Organisational Design Consulting
Designing organisations that are structured for performance, clarity, and sustainable growth.
LevelUp helps Australian organisations design structures, operating models, and role frameworks that support strategic objectives, create accountability, and enable sustainable performance. We bring together organisational design methodology, HR expertise, and deep industry knowledge to produce designs that work in practice, not just on the org chart. From restructuring complex multi-site operations through to designing the operating model for a growing professional services business, LevelUp delivers organisational architecture that performs.
About Organisational Design at LevelUp
Organisational design is one of the most powerful, and most underutilised, tools available to business leaders. The structure of an organisation determines how decisions get made, how work flows, where accountability sits, how effectively the business can respond to change, and whether the organisation can scale without losing the qualities that made it successful. A structure that worked at $20 million in revenue may actively impede performance at $80 million.
LevelUp approaches organisational design as a strategic discipline, not an administrative exercise. We begin with the business strategy, understanding where the organisation is going and what capabilities and structures it will need to get there, and work backwards to design the organisation that can execute that strategy effectively. This means examining not just the org chart but the operating model, the decision rights, the governance mechanisms, and the capabilities required at each level.
Our organisational design capability is integrated with LevelUp’s HR, IR, and employment law expertise. This matters because restructuring an organisation has employment law implications, including consultation obligations under the Fair Work Act 2009 and applicable Modern Awards, redundancy requirements, and the need to ensure that changes to employment conditions are managed compliantly. LevelUp advises on both the design and the legal and HR dimensions of implementation simultaneously.
LevelUp has delivered organisational design programs across construction, mining, engineering, manufacturing, and professional services, including civil contractors transitioning from reactive delivery to programme-driven operating models, precast manufacturers redesigning roles and governance to support accountability and growth, and professional services firms redesigning their structure to support national expansion.
How LevelUp can help
- Assessing the current organisational structure and identifying where it is creating friction, limiting performance, or misaligned to strategy
- Designing future-state organisational structures that reflect the strategy, improve accountability, and support the way work actually needs to flow
- Developing operating models that clarify how work gets done, including process flows, decision rights, governance mechanisms, and cross-functional interactions
- Creating capability frameworks that define what ‘great’ looks like at each level and role, the foundation for recruitment, performance management, and development
- Writing position descriptions and role design documentation that are accurate, legally compliant, and useful for recruitment, performance management, and IR compliance
- Advising on spans of control and layers of management to reduce overhead, improve decision speed, and create the right management ratios for the operating context
- Designing workforce structures for project-based organisations, including the mix of permanent, contract, and casual roles, that balance operational flexibility with workforce stability
- Supporting restructures and workforce transitions, including managing consultation obligations, redundancy processes, and the IR and employment law dimensions of implementation
Topics covered
- Organisation Structures
- Operating Models
- Capability Frameworks
- Position Descriptions
- Workforce Design
- Span of Control
- Role Design
Organisational Design topic areas
LevelUp covers every major topic within organisational design.
Organisation Structures
Designing clear, logical organisational structures that reflect accountability, decision-making authority, and the flow of work. LevelUp’s structural design work considers multiple design options, functional, divisional, matrix, and hybrid models, and assesses each against the organisation’s strategy, culture, and operating context. We document structural decisions with the clarity needed to communicate them to employees, support position description development, and manage the Fair Work Act consultation process.
Operating Models
Defining how the organisation creates and delivers value, the processes, governance mechanisms, accountabilities, and cross-functional interactions that make the structure work in practice. An operating model is the bridge between strategy and execution. LevelUp develops operating models that are sufficiently detailed to guide day-to-day decision-making and role clarity, while remaining adaptable as the organisation grows and evolves.
Capability Frameworks
Developing frameworks that define the knowledge, skills, and behaviours required at each level and role in the organisation. LevelUp’s capability frameworks are designed to be practically useful, supporting recruitment (defining what to assess), performance management (defining what great looks like), and development planning (identifying what needs to grow). We design frameworks at the appropriate level of granularity for the organisation’s size and management maturity.
Position Descriptions
Writing clear, accurate, and legally compliant position descriptions that support recruitment, performance management, and IR compliance. LevelUp’s position descriptions are written to a consistent standard across the organisation, covering purpose, key accountabilities, decision rights, qualifications, and capability requirements. We also review existing position description libraries for accuracy, consistency, and alignment to the current organisational structure and Modern Award classification requirements.
