Build a Structure Your Business Can Grow Into
Organisation design decides how your company is divided into departments, who reports to whom, how many people a manager can genuinely carry, which decisions each level may take without you, and who is answerable where two departments meet. What you end up with is an agreed structure, written reporting lines and a delegation of authority managers actually work by.
Organisation Design in brief
Organisation design is the work of deciding how your company is divided into departments, who reports to whom, how many people a manager can genuinely carry, which decisions each level may take without you, and who is answerable where two departments meet. What you end up with is an agreed structure, written reporting lines and a delegation of authority managers actually work by.
- GullyHR is an HR consulting, HR services, training and software company based in Bengaluru, working with Indian startups and small and medium businesses.
- Organisation design sits within GullyHR's HR management consulting pillar, alongside HR strategy and workforce planning, role design and HR policy.
- You receive working documents: the chart you actually run today, a target structure, department charters, a delegation of authority schedule and an accountability matrix.
- Structure decisions, including who heads what and whose reporting line changes, are taken by you. GullyHR draws the options and says what each one costs and what it makes harder.
- Scope and sequence are agreed after a consultation. Where a structural change touches an employee's terms of employment, a qualified professional is coordinated.
The starting point
Does Everything Still Come Back to You?
Structure in a growing business is usually the residue of past decisions rather than a design. People were added where there was room, designations were given to keep someone, and a senior hire was made without settling what the position may approve. It holds until the owner becomes the constraint.
We design the structure around the work, then write down who may decide what.
You may be experiencing:
- Almost everyone reporting to you, with decisions waiting for your signature before anything moves.
- A strong individual contributor promoted to head a team, still carrying their own accounts, with nobody actually managing.
- A second location where it was never settled whether the site in-charge reports locally or to a function head.
- Two departments quietly doing overlapping work, while a third activity fails periodically because it was nobody's job.
- A senior hire made to take load off you, with every decision still returning because nothing says what they may approve.
- A supervisor carrying more people than anyone could genuinely review.
- An investor-deck chart that is not the chart people actually work by.
- Designations handed out to keep or reward someone, so titles no longer describe what a person does or decides.
- The same request approved at different levels on different days, because the limits were never fixed.
- Leave, expense and appraisal approvals reaching the wrong person because the reporting lines in your HR records are out of date.
- Roles held by family members whose responsibilities have never been separated from ownership.
What we can help with
Our Organisation Design Services
Organising Principle
Whether the business is best divided by function, by location, by product line or by customer segment, put to you as workable options with what each costs in management positions and what each makes easier.
Department Charters
What each function owns, what it hands to the next one, and which activities sit with it rather than with operations or with the owner, so a department is more than a box on a chart.
Reporting Lines
A single primary reporting manager for every position, with dotted lines named explicitly where a function head and a location head both have a legitimate claim, so nobody has two bosses by accident.
Spans and Layers
Reports per manager and levels between the owner and the front line, counted and tested against the work, so a supervisor is not carrying more people than any one person could review.
Role Rationalisation
Duplicated work, split work and unowned work found and assigned: two people doing the same task in different departments, and the activity nobody owns until it fails.
Decision Rights
Which decisions must stay with the owner and which a function head, a manager or a supervisor can take, separated deliberately rather than by habit or availability.
Delegation of Authority
A written schedule covering hiring, salary revision, purchase, expense, discount, credit and disciplinary decisions by designation and limit, replacing a verbal understanding with a document.
Cross-Department Accountability
For activities that cross functions — a customer complaint, a delivery slip, a recruitment need, a statutory return — one name recorded as answerable, alongside who approves, who is consulted and who is informed.
The scope
What the Consulting Covers
Structure touches every function, so it needs the owner, senior managers and HR in the same conversation. These are the parts of the work we can review or design. The scope is agreed with you and can take all twelve areas or only some.
Current-State Mapping
The structure you actually run, built from employee records and corrected against the reporting lines and approvals people follow.
