Levels of Business Organization

There are different ways to define levels of business organization such as the terms used in business process modeling. This method has three levels of organization -- the organizational level, the process level and the business activity level. Each level offers a different perspective of an organization's activities. In business process modeling, levels of organization help managers analyze how to increase efficiency.

Business Process Modeling

A business can use three levels of business process modeling to analyze how work is performed. Every work process must be documented in a form that includes flowchart symbols and written descriptions. This written form shows how any product or service is handled by different employees. Using a flowchart, stakeholders such as managers and employees can troubleshoot problems and suggest improvements to the way business activities are organized.

Organizational Level

At the organizational level, it's important to consider all major functions of the business. An organizational-level analysis might include listing functions that support each product family in a manufacturing company. Listing the functions helps to define the business's overall capacity to serve its customers. In a smaller company, such as a construction company, there might be only a few functions -- such as a sales function, a project management function and an accounting function. Other functions might be important to the construction company, but might be performed by outside labor, such as subcontractors.

Process Level

Inside the organization, it's important to study the flowcharts of all business activities in one process. A process might consist of all activities that support a major service that a company provides to customers. Experts in different areas of the business process can analyze how the business process works in an interdisciplinary task force. Experts in one activity might suggest improvements for another business activity to make it more efficient, with the end goal of benefiting the customer.

Activity Level

Inside a business process, each business activity consists of a manager and employees who assist in creating very detailed descriptions of work tasks performed. These employees have firsthand knowledge of work tasks and can suggest improvements to their own work. They also understand how tasks performed by others in their activity contribute to the activity's efficiency. When these task experts participate in cross-functional task forces, involving employees from different business processes, they can suggest how changes at the organizational level will impact their activity. A task force might decide that one business activity should occur in a different order in the sequence of work activities in a business process, or chain of production.