Human Resource Management: Organisational Structure classroom activity

This Human Resource Management: Organisational Structure classroom activity is designed to support teaching of the IB Business Management syllabus and helps students understand how businesses organise their workforce to achieve efficiency, accountability, and clear lines of communication.

The resource includes a range of engaging and scaffolded activities that guide learners through identifying, interpreting, and applying different types of organisational structures, with a clear focus on how structure affects decision-making, communication, motivation, and business performance. A fully adapted SEND version is included, featuring simplified language, visual prompts, sentence starters, and structured tasks to ensure inclusive access for all learners.

Students explore key organisational structures such as hierarchical, flat, and matrix structures, as well as important concepts including span of control, chain of command, delegation, levels of hierarchy, and centralisation vs decentralisation. Interactive activities such as a picture-based quiz and “Who am I?” identification task support knowledge retention and vocabulary development, while a higher-level evaluative task challenges high-achieving students to analyse the suitability of different structures for specific business contexts.

The resource also includes application-based and evaluative tasks, encouraging learners to justify organisational choices and assess the advantages and disadvantages of different structures, supporting both exam preparation and deeper conceptual understanding.

All images used in this resource are royalty-free icons, illustrations, or diagrams sourced from open educational or free-use image libraries (e.g. Freepik, Flaticon, Pixabay, Vecteezy, The Noun Project) and are used for educational purposes only. No copyrighted photographs or proprietary images are included.