Organization Chart Solution

Organization Chart Solution

Overview

Microsoft Office Visio is commonly used to develop organization charts for business that range from a small number of employees to very large organizations numbering in the thousands. There are different approaches that can be taken to build an organization chart with Visio, from using the Visio user interface drag and drop tools to create your drawing to using automation wizards that read organization information from a file or database and create the organization charts automatically.

The wizard can be run interactively from the Visio user interface or it can be launched programmatically. Running the wizard programmatically is often referred to as “silent” mode because it can be set to run without any user interaction. All of the information that is normally provided to the wizard interactively when launched from the UI can be provided as parameters when the wizard is launched in “silent” mode.

Creating organization charts in Visio

The drag-and-drop construction techniques of Visio, coupled with Visio’s SmartShape technology make the creation of organization charts very easy.

The following demonstration illustrates the key points of constructing an organization chart drawing.

Try it! The Basics of creating an organization chart in Visio

1. 
   Start a new drawing that is based on the organization chart template. From the menu, choose File > New > Business > Organization Chart (US Units). Alternatively, you could choose Organization Chart (Metric) or your own custom template.
   
2. 
   From Organization Chart Shapes, drag the Executive shape onto the drawing page.
   
3. 
   Add a name and title to the shape.
   
   1. 
      Select the shape, and then type the name of the person holding the position that shape represents.
      
   2. 
      Press ENTER, and then type the person's title.
      
   3. 
      Click anywhere outside the shape.
      
4. 
   From Organization Chart Shapes, drag a Manager shape directly onto the Executive shape to establish a reporting relationship. Add a name and title to the shape. Repeat until you've added all the managers you want.
   
5. 
   From Organization Chart Shapes, drag a Position shape directly onto a Manager shape to establish a reporting relationship. Repeat until you've added all the positions you want.
   

We will next explore various options for organizing and fine-tuning the organization chart.

Organization Chart Menu

Let’s explore some of the options available for managing the organization chart drawing. These can all be found under the menu Organization Chart. Many can also be found by right clicking a shape or from the Organization Chart Toolbar.

Re-layout. The shapes in your organization chart are automatically arranged in the best way possible, while maintaining your layout preferences defined under Organization Chart – Change Spacing.

Note:

The Organization Charts use their own specialized layout algorithms that are separate from the general layout tools available in Visio.

Best Fit to Page. Visio will adjust the spacing and choose the layout to fit the maximum number of shapes to a page.

Arrange Subordinates. Select the shape whose subordinates are to be arranged. There are choices for horizontal, vertical, and side-by-side layouts. Only the immediate subordinate shapes are affected.

Hide Subordinates. The function makes all shapes on the page that are subordinate to the chosen shape invisible. Show Subordinates makes them visible again.

Move Subordinates. Moves a shape (and its subordinates) left or right in a horizontal display and up or down in a vertical display. It does not change the reporting structure.

Note:

If you wish to change who a position reports to, drag the corresponding shape and drop it on the person to whom they are to report. The connections are redrawn automatically.

Change Position Type. Any of the shapes Executive, Manager, Position, Consultant, Vacancy, Assistant, or Staff can be changed to one of the other types. It is not necessary to delete and replace one of these shapes in order to change its type.

Synchronize. There are two items in the Synchronize group: Create Synchronized Copy… and Expand Subordinates.

Create Synchronized Copy… It is often helpful to be able to repeat a portion of an organization chart on different pages within the drawing. Create Synchronized Copy makes this very easy. Create the portion of the organization chart that you wish to duplicate in one portion of the drawing. Choose Create Synchronized Copy… to copy a shape and all of its subordinates to another section of the drawing. If changes need to be made, they can be made in either place and the changes will be “synchronized” to the other location. See the help file for “Create Synchronized Copy” for specific limitations of this function.

Expand Subordinates. Some changes to a Synchronized drawing such as the addition of a new subordinate shape or the deletion of a subordinate shape will not show up automatically in all synchronized views. Use the Expand Subordinates feature to force the update to be made.

Note:

Expanding subordinates applies to one level of subordinates for a shape. If you added more than one level of subordinate positions to a synchronized copy, when you update the other synchronized copy you must expand each level.

Note:

In the upcoming lab, we will explore these features as part of the exercise.

Organization Chart Menu (cont.)

Let’s explore the remaining options available for managing the organization chart drawing. Import Organization Data. Run the Organization Chart Wizard.

