Organisational Structure And Culture Commerce Essay

Types of organisation and associated structures: functional, product-based, geographically based, multifunctional and multidivisional structures, matrix, centralisation and decentralisation.

Organisational networks and linkages: internal and external network structures, flexible working.

Organisational culture: classification of organisational culture – power culture, role culture, task culture, person culture, cultural norms and symbols, values and beliefs, development of organisational culture.

Authority and power: organisational charts, spans of control.

The human resource function: a stakeholder perspective, personnel management roles, personnel policies, strategies and operating plans, strategic goals for personnel.

Diagnosing behavioural problems: concepts, principles, perspectives, methodology.

Perception: definition, perceptual selection, perception and work behaviour, attitude, ability and aptitude, intelligence.

Significance and nature of individual differences: self and self-image, personality and work behaviour, conflict.

Individual behaviour at work: personality, traits and types, its relevance in understanding self and others.

Relationship between organizational structure and culture: Organizational culture is more of a larger picture, a more general term that refers to a large umbrella of smaller topics and issues within an organization. The structure of Mr Smith’s restaurant refers to the infrastructure, and the various methods and practices within that infrastructure, that helps his restaurant’s culture run with the efficiency and consistency that should be the hallmark of any healthy organizational structure, whether it is in a corporation, sports team, or any other set up that is large enough to create its own organizational culture.

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This makes the structure an integral part of any organizational culture, but also narrows out a very specific segment of the culture as its own responsibility. Organizational structure will deal primarily with the set up of the culture. How management works, which specific responsibilities supervisors have, how a complaint is passed through the ranks-these are all issues within the organizational culture that are directly tied to how an organizational structure works. The structure is not limited to those three examples, but it would certainly include all of them.

The factors that influence individual behaviour: At According to John Ivancevich and Michael Mattson, the major factors that influence individual differences in behavioural patterns are demographic factors, abilities and skills, perception, attitudes and personality. Let us discuss them and they are as follows:-

1. Demographic Factors: The demographic factors are socio economic background, education, nationality, race, age, sex, etc. Organisations prefer persons that belong to good socio-economic background, well educated, young etc as they are believed to be performing better than the others.

2. Abilities and Skills: The physical capacity of an individual to do something can be termed as ability. Skill can be defined as the ability to act in a way that allows a person to perform well. The individual behaviour and performance is highly influenced by ability and skills.

3. Perception: There are many factors that influence the perception of an individual. The study of perception plays important role for the managers. It is important for mangers to create the favourable work environment so that employees perceive them in most favourable way. The employees are likely to perform better if they are going to perceive it in a positive way.

4. Attitude: The managers in an organisation need to study the variables related to job as to create the work environment in a favourable way that employees are tempted to form a positive attitude towards their respective jobs. The employees can perform better in the organisation if they form a positive attitude.

5. Personality:. Personality can be regarded as the most complex aspect of human beings that influences their behaviour in big way. It can be concluded that the study of personality traits offers an opportunity to understand the individuals. It helps them properly in directing their effort and motivating them for the accomplishment of the organisational goal. It refers to the fact that different environmental factors may generate different responses. The study of these responses is very important for the organisation. Every organisation demands a particular type of behaviour from their employees and such behaviours can be discovered through observation, learning, exposure, training, etc.

Organizational theory and practices: Organizational Behaviour studies encompass the study of organizations from multiple viewpoints, methods, and levels of analysis. For instance, one textbook divides these multiple viewpoints into three perspectives: modern, symbolic, and postmodern. Another traditional distinction, present especially in American academia, is between the study of “micro” organizational behavior-which refers to individual and group dynamics in an organizational setting-and “macro” organizational theory which studies whole organizations, how they adapt, and the strategies and structures that guide them. To this distinction, some scholars have added an interest in “meso” — primarily interested in power, culture, and the networks of individuals and units in organizations-and “field” level analysis which study how whole populations of organizations interact. In Europe these distinctions do exist as well, but are more rarely reflected in departmental divisions.

