Let V be an arbitrary linear space and f : V×. . .×V → V an n-linear map. It is proved that, for each choice of a basis B of V, the nlinear map f induces a (nontrivial) decomposition V = ⊕V j as a direct sum of linear subspaces of V, with respect to B. It is shown that this decomposition is f -orthogonal in the sense that f (V, . . . , V j , . . . , V k , . . . , V) = 0 when j = k, and in such a way that any V j is strongly f -invariant, meaning that f (V, . . . , V j , . . . , V) ⊂ V j . A sufficient condition for two different decompositions of V induced by an n-linear map f , with respect to two different bases of V, being isomorphic is deduced. The f -simplicity -an analogue of the usual simplicity in the framework of n-liner maps -of any linear subspace V j of a certain decomposition induced by f is characterized. Finally, an application to the structure theory of arbitrary n-ary algebras is provided. This work is a close generalization the results obtained by A. J. Calderón (2018) [6].