The department I am currently working in is a classic case of a Divisional Structure. Within our Athletic Department, each person is responsible for a certain division (a team or, in my case, the public relations/marketing efforts), with a team of managers (Assistant Athletic Directors and, ultimately, the Athletic Director) overseeing the operations of the individual business units. Budgeting and planning is definitely on a profit basis, because each individual sports program can run itself as its own business organization.
This type of structure has quite a few positives, especially when dealing with athletics teams. Each team can run itself independently, meaning a head coach really only needs to rely on himself to make sure his individual business unit runs correctly. The individual divisions are not micromanaged, and you are given the freedom - within reason, of course - to run your division as you see fit, only needing the final approval of the top manager (the Athletic Director) on money-related issues. This allows you to create your division in a vision all your own, and it can certainly give you a sense of pride to accomplish goals that you yourself have crafted. This, in turn, can make your employees more motivated, because they feel like they are setting the course of their unit's direction, something I feel is overlooked when talking about divisional structures.
As with any type of organizational structure, however, there are two sides of the coin. The structure I am currently working in shows a lot of the challenges facing a Divisional Structure in this time period. Because our department is severely understaffed, we have people wearing multiple hats in the organization: I, for example, am also the Assistant Baseball Coach at the school, as well as the only member of the Athletic Communications Department, responsible for promoting 10 teams while coaching one of them. There are only three members of our department that have only one responsibility, so the current design lends itself to a myriad of potential problems.
Because everyone is so concerned with maintaining all of his
or her responsibilities, there is almost no coordination between
divisions. This creates a department
that is unorganized as a whole: Each individual division may be organized, but
there are no department-wide initiatives or standardizations, because there are
simply not enough hours in the day.
Also, all the responsibilities make for a lack of in-depth
competence across the divisions. It is
merely about getting all the tasks required of you done as quickly and as
accurately as possible, and not falling behind. There is very
little if any time for improvement or professional development, which leads to
a stagnant division and, consequently, a stagnant department. The environment does not lend itself to a lot of creativity, because there simply isn't enough time to truly be creative. It is merely about getting everything done on time, and at times, the work suffers because of it.
It is for these reasons why I feel a Divisional Structure in a small organization is doomed to be a failed one. Smaller organizations are in a 'Catch-22' of sorts: They have to have individual divisions to get all the work done, but the lack of collaboration between them creates no long-term growth for the organization as a whole. We are merely mice spinning our exercise wheels, moving through the year's cycle of work only to repeat it all over again. The result is a stagnant organization and, as much as we would all like to think otherwise, stagnant employees.
Andrew, I would like you to push your thinking a bit. How are other athletic departments structured? Do you think some have implemented the divisional structure better than others? Besides the size of the organization, what other factors could lead to a successful structure in an athletic department?
ReplyDeleteCourtney,
ReplyDeleteI read your comment, and asked around a little bit at other schools in my area. From what I've gathered in talking to people at other institutions, most athletic departments are divisional structures. It just makes the most sense with regards to each sports program being its own separate business unit. Some are working better than others, but I found that the organizations that hold more staff meetings, where the entire department is there as a whole to iron out any issues, are the most successful. I feel this allows them to have a lot more collaboration between the individual units, which makes for a more cohesive department.
In terms of the other factors that could help to build a successful structure, I think the most important one has to be financial resources. By this, I mean the financial resources needed to properly staff the divisional structure. In a smaller athletic department's case, people are wearing two, possibly even three hats just to make the organization function properly. When you're doing this many different things over the course of an academic year, there's really no time left for collaboration or coordination between you and, say, another head coach, on a community service initiative you'd like to do. It's all about keeping your head above water, and not falling behind on what your individual responsibilities are.
So in order for a divisional structure to be truly successful, employees need to have set time, like staff meetings for instance, to collaborate and coordinate organization-wide initiatives. I think the smaller the organization, the more this is necessary. People in a smaller organization are typically over-worked, so they may not have the time to do these things on their own. It is then up the managers to take the initiative and put everyone in the same room more often, and see what ideas can come out of it.
Thanks for bringing up the questions, you really made me think!
Andrew - That is a strong claim you made at the end of your piece: "a Divisional Structure in a small organization is doomed to be a failed one." It's obvious that there are some issues in the athletic department that are influencing your impression of a divisional structure.
ReplyDeleteI wonder what you would do to improve this structure. I'm guessing that you would start with human resources and start hiring more people. Nothing puts strain on an organization quite like not having enough people to carry out the strategic objectives of the business unit. Would you trash the divisional structure altogether I wonder. Or would you add some funtional horizontal teams/personnel to the existing divisional structure? It seems like there is a lot of room for improvement if there is synergy created between sports. I think a liason figure for the athletics department that fuels inter-unit communication would be a good place to start. Daft would most likely (2007) recommend instituting core processes to drive this horizontal communication.
From a glass half-full perspective, at least you're getting tons of experience performing varied tasks. Keep up the good work!