How to Write an Organizational Structure Chart | Bizfluent

How to Write an Organizational Structure Chart

Dec 2, 2010
2 minute read

An organizational structure chart shows the structure of a business. The chart shows each employee, his area of responsibility and to whom he reports. A chart can help to make work divisions clear, show the types of work your business is involved with and can also clearly show promotion lines from one level to the next. An organizational chart can be drawn by hand or drawn using software.

Draw a box at the top of the page. Type or write the name of the CEO, owner or other top-level member of the organization along with her title. This should be a person who does not report to anyone else.

Draw a row of boxes below the CEO--one box for each person who directly reports to the CEO. Each box should have that person's name, title and department. For example, the next row down may be four department heads. Connect each person in this row with a line from the top of their box to the bottom of the CEO's box.

Draw a third row of boxes with the names and job titles of the people who report to the people in the second row. In the above example, you might have four supervisors reporting to each department head. In this case, you would have a row of sixteen boxes. Connect each box with a line from the top of the box to the bottom of their boss' box.

Continue drawing rows of subordinates, connecting the top of any boxes with the bottom of the box of the person they report to.

Tip

If you have several top-level members, draw a box for each member. The boxes should be lined up in a horizontal row. Consider how many people are at the bottom of the organizational chart before you start drawing. An organization is typically shaped like a pyramid: if you consider how many people will be at the base of your pyramid, you'll have a rough idea about how big your paper should be.

Stephanie Ellen

Stephanie Ellen teaches mathematics and statistics at the university and college level. She coauthored a statistics textbook published by Houghton-Mifflin. She has been writing professionally since 2008. Ellen holds a Bachelor of Science…

Bizfluent Logo

Bizfluent equips entrepreneurs with the tools and tactics they need to build and grow their small businesses, from starting a first venture to refreshing an established one.

Property of TechnologyAdvice. © 2026 TechnologyAdvice. All Rights Reserved

Advertiser Disclosure: Some of the products that appear on this site are from companies from which TechnologyAdvice receives compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products appear on this site including, for example, the order in which they appear. TechnologyAdvice does not include all companies or all types of products available in the marketplace.