This
article looks at some of the departments and organizational structure
of a civil construction company. It talks about the people behind the
scenes and their roles and responsibilities.All around us we see
infrastructure such as buildings, roads, highways, parks etc. It is the
job of a civil construction company, to develop this infrastructure that
we love so dearly and is a part of our every day lives. In this article
we will look more into the organizational setup of a construction
company. We will take a brief overview of the people behind the
scenesand what their roles are.
At
the top of the construction company there mostly is a chairman. His job
is to offer overall guidance to the company in terms of strategy, head
the annual general meetings of the company and look at key decisions for
positioning of the company.
After the chairman comes the
managing director. The managing director plays a more active role in the
daily processes of the company. Top managers of different departments
usually report directly to the managing director and keep him updated on
the performance of their respective departments. The managing director
has a lot of responsibility on his shoulders and is responsible for the
profit, loss and overall growth of the company.
After the
managing director comes the top-level management of the company. In
larger companies there may also be a vice president or president as a
link in between to the managing director. In such cases the top-level
management reports to the president and then the president to the
managing director. The top-level managers usually head individual
departments. Some of these departments are sales, accounts, projects,
purchase, hr etc.
The sales department would usually have a sales
head at the top with sales managers and business development managers
under him, reporting directly to him. The sales teams job is to develop
new business for the verticals of the company and to maintain
relationships with their customers.
In
construction this may involve interaction with top builders for work,
advertising activities, gathering new project information from industry
magazines and journals etc. The sales head ensures that the order book
is maintained with sufficient new business. He also motivates and
disciplines his team to achieve targets and perform better.
The
accounting department as the word suggests maintains the proper accounts
of the construction company engaged in construction engineering. They
maintain books of account, ledgers, payments received and payments made
etc. In construction accounting is a very important aspect. The number
of transactions is large and very dynamic. Thus having a solid accounts
team is essential.
Moreover taxation in construction is complex
and varied. A good accounts team ensures that all taxes are being
accounted for properly and deposited on time. They also maintain
projected cash flow requirements and prepare balance sheets and profit
and loss statements of the company. The accounts department consists on
accountants, chartered accountants, auditors etc.
As you can see
we have barely covered 20% of the organization structure and there are
already so many people involved. The sheer manpower required to complete
infrastructure projects is huge. Large construction companies employ
thousands of people across various departments just to manage their
activities. Not all companies have the same organizational structures.
They differ according to the company’s own management style and distinct
characteristics. We will take a deeper look into the other departments
such as tendering, projects, purchase, human resources etc. of the
construction company’s structure in our next articles.