Planning a reorganization: org chart, timeline and headcount
Every reorganization has to answer three questions before it is announced: where does each person end up, when does each change happen, and how many people move from which team to which. Each question has its own diagram. Drawing all three, in this order, is the quickest way to find the gaps before the people affected find them for you.
Start with two org charts: today and after
Draw today's structure first, from the HR list: every person, their manager, their department. It is almost never what the leadership slide says, and the differences (a team that quietly reports elsewhere, a manager with fourteen direct reports) are usually part of why the reorg is happening.
Then draw the target structure. Compare the two side by side: who changes manager, which teams merge or split, where spans of control get too wide, which roles are new and still empty. Every difference is a change someone has to make and someone has to be told about.
Put the changes on a timeline
A reorg is a project, and its steps depend on each other. New leaders are appointed before their teams move; consultation, where it is required, finishes before roles are confirmed; systems, payroll and access rights are updated before the first day in the new structure, not after.
A Gantt chart makes those dependencies visible: one task per change, each with a duration and the tasks it waits for, and milestones for the announcement, the end of consultation and the go-live date. Move the announcement by a week and every date after it moves with it.
- Agree the target structure (milestone)
- Appoint the new leaders
- Consult with the affected teams, where required
- Announce the new structure (milestone)
- Update systems, payroll and access
- Teams move (go-live milestone)
- Review after 90 days
Show the headcount moving
The third question is the one leadership asks first and the org charts answer worst: how many people move from where to where? A Sankey diagram answers it in one picture: today's departments on the left, the new ones on the right, and a band between them as wide as the number of people who make that move.
Its arithmetic is also a check. Every person who leaves a department on the left has to arrive somewhere on the right, so if the totals do not balance, someone has been left out of the plan, or counted twice.
Keep the before picture
Once the new structure is live, the old chart is the first thing that disappears, and the first thing people ask for in the 90-day review. Keep it. OrgTree.app draws both charts free in the browser; QueryChart, the platform it is built on, keeps every version of a chart in one account, so the before and the after stay side by side.
Frequently asked questions
What should be in a reorganization plan?
Three things: the target org chart (who reports to whom after the change), a timeline of the changes with their dependencies and milestones, and the headcount moving between the old and new teams. Each answers a different question, so each is its own diagram.
How do you show people moving between teams in a reorg?
With a Sankey diagram: the old departments on the left, the new ones on the right, and a band between them as wide as the number of people who move. If the totals on both sides do not match, someone is missing from the plan.
Try it on your own team
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