Hello,
I would like to work in a matrix type organization. Matrix organization is a mixture of functional and projectized organization structure which helps employees to perform well, allows enhanced growth and career development. Matrix organization has some advantages such as resources can be used efficiently, products and projects are equally balance, employees are in contact with many people which helps with sharing of information and can speed the decision process. Employees also have an opportunity to involve in different projects that gain knowledge and skills that can facilitate in future projects.
From my experience, i feel that I work within a matrix organization, my team operates by function and product, which overall exposes me to different teams and projects. I've had the pleasure to closely work with Quality, R&D and manufacturing during my team at Ethicon. In addition, I feel that a matrix organization is best suited for me due to the wide exposure to different functional teams.
Chris
I think I might enjoy working in a classical functional organization. I like working in research/engineering and would prefer not to be bothered with the marketing, manufacturing, or accounting aspects of the project; in a functional organization each department works separate of the other. I would not want my unfamiliarity of marketing to slow down the progress of the project. Also, if I were to specialize in conducting experimental designs, then, over time, I would become an expert whereby subsequent projects would benefit from my expertise. I understand that the disadvantage of a functional organization is lack of teamwork among departments, however maybe with a strong Project Manager this lack could be alleviated.
The organization I work for is primarily organized in a functional setup. The company is primarily separated into 4 functional teams: quality, process, operations, manufacturing. Employees of each functional area work together quite a bit to accomplish specific tasks. This corporate organization is surprisingly rigid for such a small company.
I personally believe that the company would benefit tremendously from adopting a more matrix style organization. One of the major short comings of this particular company is difficulty in anticipating issues or problems along the product life cycle. When a problem does arise, it is often not apparent to members in quality until reported by someone in process or manufacturing after it has occurred. This is why a matrix organization where there are cross-functional teams would benefit to minimize hiccups before they become major issues.
I personally enjoy working in a functional structure because it helps me gain skills in my particular area of work. But for the overall efficiency of the company that I am working for, I believe more cross communication would be of tremendous benefit.
I work for Cordis, part of Cardinal Health and the organization is highly matrixed. I report to my supervisor within supplier quality and also serve on project teams for various internal projects. I have life cycle management responsibilities related exisiting suppliers that include minor project changes, to supplier CAPA management, risk investigations and supplier auditing. These are under my functional supervisor. Additionally I serve on Project teams as supplier quality for new products as well as larger organization wide changes that may impact supplier quality. This second group is generally managed by a project manager. This has benefits and disadvantages. In my functional group I spend a lot of time "putting out fires" or solving problems that were not forseen. These fires can negatively impact my ability to participate on the project team. Generally in our organization, any quality issue related to product in the field takes precedent. This can end up impacting the project timeline.
I work for Sloan Kettering, and the organization is matrixed. I work in the office of technology development in the licensing group, which would seem that it would be a functional organization. However, my role includes licensing a portfolio of medical devices and tangible research materials to my supervisor in the licensing group. I also manage the Technology Development Fund, which is an internal fund that awards $1-3M to MSK proprietary technologies, and I report to the head of the office and department for that role. I also oversee the Parker Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy PICI relationship where I report to the head of the office of technology development and the parker institute. Overall there is a good mix of working with a functional group and overseeing other programs/projects within the institution and a collaborative programs, such as the Parker relationship.
I currently work at Ethicon as a R&D Engineer co-op. There are three industries that J&J spans which are consumer products, pharmaceutical products, and medical devices. Within these industries, there are many subsidiary companies. Ethicon falls under the medical device industry Each subsidiary company is broken down further into departments such as quality, marketing, sales, package development, supply chain, R&D, and manufacturing. Each department has different roles too that further break down the functionality of the company as a whole. The R&D team I work with has a director (my manager), principle engineers, staff engineers, and co-ops. They are currently expanding the team to hire people for Engineer I positions. Each position has their own roles and responsibilities as well but work as a team to get the job done. We collaborate with other departments too in order for our products to manufactured and marketed. I like this set-up because it allows each department to really focus on one aspect of the medical device development and ensure that it's top quality to be added to the whole picture.
