A Detailed Review of Matrix and Divisional Organizational Structure

This essay provides an analysis of matrix and divisional organizational structures. It highlights that matrix structures connect employees from diverse departments, fostering democratic leadership and employee motivation, but may also cause internal complexity and conflict. Cognizant is given as an example of a company using a matrix structure. The essay then discusses divisional structures, noting their ability to focus teams on specific products or services, promoting higher morale and knowledge, but also potentially leading to internal politics. BT Group England is cited as an example of a company using a divisional structure. The essay concludes by referencing various academic sources that support the analysis of these organizational structures.

0Running head: ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE
Organisational Structure
Name of the Student
Name of University
Author’s note

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ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE
Matrix organisational structure is an atypical structure that connects employees and
managers from diverse departments and promotes them to work in sync towards
accomplishments of goals (Lunenburg 2012). One of the core advantage of matrix organisation
structure is it encourages a democratic leadership style (Lunenburg 2012). This leadership style
incorporates a through input of team members before the managers finalize the decision. This
onus, which is imparted over the employees towards valuable decision making helps in the
development of employee confidence. This employee confidence promotes employee motivation
and simultaneous job satisfaction. This collaborative decision making is one of the main
advantages of the matrix organisational structure and this in turn help the leaders to keep their
team members informed and motivated towards the entire work process. However, matrix
organisational structure is often criticised for the generation of internal complexity (Lunenburg
2012). For example an employee may get directed via different command concerning the same
problem from different supervisors coming from different departments. This dual authority along
with communication problem cause a partition among the employees and the managers and the
onus of shared decision making may give rise of internal conflict or conflict of interest
(Lunenburg 2012).
Example: Cognizant uses a matric organisational structure as all employees are also
involved in the decision making process (Pearlson, Saunders and Galletta 2016).
Divisional organisational structure consists of parallel teams. Each of this team has
their spate product line-up or service (Cosh and Hughes 2012). The main advantage of the
structure is it allows a team to concentrate upon single product or service with a specific
leadership structure that works in favour of major strategic objectives. This common objective
helps in the development of common culture and this help in the promotion of higher morale and

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ORGANISATIONAL STRUCTURE
knowledge about the division portfolio. This high morale help the employee to work as a team
while maintain the integrity during crisis situations (Cosh and Hughes 2012). The main
disadvantage of this organisational structure is it helps in development of group politics like one
division tries to undermine the other division. This office politics hampers the productivity as it
makes the environment unhealthy (Cosh and Hughes 2012).
Example: BT Group England, the first ever telecommunication industry in Britain
employs divisional organisational structure and thus it is tight stairs of hierarchy along with
separate set of product line-up (Battistella 2014).

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References
Battistella, C., 2014. The organisation of Corporate Foresight: A multiple case study in the
telecommunication industry. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 87, pp.60-79.
Cosh, A., Fu, X. and Hughes, A., 2012. Organisation structure and innovation performance in
different environments. Small Business Economics, 39(2), pp.301-317.
Lunenburg, F.C., 2012. Organizational structure: Mintzberg’s framework. International journal
of scholarly, academic, intellectual diversity, 14(1), pp.1-8.
Pearlson, K.E., Saunders, C.S. and Galletta, D.F., 2016. Managing and Using Information
Systems, Binder Ready Version: A Strategic Approach. John Wiley & Sons.
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