Task 01

1) Discuss different organization structures and identify the type of

organizational structure that do you thinks suitable for your selected
organization?

Organizational structure
• Organizational structure is the way in witch an organization’s activities (job
tasks) are divided, organized and coordinated.
• Organizational structure is the way in which and work, authority resources of
an organization have been divided among members.

Types of organizational structure

♣ Entrepreneurial structure
♣ Bureaucratic structure
♣ Matrix structure
Entrepreneurial structure

Most organizations start life as an entrepreneurial structure in that they are

brought into existence to extend the capability and capacity of an individual, who
has discovered a way of meeting potential customer – or client need, but cannot
achieve results without assistance. The two essential components of any
dictionary definition of the word ‘entrepreneur’ are risk and initiative. The fact of
having had the initiative and taken the risk gives the entrepreneur such
dominance in the evolving organizations that everything depends on him and
most activities of other members are either replicating or mirroring what the
entrepreneur is doing. The initiative shown usually includes a powerful ingredient
of expertise or specialized knowledge that nobody else can supply, and which is
the secret of success.

Most people are employed in organizations that do not depend absolutely on the
continuing, irreplaceable contribution of a single entrepreneur. The large oil
companies most public sector undertakings like the National Health Service or
the Civil service, High Street banks, schools, colleges, airline companies,
insurance companies have a quite different type of drive to their activities. Other
types of organization appear to need, however, the strong centralization of the
entrepreneurial form to be effective. Where there is the need to move fast and
take major decisions requiring flair and skilled judgement rather than a measured
weighing of alternatives, then the entrepreneurial form is maintained.

The entrepreneurial form is attractive to many managers because of its emphasis

on individual power and risky competition.

This organization works on precedent, on anticipating the wishes and decisions

of the central power sources. There are few rules and procedures, little
bureaucracy. Control is exercised by the centre, largely through the selection of
key individuals, by occasional forays from the centre or summonses to the
centre. It is a political organization in that decisions are taken largely on the
outcome of a balance of influence rather than on procedural or purely logical
grounds.
 Personal Assistant
Company secretary &
Distribution Personnel office

Southern Region Account and general

Sales office

Chief executive
Purchasing and
Northern Region Supplies
Sales

Overseas sales Research and

Production Development
Supervisor
Design and
Engineering

Bureaucratic structure

Bureaucracy is the most common form of organization and has been used, as we
saw in the second chapter, in various forms for most of human history. It is only
recently that the word has taken on the unattractive overtones that turn
“bureaucrat” into a term of abuse.

The principal of bureaucratic organization is that jobs are grouped according to

some common feature and then ranked in a conventional hierarchy of
responsibility to distribute power between organization members. The most
common grouping is function, with a marketing hierarchy, a production hierarchy
and so on. An alternative is the geographical grouping, whereby there is a factory
hierarchy and another for the London office and a third for the warehousing and
distribution centre. In bureaucracy the employee focuses on his role in the
organization rather than on the relative power of individuals.

Bureaucratic structures are characterized by an advanced degree of

specialization between jobs and departments, by a reliance on formal procedures
and paperwork, and by extended managerial hierarchies with clearly marked
status distinctions. In bureaucracies there tends to be a strictly delimited system
of delegation down these hierarchies whereby an employee is expected to use
his discretion only within what the rules allow.

A useful example is retail banking or the work of building societies. Here the
operations have to be standardized, not only in all branches of the same bank
but also between competing banks, so that customers find the system easy to
deal with. The work of bank clerks and, in a different way, bank managers
requires knowledge, skill and accuracy, but it must be carried out strictly in
 accordance with the rules and there is little scope for individuality apart from
one’s manner in talking with customers and manual dexterity in counting
banknote. Bureaucracy provides scope for economies of scale and extensive
specialization at the expense of flexibility and product innovation. Their
predictability provides a secure environment for the employee and a clear line of
safe career progression.

Chief Executive

Director of Director of Director of Director of Director of

manufacturing Marketing Finance Personnel Research

The matrix structure

As the entrepreneurial and bureaucratic structures have such obvious drawbacks, a third
general mode has been evolved and used IV some situations: the matrix. The method is
simply to overlay a second set of hierarchical connections over a first, but at right-angles
to it. This was first developed in the American aerospace industry because of
government demands for a single project manager who would be responsible for the
progress of each government contract and to whom government officials could channel
all their queries and instruction. Companies soon found big advantages in this
arrangement and expanded it so that the project manager was not only a communication
link but also a direct superior of employees in different functional groups, although these
employees would also still report to their functional superiors.