During my internship in the Saad Research and Development center, I worked in a Matrix based industry. There were two organizations locally and two internationally that were funding the research that were going on in the center.
From this experience I assessed that I would personally like to work in a Project based industry for a year or two to enhance my technical and interpersonal skills and then move on to work in a Matrix based industry. This I believe is ideal for me, as a number of organizations are involved with your company, it requires you to be in constant contact with them and plan visits to present how far along your work has progressed. This in turn gives you an opportunity to interact with a number of people from each company involved and build your network.
The sort of organization feel that I would be most suited for is a project-based industry. Since projects are time-restricted by definition, hierarchical structures in view of activities persistently change as the undertakings change. This steady motion brings about expanded adaptability in allocating work to the representatives most appropriate to the undertakings. Projects are focused on solutions and usage, for example, regardless of whether the task does what it should, whether it is inside spending plan and whether you will finish it on the plan. Assignments that have clear objectives are appropriate for the organization as projects. You can accomplish work all the more rapidly and effectively by designating a project manager and gathering a group of individuals who are most suited to the activity.
I worked for Stryker last summer as an R&D intern on the Foot & Ankle team, and it is a matrix organization. My team consisted of two engineers leading the design of the project, and we worked closely with many other departments, such as quality, testing, advanced operations, additive engineering, marketing, etc. Our project had at least one person as a resource from these respective teams based off the skill set required. Some of these employees were also working on multiple projects given by their own functional manager, and some of them were only working on our project.
Throughout my undergraduate education, I worked as an intern at Spex Organic Manufacturing and JFK Prosthetics and Orthotic Lab. During these internships I have been exposed to the manufacturing process as well as R&D. After exposure to these two companies I found that my best place in industry would be research and development. I enjoy being apart of innovative projects that would ultimately better the biomedical industry and exercising problem solving.
From my experience, I worked for a project-base company before, project-base company is easy to work with, but sometimes sometimes closing a project can mean losing your job or wait for next project which loosing time and money. In project-based organization the whole team is focused on the team’s goals.
I prefer to work for a Matrix-organization, you can work on lots of different things, getting more experience. You have to work with two bosses. In a matrix-organization give faster decentralized decisions.
Currently, I work for a medical device company within the north jersey area. From my experience so far with the company, I would argue that is a functional organization. With such a large company it is difficult not to separate out departments as opposed to have specified groups with multiple experts from different departments. There are projects that I work on that require buy from multiple departments which I enjoy very much. Certain projects call for regulatory, R&D, quality, manufacturing etc. to all work together to achieve a common goal. Although on the face of it all, the company is mainly a functional organization, many of the projects that I see myself working on have a lot more collaboration with specialized groups of experts and less and less silos.
Currently, I work for New York Presbyterian in New York area. It is a really good place to work for. The organization i experience a Matrix organization.I have my Bio-med team or my Department that i do my daily work. If i work for a project i have a Project Manger other than my regular functional manager that i have give my report. The advantage i have is that, I am able to know all other department when i work on a project. In my previous company i work with had a functional organization structure. There was a silo in sharing the information and culture within the organization. I had the difficulty in knowing how other team work. Only difficult in Matrix Organization is that, I have two people that i need to give my reports too.
Currently, I work for Scimedx, a small diagnostic medical device company. Since the company is small (only about 30 people) its a little harder to describe how we operate but I think it is closely related to a matrix organization. If there is a large product, the people in the microbiology department (my department) will help out whatever other department needs help, and vice versa. So they will pull personnel from departments in order to help others, and it's not always the same people working together, it is whoever is suited best for the project, so in this respect, it is similar to a matrix organization. However, because of the size of the company, there aren't project managers and functional leaders to report too. This means that if there isn't a larger process, we just report to our boss so it will be more of a functional situation.
