Re: Organizational Structure

[Bernie McCann <BernieMc -at- AOL -dot- COM>]

Hello Tracey;

Your question often occurs these days with young companies moving into rapid
expansion.  Senior management, some of whom may hardly have any more
experience than those lonely souls in the lower echelons, extract the maxim
from "The 1-minute Manager", which explains how to remove the monkey off of
their shoulder.  Thus, these remarkable questions appear on the Internet.

Remarkable, because if I was a company president and I discovered my staff
asking this sort of question, I would become quite concerned.  Of course,
there is an element of initiative being shown here, but do we have time to
learn the numerous aspects of the requirement (I am aware that I may be making
a wrong assumption here).

In answer to the question, I think that a change of title to, perhaps,
Communication Specialist would be more helpful.  This will better cover all
the various tasks that you list and, thus, you will have reason to develop a
Communication Department (and better visualize its position in the hierachy).
A manager will need to be appointed, and a serious job description will have
to be written (Perhaps, 66% of the description would be writing and the rest
supervising contractors - who knows).  Eventually, I recommend that a well
qualified, senior editor, be assigned to the top position.

Who should a Publications Manager report to?  This will become The Subject of
The Month, and some will say that direct reporting to the President ought to
be the case, and I would tend to agree but, unfortunately, stronger wills may
prevail and you will report, for example, to the Director of Engineering.
Then, it may become a question of personalities rather than experience.
Certainly, your creditability as a manager will be on trial.  How would you
reply to a statement such as, "We hope that you're not going to tell us that
writing is an art form."  This once happened to me on my first day in the job.

Thus, a Communication Department, in my opinion, doesn't fit comfortably into
any of the three departments mentioned, and has a degree of importance equal
to either of the others.  You should not share management of your staff with
other departments.  I will repeat here the real need for serious job
descriptions - more problems are created in this area than almost anything
else.

Interesting subject - Good luck.

Bernie