3.2 Organisational structures and different ways of working GapFill

The term 'organisational structure' refers to how a business is organised. A very large business is likely to be  tallshortwidebroad, and a very small business  flatnarrowtallwide. Generally, there are more opportunities for  promotionconversationredundancyholidays in larger businesses, but job roles may be very precisely set out. Some employees may prefer the opportunity to carry out a wide variety of tasks, and not be concerned about promotion. They may be more suited to working in   a largean internationala talla flat business.

The number of staff that one manager or supervisor is responsible for is called the  chain of commandworkforceteamspan of control. The act of passing information or instructions between different layers of a business is the  broadcastcommunicationchain of commandspan of control. 

Employers value a flexible workforce, able to deal with  advertisingconversationseasonalmanufacturing changes in demand. This is particularly important in the hospitality industry. A core workforce may be employed on   an hourlya full-timea dailya weekly basis, all year around. Other staff will have contracts to work when the business is busy. These contracts may be  part-timevariedwrittenverbal and possibly also temporary. This ensures customers receive good service. 

It is important to retain good staff in businesses. For staff who work in offices, with no face-to-face contact with customers, they may have the opportunity to  take responsibilityhave holidayswork from homelead teams for part of their working week. This may motivate them as they save money on  salarycommuting costswagesfringe benefits.