The matrix organisational structure is aimed at improving the way people work together and breaking down traditional barriers to cooperation within a company. There are two significant advantages to a matrix organisational structure. The first is that it prioritises work assignments according to the skills and weaknesses of the company’s employees, allowing for specialisation. The second is that it allows easy transmission of information between employees at all levels and across task boundaries. The matrix structure combines the best of both the functional and divisional (also called "product” structure) management structures because it groups employees by both function and product, rather than either separately. By recognising the real life complexity of a business environment, the matrix structure therefore gives a company maximum flexibility in its business model. It is ideally suited for companies that are "project-driven”, where individual employees may be assigned more than one project, depending on their skills, and in which a different manager oversees each project. This results in a simple lattice structure of management that groups employees by both function and product. The advantage of this system is that it targets each project to those individuals best suited to complete it successfully, therefore exploiting the full potential of each employee. The decentralisation of management produces a dynamic and flexible business model that can be adapted to reflect the need of global or regional customers. Opponents of matrix management believe it is an outdated business model that can create conflicts of loyalties and make it more difficult to monitor each individual team.
