Aquarius Advertising Agency Organization Chart

These sociometric data were gathered by a consultant who conducted a study of the

patterns of formal and informal communication. Each intersecting cell of Aquarius personnel

and the clients contains an index of the direct contacts between them.

Although and account executive was designated to be the liaison between the clients and

specialists within the agency, communications frequently occurred directly bewteen clients and

specialists and bypassed the account executive. These direct contacts involved a wide range of

interactions, such as meetings, telephone calls, e-mail messages, and so on. A large number of

direct communications occurred between agency specialists and their counterparts in the client

organization. For example, and art specialist working as one member of a team on a particular

client account would often be contacted directly by the clients's in-house art specialist, and

agency research personnel had direct communication with research people of the client firm.

Also, some of the unstructured contacts often led to more formal meetings with clients in

which agency personnel made presentations, interpreted and defended agency policy, and

committed the agency to certain courses of action.

Both hierarchical and professional systems operated within the departments of the operations

and marketing divisions. Each department was organized hierarchically with a director, an assistant

director, and several levels of authority. Professional communications were widespread and mainly

concerned with sharing knowledge and techniques, technical evaluation of work, and development

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