Organigraphs: Drawing how companies really work

Walk into any organization and you will get a snapshot of the company in ac tion - people and products moving every which way. But ask for a picture of the company and you will be given the org chart, with its orderly little b oxes showing just the names and titles of managers. Not there's a more revealing way to depict the people and operations within an organization - an approach called the organigraph. The organigraph is n ot a chart. It's a map that offers an overview of the company's functions a nd the ways that people organize themselves at work. Perhaps most important , an organigraph can help managers see untapped competitive opportunities. Drawing on the organigraphs they created for about a dozen companies, autho rs Mintzberg and Van der Heyden illustrate just how valuable a tool the org anigraphy is. For instance, one they created for Electrocomponents, a Briti sh distributor of electrical and mechanical items, led managers to a better understanding of the company's real expertise-business-to-business relatio nships. As a result of that insight, the company wisely decided to expand i n Asia and to increase its Internet business. As one manager says, "It allo wed the company to see all sorts of new possibilities." With traditional hierarchies vanishing and newfangled-and after quite compl ex-organizational forms taking their place, people are struggling to unders tand how their companies work. What parts connect to one another? How shoul d processes and people come together? Whose ideas have to flow where? With their flexibility and realism, organigraphs give managers a new way to answ er those questions.