Export Organization Data. Organization chart data can be exported to a file. Every shape data field that is part of the organization chart will be exported as part of the data. You can export organization chart data in Microsoft Office Excel workbook (.xls), text tab-delimited (.txt), and CSV comma-delimited (.csv) formats.

Compare Organization Data. Use to compare two versions of an organization chart. The comparison includes custom property data in each drawing.

Change Spacing… Change Spacing allows the user to set the minimum spacing between shapes value for auto layout.

Display Options… A three tabbed dialog box with the following tabs:

1. 
   Options. Control shape dimensions, organization chart display themes, pictures, etc.
   
2. 
   Fields. Control which custom properties are displayed in the shape as text fields.
   
3. 
   Text. Apply fonts and text formatting at the field level.
   

Organization Chart Reporting

After you've added data to organization chart shapes, such as names, titles, and telephone numbers, you can create a report of that data and save it to a file that you can print or distribute to others. Microsoft Office Visio provides a ready-made report that includes the default shape data fields that are stored for each organization chart shape.

If additional shape data fields are added to the shapes in the drawing, the report can be modified to also report on these new properties.

To run organization chart report

1. 
   Choose Review > Shape Reports.
   
2. 
   In the Reports dialog, under Report, click Organization Chart Report.
   
3. 
   Click Run.
   

Note:

If you do not see the Organization Chart Report or another report that you wish to run, clear the Show only drawing-specific reports check box, or click browse and navigate to the location of the report definition.

Lab 2.2: Exploring the organization chart user interface

We’ve provided a description of the function that each of the Organization Chart menu items provides. Now let’s explore some of these features.

Lab: Exploring the Organization Chart solution user interface

1. 
   Open \Demos\Vol2\Organization Chart Solution\ Sample Organization Chart.vsd
   
2. 
   Work with the following features to become familiar with how each operates. Rearrange the organization chart to make it more to your liking.
   
   1. 
      Arrange Subordinates
      
      1. 
         Change the subordinates of some of the shapes to use vertical, horizontal, or side-by-side layout
         
      2. 
         Experiment with putting the layout lines on the left or right
         
   2. 
      Hide/Show Subordinates - hide or show the subordinates for a shape
      
   3. 
      Move Subordinates – move a shape left/right in a horizontal layout or up/down in a vertical layout
      
   4. 
      Best Fit – will re-optimize the layout for the page
      
3. 
   Create Synchronized Copy
   
   1. 
      Find the shape for Ashley Larsen (Use the Edit – Find command)
      
   2. 
      Create a synchronized copy of Ashley’s organization on a new page in the drawing.
      
      1. 
         Right click the shape for Ashley Larsen and select Create Synchronized Copy.
         
      2. 
         Choose New page and OK
         
      3. 
         This creates a copy of Ashley’s organization onto a new page in the drawing. Right click on the original Ashley Larsen shape and select Hide Subordinates.
         
      4. 
         Go to the new page where the copy was made and make changes to Ashley’s organization. Add a shape, delete a shape, change some text, etc.
         
      5. 
         Go back to the original Ashley Larsen shape. Right click and select Show Subordinate. Note that text changes are synchronized, but adding and deleting shapes are not.
         
      6. 
         Go back to the original Ashley Larsen shape. Right click and select Expand Subordinates. Note that added shapes are synchronized, but deleted shapes are not. Note: This command works only one level down. You may have to select your way down the organization chart and select Expand Subordinates depending upon where your changes occurred.
         
4. 
   Export the organization data to an Excel spreadsheet. This data can be used later as we learn about the Organization Chart Wizard.
   

Organization Chart Wizard

The Organization Chart Wizard will create an organization chart from data that is stored outside of Visio. This data can be stored in a text (.txt) file, as an Excel spreadsheet (.xls), or an ODBC compliant data base. The data can also be extracted from Microsoft Exchange Server.

Try it! The Organization Chart Wizard

1. 
   Run the wizard in any of these ways:
   
   1. 
      View > Add-ons > Business > Organization Chart Wizard
      
   2. 
      Org Chart > Import
      
   3. 
      File > New > Business > Organization Chart Wizard
      
2. 
   On the first screen click “Information that’s already stored in a file or database.”
   
3. 
   Choose “A text, Org Plus(*.txt) or Excel file”
   
4. 
   Click Browse to “Locate the file that contains your organization information”
   
5. 
   Open \Demos\Vol2\Organization Chart Solution\ ORGDATA.XLS
   
6. 
   On the next screen choose the data fields that uniquely define the records in the organization data.
   
7. 
   On the next screen select the data to be displayed as text fields in the organization chart.
   
8. 
   On the next screen select the data fields that are to be included in the drawing shapes as custom properties.
   
9. 
   Choose “I want the wizard to automatically break my organization chart across pages.” We’ll explore the other options later.
   