Whenever people interact in organizations, many factors come into play. Modern organizational studies attempt to understand and model these factors. Like all modernist social sciences, organizational studies seek to control, predict, and explain. There is some controversy over the ethics of controlling workers’ behavior. As such, organizational behavior or OB (and its cousin, Industrial psychology) have at times been accused of being the scientific tool of the powerful. Those accusations notwithstanding, OB can play a major role in organizational development and success.

One of the main goals of organizational theorists is, according to Simms (1994) “to revitalize organizational theory and develop a better conceptualization of organizational life.” An organizational theorist should carefully consider levels assumptions being made in theory, and is concerned to help managers and administrators.

Important spect of the Organizational Behavioral is- Planning – Staffing – Organizing – Controlling.

Different approaches to management and theories of organisation: Classic – Weber’s model of strict defined jobs – no peaking at the other guy. Formal hierarchy. Formailty, formality, formality. Rules, rules, rules.

Bureaucratic – Social stability through slow change example: Military and see movie Brazil

Humanist – People first – A. Maslow and his people needs

Different leadership styles and effectiveness:

•Autocratic:

-Leader makes decisions without reference to anyone else

-High degree of dependency on the leader

-Can create de-motivation and alienation of staff

-May be valuable in some types of business where decisions need to be made quickly and decisively

•Democratic:

•Encourages decision making from different perspectives

– Leadership may be emphasized throughout the organization

-Consultative: process of consultation before decisions are taken

-Persuasive: Leader takes decision and seeks to persuade others that the decision is correct

-May help motivation and involvement

-Workers feel ownership of the firm and its ideas

-Improves the sharing of ideas and experiences within the business

-Can delay decision making

•Laissez-Faire:

-‘Let it be’

– The leadership responsibilities are shared by all

-Can be very useful in businesses where creative ideas are important

-Can be highly motivational, as people have control over their working life

-Can make coordination and decision making time-consuming and lacking in overall direction

-Relies on good team work

•Paternalistic:

•Leader acts as a ‘father figure’

•Paternalistic leader makes decision but may consult

•Believes in the need to support staff

Different motivational theories: There are a number of different views as to what motivates workers. The most commonly held views or theories are discussed below and have been developed over the last 100 years or so. Unfortunately these theories do not all reach the same conclusions!

Taylor

Frederick Winslow Taylor (1856 – 1917) put forward the idea that workers are motivated mainly by pay. His Theory of Scientific Management argued the following:

Workers do not naturally enjoy work and so need close supervision and control

Therefore managers should break down production into a series of small tasks

Workers should then be given appropriate training and tools so they can work as efficiently as possible on one set task.

Workers are then paid according to the number of items they produce in a set period of time- piece-rate pay.

As a result workers are encouraged to work hard and maximise their productivity.

Mayo

Elton Mayo (1880 – 1949) believed that workers are not just concerned with money but could be better motivated by having their social needs met whilst at work (something that Taylor ignored). He introduced the Human Relation School of thought, which focused on managers taking more of an interest in the workers, treating them as people who have worthwhile opinions and realising that workers enjoy interacting together.

this Mayo concluded that workers are best motivated by:

Better communication between managers and workers ( Hawthorne workers were consulted over the experiments and also had the opportunity to give feedback)

Greater manager involvement in employees working lives ( Hawthorne workers responded to the increased level of attention they were receiving)

Working in groups or teams. (Hawthorne workers did not previously regularly work in teams)

In practice therefore businesses should re-organise production to encourage greater use of team working and introduce personnel departments to encourage greater manager involvement in looking after employees’ interests. His theory most closely fits in with a paternalistic style of management.

Maslow

Abraham Maslow (1908 – 1970) along with Frederick Herzberg (1923-) introduced the Neo-Human Relations School in the 1950’s, which focused on the psychological needs of employees. Maslow put forward a theory that there are five levels of human needs which employees need to have fulfilled at work.

A business should therefore offer different incentives to workers in order to help them fulfill each need in turn and progress up the hierarchy (see below). Managers should also recognise that workers are not all motivated in the same way and do not all move up the hierarchy at the same pace. They may therefore have to offer a slightly different set of incentives from worker to worker.

