A Function is Not a Department a Department Not a Function!
The term “Function” or “Business Function” is often incorrectly used to mean an organisation unit or department within a business. People in the business will refer to the “Finance Function” when what they really mean is the “Finance Department”.
This misuse of the term leads to all sorts of confused thinking (and doing) and should be avoided.
The biggest misunderstanding arises when people talk about the disadvantages of organising a business around functions. To those who do not understand what a function is, this might seem quite profound. They do not realise that this is as ridiculous as saying that a business should not organise its doing around doing!
EVERYTHING THAT A BUSINESS DOES IS A FUNCTION!
All data is created or transformed by Functions. Every step in a Process is a Function.
So, contrary to popular misconceptions, it really is a very good idea to organise a business around business functions. In fact, one of the best indicators of what a an effective and efficient business organisation would to be is a properly drawn Function Hierarchy.
So, does this mean that there is no need for processes? Not at all. Processes are needed in order to achieve required results within the business in response to specific triggers.
Processes are not there to overcome ineffective organistion structures!
More on Function Modelling.
More on Process Modelling.
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yes.. it does help.. what’s the difference between division and department? product line and product portfolio? capabilities and offering?
Hi Ravi
In answer to your questions:
A “division” generally is used to refer to 1) a large subdivision of an organisation, for example, the European Division or 2) a large self governing sector of the organisation, for example, the Engineering Division.
A department tends to refer parts of the organisation created for the purposes of carrying out a specific group of tasks under one manager, for example, the Finance Department. This would not be self governing.
Product line is a single product or variations of a single product, for example, televisions could be a product line.
Product portfolio refers to the entire catalogue of products that an organisation create or sells.
A capability is something that the organisation is capable of doing, for example, the capability to produce 1,000 units of a product per minute, hour or day.
An offering is a vague term and can mean many things. Hoewever, it tends to mean some product or service that an organisation or individual is offering for sale or proposing as a solution.
Regards
John
John,
I totally agree that so-called experts often ignore the crucial role of definitions. And I’m also going along with a lot of what you say.
I have a question for you: can you (in clear definitions terms) explain the difference between a Function and a Functionality?
Thanks…
Regards,
Jan
Hi, Jan
Thank you for your comment. The difference between a Function and Functonality?
A Business Function (or Function) is a core activity of an enterprise. It is something that the enterprise must do in order to meet its objectives and continue in existence.
Examples, of functions would be, “Sell Product to Customer”, “Bill Customer for Products Delivered”, “Recruit Employee”, etc.
“Functionality” is a general English phrase that is generally used when referring to a computerised system in defining what Business Functions the system fully or partly supports.
Does this help?
Regards
John