Organising Principle
Whether the business is best divided by function, location, product line or customer segment, with what each option costs and makes easier.
Departments and Functional Boundaries
What each department owns, what it hands to the next and where its responsibility ends.
Reporting Lines and Dotted Lines
A primary reporting manager for every position, with dual or matrix relationships named where a second manager has a legitimate claim.
Spans of Control and Layers
Reports per manager and levels between the owner and the front line, tested against the nature of the work.
Role Rationalisation and Accountabilities
Duplicated, split and unowned activities identified, with each one assigned to a position.
Decision Rights and Delegation of Authority
Which decisions stay with the owner and which a head, manager or supervisor can take, with limits set by designation.
Cross-Functional Accountability
For activities that cross departments, one named owner alongside who approves, who is consulted and who is informed.
Multi-Location and New-Site Structure
How a branch, plant, warehouse or field team is organised, who the in-charge reports to and what is decided locally.
Promoter, Family and Leadership Roles
Positions held by owners, family members and senior leaders described by what they own and decide, so the structure holds if the holder changes.
Phased Transition and Communication
Interim structures where the target cannot be reached at once, and the sequence in which people hear about changes.
Reporting Lines in HR Systems
How the agreed hierarchy is recorded in your employee master so approvals travel along the designed lines.
Working together
Ways to Work With Us
Organisation Design Diagnostic
A short assessment of the structure you run today: the real chart, spans and layers, duplicated and unowned work, and the decisions that are stuck.
Structure Design Project
The defined project. Organising principle agreed, target and interim structures drawn, charters written, and the delegation schedule and accountability matrix settled.
Structure With Role Documentation
The structure work paired with job descriptions and role-based measures, so every box on the new chart has a written role behind it.
New Location or Entity Structure
A focused piece of work for a branch, plant, site or newly incorporated company: the positions needed at opening and at full scale, and what stays with head office.
Organisation design is about positions and decision rights, not about individuals. Where a redesign has implications for people, those are separate decisions that remain yours.
The deliverables
What You Receive
Depending on the scope of your engagement, deliverables can include:
- A current-state chart, built from your employee records and corrected against the reporting lines people actually follow.
- A target chart showing departments, layers, positions and reporting lines, each position marked filled, vacant, to be recruited or interim.
- A charter for each department, stating what it owns, what it delivers to whom and where its responsibility ends.
- A span and layer analysis listing reports per manager and levels from owner to front line, with positions recommended for change.
- A role rationalisation note naming duplicated, split and unowned activities, with a recommended treatment against each.
- A delegation of authority schedule covering hiring, revision, purchase, expense, discount and disciplinary decisions by designation and limit.
- An accountability matrix for cross-department activities, recording who is responsible, approves, is consulted and is informed.
- A change communication pack: the announcement, the manager briefing note and draft wording for individual conversations.
- A reporting-line change list for the employee master, showing each affected position with its old and new reporting line.
- A decision-rights register listing recurring decisions, who takes each one and where it escalates.
- A phased transition plan separating the changes to make now from those that follow a hire or a location opening.
Step by step
How We Work
Draw the Real Chart
We build the current chart from your employee master and payroll records, then correct it by asking people who they genuinely go to for approvals and for work. The two charts are rarely the same.
List the Work, Then Test the Structure
Before any box moves we write down what the company must produce. Against that we test reports per manager, levels, activities appearing in two departments and activities appearing in none.
Agree the Organising Principle
Function, location, product line or customer segment, put in front of you with what each costs in management positions and what each makes easier. This decision shapes everything that follows.
Design the Structure and Settle Delegation
Departments, positions, reporting lines and spans are drawn, with an interim structure where the target cannot be reached at once. A working session then assigns decisions and limits to designations.
Communicate, Configure and Review
People whose reporting line or designation changes hear it in a planned sequence from their own management. New lines are set in the employee master so approvals travel correctly, and we review after a full cycle. Where it is included in the engagement, we support a pilot with one department or location first and refine the structure and delegation schedule from what the managers found.
