale advantage of multinational companies with the flexibility and low cost advantage of small companies. However, the communication difficulty required for dual management can be imagined. Most of ABB's management documents describe the responsibilities and relationship between regional managers and business managers, and make managers understand their roles through continuous training. At the same time, they also developed a new information management system to strengthen information sharing. Even so, communication is still the most urgent problem for ABB. \ x0d \ x0d \ matrix organizational structure has the following advantages: it can promote the cooperation and coordination of managers at various departments and levels, and strengthen contact and communication while maintaining professional division of labor; It is conducive to the overall consideration of management functions, product production and marketing and regional market factors, so as to achieve the same profit target and rationally allocate resources. \x0d\\x0d\ But the disadvantages of this model are: many leaders will easily lead to inefficiency; Improper coordination can easily lead to conflicts between managers. This organizational structure is more suitable for construction engineering, aerospace, marketing and management consulting companies, which have many experts engaged in the same project. \x0d\ Positioning of human resources under matrix organizational structure \x0d\\x0d\ (I) What is matrix organizational structure \ x0d \ x0d \ Matrix organizational structure is another very common organizational structure, which has been applied for more than 30 years and successfully used by companies such as International Business Machines Corporation (IBM) and Ford Motor Company. Enterprises adopting this organizational structure will have two combination paths to divide functions and powers: functions and products. Its basic form is shown in Figure 5. \x0d\\x0d\ (II) Characteristics of matrix organizational structure \ x0d \ x0d \ Matrix organizational structure is designed to have the advantage of division of functions and product (project) functions. Because the advantages and disadvantages of functional division and product functional division are just complementary. At the same time, the most prominent feature of this structure is to break the concept of single instruction system, so that employees in the management matrix have two superiors at the same time. Therefore, the matrix organizational structure mainly has the following advantages and disadvantages. \ x0d \ x0d \ Advantages: \ x0d \ 1. Obtained the coordination of the dual functions put forward by the environment to the enterprise; \ x0d \ 2。 Realize the flexible enjoyment of human resources between products; \ x0d \ 3。 Suitable for complex decision-making and frequent changes in uncertain environment; \ x0d \ 4。 It provides opportunities for the improvement of functions and production skills; \ x0d \ 5。 It is most suitable for medium-sized organizations with multiple products. \ x0d \ x0d \ Defect: \ x0d \ 1. It is easy to cause employees to fall into the confusion of dual functions and powers, thus reducing the enthusiasm of employees; \ x0d \ 2。 Require employees to have high interpersonal skills and need comprehensive and systematic training; \ x0d \ 3。 It takes a lot of time to coordinate; \ x0d \ 4。 Employees are required to have a strong understanding of this organizational structure and adopt university-style management; \ x0d \ 5。 The balance of their functions and powers comes from the double requirements put forward by the environment. \ x0d \ x0d \ From the above characteristics, we can't find that the balance between the two powers is the key to this organizational structure. Obviously, there can't be absolute balance in reality, so in practical work, there are naturally two evolution forms: function matrix and item matrix. The former is based on the functional director as the main decision maker, and the latter is based on the product/project leader. \x0d\\x0d\ (3) HR positioning under matrix organizational structure \x0d\\x0d\ No matter what evolution form, there is a balance problem in matrix organizational structure. This includes not only the balance between the two forces, but also the balance of key roles in the matrix. Therefore, the orientation of human resources department under this organizational structure is to strive for balance. This positioning is mainly reflected in the following two aspects. \ x0d \ x0d \ 1. Strengthen internal communication and interpersonal relationship guidance. Due to the large amount of information in this organizational structure, the information flow is very complicated. Therefore, all employees must receive professional training regularly to ensure the normal operation of this structure. On the one hand, it is to help employees better understand this organizational structure and deal with all kinds of information and confusion under the dual power mode more effectively. On the other hand, it is also to guide employees to correctly handle problems in their work, reduce conflicts and prevent people from making bad use of this dual structure. Therefore, as a function that permeates all projects/products, the orientation of human resources department should be to actively guide and promote open communication. \ x0d \ x0d \ The second is to strengthen the human resource management of key matrix roles. Because the matrix organizational structure is much more complicated than the single power structure, its normal operation requires a series of brand-new management and execution skills, which is also the role that the key matrix can not be ignored. In other words, the status of the key matrix role directly determines the success or failure of this organizational structure. These key roles include senior leaders, matrix supervisors and employees with dual supervisors. Through their own work, the human resources department must ensure that these key roles are played by competent people or make them meet the ability requirements.