Just like a basketball coach can’t visualize their team’s plays without drawing them on a whiteboard of the court, the business engine running a professional basketball team can’t operate without an accurate org chart.
No one knows that better than Patricio Olivas, Director of People Technology & Total Rewards for the Portland Trail Blazers.
“A tool like OrgChart is required for us to ensure that people are up to date with the right information,” he said. “As a data-driven organization, I can’t tell you how important it is to have an accurate chart. If a job title change is not on there, it is not official. Although it is heavily used by people as a point of reference, it also allows senior leaders to take a more intentional approach from a planning standpoint.”
When Olivas first joined the NBA team based out of Portland, Oregon, his HR team was spending hours each month manually drawing org charts in Visio. Updating the Visio chart took so much time that the org chart would occasionally not be updated for months. Having used OrgChart at a previous organization, he knew there was a better solution that could save everyone time
“I wanted the ability to connect my org chart to my HR system so changes flow directly from there. Also, we wanted to make it have our logos, fonts, colors, and position executive assistants a certain way on the chart,” he said.
At the end of the day, having OrgChart allows us to have time to design more robust and engaging programs for our employees and our managers. We are no longer spending hours and hours designing Visio charts, we’re actually creating a much stronger workforce planning program.
The Portland Trail Blazers are actually made up of two organizations, the Trail Blazers basketball team, and Rip City Management, the Trail Blazers’ venue operator for Moda Center. These organizations both have employees who need to be shown on the same org chart so leadership can have a comprehensive overview of its entire workforce. The Trail Blazers leaders need this information to make strategic future plans, as the sports and entertainment industry is constantly evolving.
“My most senior leaders have an org chart with everyone’s pay and everyone’s details,” Olivas said.
Trail Blazers leaders also like the ability to look at historical org charts within the OrgChart software.
“When it comes to org planning, it’s helpful for my leaders to know that there is a snapshot of the organization being archived on a regular basis,” Olivas said. “They use this as a point of reference when it comes to replacing a leadership position. My team will go back and look at what the structure looked like when the leader was there.”
Although Olivas isn’t sketching plays for the team’s star players like Deni Avdija and Shaedon Sharpe, he is helping the team’s leaders plan for the financial backbone to support the continued growth of the organization. And he’s thankful that OrgChart is there to partner with him.
“I’m very appreciative of its ability to connect directly with UKG and have updated photos,” he said. “OrgChart has been incredibly helpful for my team.”