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Herzberg

Frederick Herzberg (1923-) had close links with Maslow and believed in a two-factor theory of motivation. He argued that there were certain factors that a business could introduce that would directly motivate employees to work harder (Motivators). However there were also factors that would de-motivate an employee if not present but would not in themselves actually motivate employees to work harder (Hygienefactors)

Herzberg believed that businesses should motivate employees by adopting a democratic approach to management and by improving the nature and content of the actual job through certain methods. Some of the methods managers could use to achieve this are:

Job enlargement – workers being given a greater variety of tasks to perform (not necessarily more challenging) which should make the work more interesting.

Job enrichment – involves workers being given a wider range of more complex, interesting and challenging tasks surrounding a complete unit of work. This should give a greater sense of achievement.

Empowerment means delegating more power to employees to make their own decisions over areas of their working life.

Relationship Motivational theories:

Motivation theories: Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, Herzberg’s Motivation – Hygiene theory, Vroom and Expectancy theories, Maccoby, McCrae and Costa – personality dimensions.

Motivation and performance: rewards and incentives, motivation and managers, rewards monetary and non-monetary.

Leadership: leadership in organisations, managers and leaders, leadership traits, management style, contingency approach, leadership and organisational culture

Leadership and successful change in organisations: pluralistic, transformational, communications, conflict

The Nature of groups: A collection of individuals, the members accept a common task, become interdependent in their performance, and interact with one another to promote its accomplishment (Harold H. Kelley and J.W. Thibaut).

Normative views describes how a group is to be organized and how its activities are to be carried out

Group dynamics consists of a set of techniques.

Regarding internal nature of groups

Various Types of Groups

Formal groups

Informal Groups

Friendship groups

Interest groups

Small groups

Large groups

Primary groups

Secondary groups

Coalitions

Membership groups

Reference groups

Command groups

Task groups

Group behavior in sociology refers to the situations where people interact in large or small groups. Special forms of large group behavior are:

crowd “hysteria”

spectators – when a group of people gathered together on purpose to participate in an event like theatre play, cinema movie, football match, a concert, etc.

Public – exception to the rule that the group must occupy the same physical place. People watching same channel on television may react in the same way, as they are occupying the same type of place – in front of television – although they may physically be doing this all over the world.

Group behavior differs from mass actions which refers to people behaving similarly on a more global scale (for example, shoppers in different shops), while group behavior refers usually to people in one place. If the group behavior is coordinated, then it is called group action.

Effective team work: Teamwork is an art. Integrating conflict, change with team decisions, Max DePree said, “The key elements in the art of working together are how to deal with change, how to deal with conflict, and how to reach our potential…the needs of the team are best met when we meet the needs of individuals persons. The key elements in the art of working together are how to deal with change, how to deal with conflict, and how to reach our potential…the needs of the team are best met when we meet the needs of individuals persons.”

Teamwork is to work with every one keeping views and thoughts as if they were told by you. It is not just a case of blue colour or white colour job, but it is case of respecting someone else thought process.

The effective team work a pathway to success we can distinguish as below:

Provided autonomy and responsibilities in your team.

Everyone self-disciplined and self-regulated in team.

A leader do you monitor direction to achieve goal.

Set unambiguous, organization related, understandable and clear-cut targets.

Everyone in your team accept and commit these targets.

Team take responsibility of output process, quality assurance, customer relations and complaints in improvable manner.

Team without psychological distance based job specification and roles.

Reward system based on performance rather fixed percentages or role wise boundaries.

Management style supportive rather bureaucratic or administrative.

Have an open approach and open communication process among you.

Whole team self-committed.

Provide full flexibility at work, multi-skilling and interchangeability between job roles.

Find team taking great interest of involvement in every project assigned.

Team members have respect and enthusiasm towards one another.

Always successful in solving grievances and disputes.

Taken enough steps to develop skills, knowledge, and expertise and high performance output in team.

Each member able to communicate with every other member of group.

Impact of technology on team functioning

Technology

The use of new technologies can improve and in some cases hinder team functioning.

As technology changes teams must update and maintain their knowledge in order to function effectively.

Technologies which have improved team functions

e-mail

mobile phones

blackberry

groupware

computers