Data file structure

In order to build an organization chart from your personnel data, the Organization Chart Wizard must be able to identify:

1. 
   Each person uniquely. This could be by employee name, but only if there are no duplicate names in the data file.
   
2. 
   Employee’s name. The way the name appears in the data file is how it will appear in the organization chart.
   
3. 
   A reporting hierarchy. Each person must be designated to report to someone else that is in the data file, except the top level employee, who reports to no one.
   

In the following file, the Name field uniquely identifies every employee and the Reports_To field refers to the Name field.


In the following file, the Name field is not unique. There are two employees with the name Robert Williams. To uniquely identify each employee an Employee_ID field has been added and the Reports_To field refers to the Employee_ID field.


Note that in both cases the Reports_To field is blank for the person at the top of the organization structure.

Tips on using the Organization Chart Wizard

If the wizard cannot generate an organization chart because of errors in the data file check for these common mistakes.

Issue

If the wizard stops because of errors in the data file, check for:

• 
  Duplicate employee names or ID numbers
  
• 
  Invalid Reports To information
  
• 
  Failure to leave blank the Reports To field for the person at the top of the organization.
  

Issue

You wish to control the information displayed on the shapes using data imported by the wizard.

The wizard will prompt you for the data that you wish to display. Information displayed as shape text can come from any field(s) in the data.

The wizard displays a screen that says “Choose the columns (fields) from your data file that you want to display.” Select each of the fields that you wish to display as text on the shape.

Note:

If the text will not fit, the shapes may need to be resized. To resize the shapes choose Organization Chart > Options > Options tab. Set the shape width and height. This affects all shapes in the drawing.

Issue

The organization chart is too big for one page.

The wizard allows you to control how much information is displayed on each page. By default, you can let the wizard make all of the decisions and then make any desired changes to the drawing after it has been created.

Alternatively, to control how the organization is broken across pages, choose the option “I want to specify how much of my organization to display on each page.”

The wizard presents a screen that allows each page to be specified. You control who is at the top of the page, how many levels to display (or choose all subordinates), and the name of the page.

Tip:

To reduce clutter on a page that has too much information select a shape with subordinates that you would like to place onto a new page and choose Create Synchronized Copy. Select the same original shape again and choose Hide Subordinates. Adjust the layout of the remaining shapes on the page or let Visio do it for you with Re-layout.

Issue

After the organization chart is created you want to view data associated with each chart shape.

Use the Shape Data window to view the data. You can also create additional text fields on the shapes to display more data.

Running the organization chart solution in “silent” mode

The organization chart wizard can also be run from the command line or it can be started from a program or macro.

From the command line:

• 
  General syntax
  

OrgWiz.exe

• 
  Example
  

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Visio11\DLL\ORGWIZ.EXE"

"/USE-LAST-VALUES"

The following code is an example of a macro that will launch the wizard. It can be executed from VBA. There is a demonstration file called WizardMacro.vsd included in the student materials which contains this code.

Sub WizardMacro()

Dim oAddon As Visio.Addon

'Get a reference to the addon for the Organization Chart Wizard

Set oAddon = Visio.Addons("OrgWiz.exe")

'Run the addon and pass as a string the parameters to control the wizard

oAddon.Run ("/USE-LAST-VALUES")