The difference
What a Settled Structure Gives You
An agreed structure helps you:
We do not promise outcomes. We record a baseline before work starts, covering the real reporting lines, spans per manager and the decisions currently waiting on the owner, and report against it, so you can see what changed and what did not.
- Let employees know who their manager is, and managers know which people are theirs to review.
- Have decisions taken at the level where the work actually happens rather than waiting for the owner.
- Stop departments doing parts of each other's work, and give the activity that fell between them a name.
- Drop a new location or senior hire into a structure that already exists, instead of negotiating case by case.
- Explain the company to a bank, an investor, a customer auditor or a new joiner from one current chart.
- Create new positions against a structure rather than inventing them to hold on to an individual.
- Keep the reporting lines in your HR system, the chart on the wall and the approvals people follow consistent with one another.
- See which decisions still return to the owner, and move them deliberately rather than by accident.
- Know which positions to create before a growth step, with the reporting line already decided.
- Give a new senior hire a written statement of what the position owns and approves.
Find your fit
Who This Service Is For
Founder-Led Companies
Businesses grown past the point where one person can be the reporting line for everyone and still do other work.
Businesses Adding a Site or Team
Companies adding a location, plant, warehouse or field team, where a head-office structure no longer covers everybody.
Companies Hiring a First Senior Layer
Businesses about to appoint an operations, sales or finance head, who need the position's authority settled before the person joins.
Family-Run Businesses
Companies where responsibilities grew around individuals, and designations no longer describe what a person does or decides.
Businesses With Overlapping Functions
Companies that grew by adding people wherever there was room, and now find two functions doing parts of the same work.
Companies Facing a Transition
Businesses in a funding round, a merger of units, a promoter separation or a generational handover, where the structure must be explained to outsiders.
HR Heads and HR Managers
Teams who maintain the employee master and need reporting lines, designations and approval routes to match how work is organised.
Groups With Several Units or Entities
Businesses run by common owners across more than one unit or company, where reporting across them was never settled.
Finance and Operations Heads
Leaders who want written approval limits so purchases, expenses and discounts do not all need a referral upward.
Good to know
A Clear Path from Current Chart to Working Structure
Understand and decide
- Map: draw the real chart from employee records and from how approvals actually move.
- Test: check spans, layers and overlapping or unowned activities against the work the company must deliver.
- Choose: agree the organising principle with you, with what each option costs and makes easier.
Design and embed
- Design: draw the target and interim structures, charters and reporting lines.
- Delegate: assign decisions and limits to designations in a working session.
- Embed: communicate the changes, set the new lines in the employee master and review after a full cycle.
Each stage has an owner, a date and a defined output.
Good to know
Track Structure and Decision Flow
Structure
- Reporting-line completeness: whether every position in the employee master has a single primary manager.
- Reports per manager: where spans are unusually wide or narrow for the work.
- Layers: how many levels sit between the owner and the front line.
- Unowned activities: which activities still have no named owner.
Decisions
- Decisions waiting on the owner: which recurring requests still depend on one person.
- Approval turnaround: where authorisation delays occur along the new lines.
- Exceptions to the delegation schedule: where limits are being bypassed and why.
Measures use agreed definitions and reporting periods.
Good to know
Scope and Service Boundaries
Each engagement defines
The departments, locations, entities, employee categories, deliverables and implementation support included.
Requires a separate agreement
- Legal entity or group structuring.
- Job evaluation, grading and compensation design.
- Advice on individual redeployment, termination or performance cases.
- Legal advice on employment terms or on company-level authority.
- Detailed job descriptions and role-based measures.
- HR software licences and system development beyond agreed configuration.
- Ongoing management of the structure after handover.
Employment decisions remain with authorised management. Delegation schedules that touch company-level authority, and any change affecting an employee's terms, should receive appropriate specialist review.
Good to know
Timeline and How to Prepare
Timeline
The schedule depends on the number of departments and locations, availability of managers, the depth of documentation and any system configuration. We confirm it after agreeing the scope.
