Burke (2017): A Brief History of Organization Change Flashcards
Scientific management (Taylor, 1980)
Based on four principles:
1) Data gathering, traditional and time-and-motion-study methods. These were then applied to the workplace by management to realize greater efficiencies
2) Worker selection and development, matching the worker on human skills and abilities. Strong advocate of training and helping.
3) Integration of the science and the trained worker, to optimize scientific management he trained works, paid well, and listened. However, if refused they were replaced.
4) Redivision of the work, management must assume new modes of work. Two parts: actual labour and the management. Taylor stressed importance of cooperation.
Hawthorne studies
The goal of the studies was to determine the effect of working conditions on productivity and morale.
- Illumination experiment, productivity increased when lighting increased. Worker attitude was thought to be a significant factor
- Relay assembly, shown the importance of worker attitude rather than physical conditions.
- Interviewing program, showed employee attitude’s and that supervisors did not handle the complaints well.
- Bank-wiring, showed importance of group norms and standards in organizations
These studies are important as they show the importance of influence of psychological or human factors on worker productivity and morale, signaled criticality of certain variables for worker satisfaction, more humanistic treatment of workers, stimulus for group dynamics.
Industrial psychology
Focus on critical points about organizational change: the difference between focusing on the individual and focusing on the contextual variables (such as group norms and organizational culture) and systemic factors (such as structure).
Survey feedback:
Organizational survey feedback method (1947). Mann (1957) noted that when a manager was given the survey results, any resulting improvement depended on what the manager did with the information.
Used properly, survey feedback can be powerful, because it is based on data, involves organization members directly, provides information about what to change and according to which priority, and focuses change on the larger system, not on individuals per se.
Sensitivity Training:
small-group discussions in which the primary, almost exclusive source of information for learning is the behavior of the group members themselves. Participants receive feedback from one another on their behavior in the group, and this feedback becomes the learning source for personal insight and development. One of the earliest interventions (1950)
Sociotechnical Systems (Trist, 1993):
Some of the primary principles of sociotechnical systems are:
- Work organizations consists of two interdependent systems: the technical system (equipment, machinery, chemical processes, etc.) and the social system (individual workers and groups of workers).
- The work system is the basic unit, comprising a set of activities that make up a functioning whole, rather than single jobs and tasks.
- The work group, rather than the individual jobholders, is central.
- Regulation of the system is performed by the group itself, instead of by supervisors (completely counter to Taylor’s scientific management notions).
- An individual worker is complementary to the machine, rather than an extension of it
Both social and technical systems are interdependent: A change in one system will directly affect the other, and this effect must be treated as another leverage in the change process.
Organization Development (OD):
More teamwork and increased decision making took place on the shop floor thus a more “bottom-up” management began to occur. McGregor and Beckhard named this “organization development”. OD, then, is an approach to organization change based on applied behavioral science and is reliant on the action research approach
Techniques used are: Diagnosis, Feedback, Discussion, and Interventions.
The Managerial Grid and Organization Development:
Blake and Mouton (1964) took the two dimensions of leadership – initiation of structure and consideration – relabeled them production and people, and specified that the typical leader or manager had different concerns about each, some being more concerned with getting the job done than about the people involved, and vice versa. They arranged these two concerns on a graph, using 9-point scales to represent the degree of concern.
The juxtaposition on a graph resulted in what they called the “managerial grid”, a two-dimensional model that describes managerial styles. The greater the concern for production, the more autocratic; the greater concern with people, the more permissive the management style.
Blake and Mouton showed that managers consider the most common barriers to organizational effectiveness to be (1) communication problems and (2) lack of planning. They argued that communication and planning as barriers to effectiveness were symptoms not causes.
Six-phase approach:
1. Train all managers to become participative
2. Teamwork development
3. Intergroup development, stimulating cooperative i.o competitive behavior.
4. Develop an ideal strategic corporate model
5. Implementing phase
6. Systematic critique of all previous phases
Phases 1, 2, and 3 were designed to deal with communication problems, and the remaining phases were to address the planning of barriers.
Coercion and Confrontations:
Groups, such as unions, minorities, and the disabled, who feel disenfranchised by the organization that employs them and confront or attempt to coerce management for changes may be understood to some degree by considering in-group and out-group theory and research.
Management Consulting:
McKinsey (founder) translated Taylors work into professionalism:
1) Gather as much information about the client
2) Thorough analysis results in a hypothesis to be tested.
3) Structured recommendations
Root of management consulting