End Sub

Command arguments for organization charts

Argument	Purpose
/USE-LAST-VALUES	Reads values from the registry chosen by the last person who used the Organization Chart Wizard. If this argument is specified, all subsequent arguments are ignored.
/FILENAME=	Required, unless /DATASOURCE or /MICROSOFT-EXCHANGE is specified. Specifies the data file name you want the wizard to read. If the file name includes spaces, put the name in quotation marks.
/DATASOURCE=, TABLE=, DBQUALIFIER=	Required, unless /FILENAME or /MICROSOFT-EXCHANGE is specified. Specifies the name, table, and qualifier of the ODBC-compliant database you want the wizard to read
/MICROSOFT-EXCHANGE	Required, unless /FILENAME or /DATASOURCE is specified. Specifies that you want the wizard to read the Microsoft Exchange Server data.
/NAME-FIELD=	Optional. Specifies the field in the data file where the wizard can find employee names. If you don't specifiy this field, the wizard will look for common names, such as Name, Employee, Employee Name, or Employees. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will fail.
/MANAGER-FIELD=	Optional. Specifies the field in the data file where the wizard can find Report-To information. If you don't specify this field, the wizard will look for common names, such as Manager, Reports To, or Reports-To. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will fail.
/FIRSTNAME-FIELD=	Optional. Specifies a field in the data file where the wizard can find employees' first names. If you don't specify this field, the wizard will look for common names, such as First Name or First-Name. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will continue building the organization chart.
/UNIQUEID-FIELD	Optional. Specifies the field containing the unique identifier. If this argument is not specified, the wizard will look for a field containing the same data values that are in the MANAGER-FIELD field. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will fail.
/SHAPE-FIELD=	Optional. Specifies a field in the data file where the wizard can find the name of the organization chart master in Microsoft Office Visio that you want it to use. If you don't specify this field the wizard will look for common names, such as Master Shape or Master-Shape. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will continue building the organization chart using shapes it chooses based on the reporting structure. For example, you can put Executive in the Shape field for the person at the top of the organization chart to indicate that the wizard should use the Executive shape for this person when it builds the organization chart.
/HYPERLINK-FIELD=	Optional. Specifies a field in the data file where the wizard can find the text used for a shape's hyperlink. The wizard will search the data file for a column named HYPERLINK or URL. If it doesn't find a likely field, the wizard will continue building the organization chart. The wizard will read the contents of the column and store that text in the shapes as hyperlink addresses. The hyperlink destination is accessible by right-clicking the shape and then clicking a hyperlink.
/PAGES= PAGENAME= , PAGENAME= ...	Optional. Specifies how you want the wizard to break the organization chart into pages. If you specify this argument, you must identify the top employee on each page (required). Optionally, you can include the number of reporting levels to include on a page, and the page name. If you don't specify the number of levels, the wizard includes all levels on a page. Names with spaces must be in quotation marks. Always include a space between and and PAGENAME= . If you don't specify the pages, the wizard defines the pages, and places an appropriate number of shapes on each page.
/DISPLAY-FIELDS=, , ...	Optional. Specifies the fields from the data file that you want to display in each box in the organization chart. If you don't specify fields, the wizard displays the employee name. The order of this list is the order displayed on the shapes.
/CUSTOM-PROPERTY-FIELDS= HIDDEN, HIDDEN, ...	Optional. Specifies the fields from the data file that you want to add to the organization chart shapes as custom property fields. Optionally, insert the HIDDEN modifier after custom properties you want to be invisible to the user. For example, your data file might include fields for department name, telephone number, and office number. By adding these fields as custom property fields on the organization chart shapes, you allow users of the organization chart to access the data in these fields by right-clicking the shapes representing employees. Also, you can use the HIDDEN modifier to store information about the source data in your shapes, without displaying it in the Custom Properties Window. For example, if you want to create an organization chart that shows the hierarchy of tasks from Microsoft Project, you can store the Project Task ID value as a hidden custom property.
/SHOW-DIVIDER-LINE	Optional. Specifies a divider line on organization chart shapes that separates the first line of display text (such as employee name) from the second (such as title).
/SYNC-ACROSS-PAGES	Optional. Specifies that all shapes representing the same employee that appear on different pages of the drawing will be synchronized, so that changes made to one of the shape's text or custom properties will be made to all the shapes.
/HYPERLINK-ACROSS-PAGES	Optional. Specifies that all shapes representing the same employee that appear on different pages of the drawing will contain hyperlinks to each other. The hyperlink destination is accessible by right-clicking the shape and then clicking the hyperlink.
/LAUNCHGUI	Optional. Specifies that the drawing-definition organization chart wizard pages will be displayed to the user, so that the user can interactively modify the command-line arguments. The user will not be able to change the data source specified in /FILENAME, /DATASOURCE, or /MICROSOFT-EXCHANGE.

Lab 2.3: Running the wizard in “silent” mode

Create a VBA macro that launches the organization chart wizard.

Lab: Run the Organization Chart Wizard from a macro

1. 
   Open \Labs\Vol2\Start\WizardMacro.vsd
   
2. 
   Modify the macro that launches the wizard to control the following parameters:
   
   1. 
      Open the sample file \Demos\Vol2\Organization Chart Solution\ORGDATA Sample1.xls
      
   2. 
      Display the Name and Title fields as text on the shape
      
   3. 
      Turn on the divider line between the Name and Title fields
      
   4. 
      Launch the interactive interface of the wizard so that additional options may be selected
      

Summary: Visio Organization Chart Solution

We have now seen that there are several important features in the Visio Organization Chart solution that aid in the efficient construction of organization charts.

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