Useful inputs
- The employee master with designations and reporting lines.
- Any organisation charts currently in use.
- Existing approval practices, emails or authority lists.
- Details of locations, entities and their heads.
- Planned hires, openings or restructuring decisions.
- A list of the decisions that most often wait for the owner.
- Current job descriptions, where they exist.
If none of this is documented, we can begin with discussions with you and your senior managers.
Good to know
Confidentiality and Employee Information
Handled by agreement
Structure work involves reporting data, payroll records and candid views about roles. Before work begins we agree the data required, who may access it, how it is shared, the confidentiality terms and retention arrangements.
Interview inputs
Comments from managers and staff are reported as findings and are not attributed to the individual who gave them.
Good to know
Frequently asked questions
It is the work of deciding how your company is divided into departments, who reports to whom, how many people a manager can genuinely carry, which decisions each level may take without you, and who is answerable where two departments meet.
No. The work is about positions, reporting lines and decision rights. It frequently finds duplicated or unowned work, and the usual treatment is reassignment rather than reduction. Where a redesign has implications for individuals, those are separate decisions that remain yours.
Structure settles how positions are arranged and who decides what. Job descriptions settle what each individual position owns and is judged on. The structure is usually agreed first, so descriptions are not written against boxes that are about to move.
Yes, and it is common. The approach is the same: the position is defined by the work it must do and the decisions it carries. Who holds a position is your decision, and we design the structure so it would still work if the holder changed.
The organising principle session and the delegation session need genuine senior time, because those are the decisions. The current-state work, the analysis and the drafting are ours, with short conversations to confirm what we have understood.
Yes. Reporting data, payroll records and what people say in interviews are handled under confidentiality. Individual comments are not attributed in anything we produce, because a structure study depends on people speaking plainly.
Reporting lines are set in the employee master so approvals travel correctly, and we review after an appraisal round or a peak season. Where something is being bypassed, that is usually the design's problem rather than the manager's, and we correct it.
Yes. The new hierarchy is configured in whichever system holds your employee master, so leave approvals, regularisation, expense claims and appraisal forms travel up the line you designed rather than the one that was there before.
After a short assessment of the structure you run today. The scope states which departments, locations and entities are covered and whether role documentation and configuration are included. It is agreed in writing before work begins.
Common types are functional, divisional or product-based, geographic and matrix. Smaller businesses usually start functional and add location or product lines as they grow; we put the options to you with what each costs in management positions.
There is no single number. It depends on how complex the work is, how experienced the team is and whether the manager also does hands-on work. We test spans against your work and set out where a manager is carrying more than can be reviewed.
A delegation of authority matrix sets who may approve which decision, up to what limit. A RACI chart shows, for an activity, who is responsible, accountable, consulted and informed. We usually build both, since one covers approvals and the other covers shared work.
Usually when one function regularly needs more attention than the founder can give, or when decisions in it wait for the founder's signature. We help settle what the position owns and approves before the person joins, so the hire takes load off rather than adding to it.
Organisation design settles structure, reporting lines and decision rights. Organisation development concerns culture, capability and ways of working. Workforce planning settles how many people each role needs and when. They are related and can be scoped together.
Yes. We define the positions needed at opening and at full scale, who the site in-charge reports to, which decisions are taken locally and what stays with head office. It is a focused piece of work scoped on its own.
The schedule sets working approvals inside the business. Authority to bind the company, and any limits set by your constitutional documents or board, should be confirmed with your company secretary or legal adviser.
Pricing depends on workforce size, the number of departments, locations and entities, and the documentation and support required. Share your requirements and we will send a tailored proposal.
Design the Structure, Then Write Down Who Decides
Settle the organising principle, the reporting lines and the spans, then give managers a written delegation of authority so decisions stop queueing at your desk.
Prefer to talk first? Call +91 80958 58589 or write to hello@gullyhr.com.
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