I don’t know about you, but one of the first things I want when I start a job or work with a client is an organizational chart. Knowing the working relationships between people, how teams are put together and who can sign-off on key decisions is critical to doing my job well. Unfortunately, the number of times I’ve asked for and received a current org chart is exactly…zero.

CogMap, “the Wikipedia of organizational charts,” is trying to help change that by making it easy to create, manage and publish them online. You can see ones for Microsoft, Google and Yahoo!, as well as everything from the US Government to the Amsterdam New York Police Department.

I don’t know how accurate the charts are, but it’s a start. I like the idea of removing the secrecy that seems to surround these documents and enabling anyone in the organization to make changes rather than waiting around for HR to do a yearly update that probably isn’t accurate anyway.

Is your company’s org chart up to date? Do you even have one? And why not make your organization a bit more transparent and put one up there yourself?

(Hat tip to the Fast Company blog)