Workforce Design
Designing workforce structures, including the mix of permanent, contract, casual, and labour hire arrangements, that meet business needs while managing the employment law obligations associated with each category. Following the Closing Loopholes amendments to the Fair Work Act, the classification of casual employees and the use of labour hire at award rates has become significantly more regulated. LevelUp designs workforce models that achieve operational flexibility within the current legal framework.
Span of Control
Analysing and optimising the ratio of managers to direct reports to improve management effectiveness and reduce overhead. The appropriate span of control depends on the nature of the work, the capability of the team, the degree of process standardisation, and the operational context, there is no universal answer. LevelUp analyses your current management ratios, identifies where spans are creating either management bottlenecks or insufficient supervision, and designs structural adjustments that improve both effectiveness and cost efficiency.
Role Design
Designing roles with clear accountabilities, decision rights, and performance expectations that enable individuals to understand what success looks like in their position. LevelUp’s role design work addresses the common failures of poorly designed roles, including unclear boundaries with adjacent roles, insufficient decision authority to meet accountability expectations, and role scope that doesn’t match the capability available in the market. Well-designed roles are the foundation of an effective organisation.
Frequently Asked Questions
Common questions about organisational design consulting in Australia.
What is organisational design?
Organisational design is the process of aligning an organisation’s structure, roles, processes, and governance with its strategic objectives. It involves decisions about how the organisation is divided into units, how those units are coordinated, where decision-making authority sits, what roles and capabilities are required, and how work flows across the organisation. Good organisational design reduces complexity, improves accountability, enables better decision-making, and creates the structural conditions for sustainable performance.
When should an organisation undertake an organisational design review?
Common triggers for an organisational design review include rapid growth or contraction; a change in strategy or business model; a merger, acquisition, or divestiture; persistent performance problems that process or talent changes alone have not resolved; excessive management overhead or too many layers; persistent accountability gaps; or a planned technology transformation that will fundamentally change how work is done. LevelUp also recommends a design review every three to five years as a matter of best practice, as structures tend to accumulate complexity over time without deliberate redesign.
What is the difference between an organisation structure and an operating model?
The organisation structure shows who reports to whom, the formal hierarchy and grouping of roles. The operating model describes how the organisation actually functions, how work flows between functions, how decisions are made, how cross-functional interactions are governed, and what processes and systems enable the structure to work. Both matter: a well-designed structure with a poorly functioning operating model will still deliver poor results, because the structure doesn’t tell people how to work together, only who they work for.
What employment law obligations arise when restructuring an organisation?
Organisational restructures trigger several employment law obligations under the Fair Work Act 2009 and applicable Modern Awards. These include consultation obligations, employers must consult with employees and their representatives before implementing major workplace changes, and, where roles are made redundant, the genuine redundancy requirements including consultation and redeployment assessment. Restructures may also trigger enterprise agreement obligations around significant change. LevelUp manages both the organisational design work and the employment law dimensions of implementation simultaneously, reducing the risk of a compliant design being invalidated by a flawed process.
How does LevelUp approach a restructure that will result in redundancies?
LevelUp’s approach to restructures involving redundancies integrates the organisational design work with the Fair Work Act compliance process from the outset. This means designing the new structure first so that the consultation process is genuine, employees are consulted on a real proposal, not a completed decision, and identifying all affected employees and assessing redeployment options before termination decisions are made. LevelUp prepares all required consultation documentation, manages the consultation process, advises on entitlements, and drafts all termination correspondence. This integrated approach significantly reduces legal risk while respecting the people involved.
What is a capability framework and how does it connect to performance management?
A capability framework defines the knowledge, skills, and behaviours required at each level and role within the organisation. It connects to performance management by providing the standard against which individual performance is assessed, replacing vague ‘meets expectations’ ratings with specific, observable capability descriptors that managers and employees can discuss with clarity. Capability frameworks also support recruitment (defining what to assess), development planning (identifying capability gaps to address), and succession planning (identifying who has the capability to progress). LevelUp designs capability frameworks that are genuinely useful tools rather than elaborate documents that sit unused.
Related Practice Areas
LevelUp’s expertise in organisational design connects closely with these disciplines.
Human Resources
Strategic HR advisory and hands-on execution. Built with you, not handed to you.
Business Analysis
Translating business needs into clear requirements, business cases, and solution designs.
Business Process Improvement
Eliminating waste, reducing cost, and building processes that scale.
Change Management
Driving successful adoption of change across people, process, and technology.
Need organisational design support?
LevelUp provides expert organisational design consulting across Australia. Let’s talk about your specific situation.