An example could be the making of a television program, which will require a rang of
specialist skills, such as set-building, make-up, special effects, design and engineering.
The matrix organization does, therefore, need time and care in its creation, balancing the
power of the tow axes and working out a basis of trust and understanding among the key
participants. It is not something to work out on the back of an envelope during a train
journey; it requires extensive consultation and discussion, progressive implementation
over several months and attention for several years as it settles down and moves
towards effectiveness.
 General Manager

Functional
areas
resurging
General Production Design Personne Material Cost projects
project l supplies Account
manager s

Project
A Team A
Manager

Project
B Team B
Manager

Project
C Team C
Manager

♥ I selected one company. That company name is EPSI

♥ Entrepreneurial structure is most suitable for this company

1.2) Explain centralization and decentralization states which types present in your
selected organization

Centralization and decentralization

Centralization: The degree to which decision-marking is concentrated at the top of the
organization.

Decentralization: The extent to which decision discretion is pushed down to lower level
employees. Or
The delegation of authority from higher to lower levels of the organization, often
accomplished by the creation of small self-contained organizational units.

Advantages and Disadvantages of Decentralization

Advantages Disadvantages
♣ Reduces the workload of top ♣ Difficulties in maintaining
managers. uniformity and consistency of
organization policies and
♣ Speed up decision-making.
procedures
♣ Difficulties in communication.
♣ Increases the quality of ♣ Coordination problems.
decisions.
♣ High administrative cost.

♣ Motivates subordinates.

♣ Trains lower level managers for

higher level responsibilities

The process of Decentralization

1. Assign duties to subordinates.
2. Grant them authority.
3. Create an obligation for the satisfactory performance of the job.
My selected organization is Decentralization because of these reasons
Reduces the workload of top managers, Speed up decision-making, Increases the
quality of decisions, Motivates subordinates, and Trains lower level managers for higher
level responsibilities.
 1.3) Examine organizational culture and how employees learn organization culture
in the deleted anyway
The organization culture is the patterned way of thinking, feeling, and reacting that exists
in an organization or its sub sectors. It is the unique ‘mental programming’ of that
organization, which is a reflection of its modal organization personality.

The organization’s culture is affected by three general factors: broad external influences,
societal values, and organization-specific factors Broad external influences are factors
over which the organization has little or no control such as the natural environment and
historical events which have shaped the society.

Organization culture, structures, and manifestations

Sources organization culture manifestations

• External • Charismatic-self- • Organization

influences design
sufficient
• Socialization
• Societal strategies
values • Paranoid-trusting • Class
• organization-
distinctions
specific • Avoidant- • Ideologies
factors achievement • Myths and
symbols
o Techn • Politicized-focused • Language
ology • Rites and
ceremonies
o History • Bureaucratic-

Type of organization culture

The modal personality of the dominant power group in the organization, usually key
managers at top levels, will be the major determinant of the organization culture. This
group makes the important decisions about the strategies and modes of implementation
such as market strategy, organization design, the nature of the reward system, and who
is advanced into this group.

The five types of neurotic organization culture

• Charismatic-self-sufficient

• Paranoid-trusting

• Avoidant-achievement

• Politicized-focused
• Bureaucratic-creative
 Charismatic-self-sufficient
A charismatic organization culture is associated with a dramatic managerial
personality. Dramatic managers have feelings of grandiosity, have a strong need for
attention from others, and act in ways to draw attention to themselves. They tend to
be exhibitionists, seeking excitement and stimulation. Howe ever, they often lack
self-discipline, cannot focus their attention for long periods of time, and tend to be
charming but superficial. They frequently exploit others and often attract
subordinates with high dependency needs.

In charismatic organization cultures, this emphasis on individualism is exaggerated,

particularly at the top level. The executives have a high need for visibility and
recognition outside the firm. The goal of the firm is to grow rapidly. Decision making
is based on intuition, guesses and hunches without careful analysis of the
environment or the capabilities of the organization. Often the organization structure
and human resources are inadequate to handle the desired growth.

Such managers exploit others, and power is concentrated at the top of the
organization. This does tow things; the top executive keeps close control and at the
same time remains the center of attention.

Firm with a self-sufficient culture emphasize independence, individual initiative, and

achievement. Members believe that the success of the firm is related to how well
individuals, as individuals, succeed. In these firms, managers have opportunities to
develop and advance at their own rates. Achievement and self-discipline are
recognized.

Paranoid-trusting
The paranoid culture results from a suspicious personality style. The manager feels
persecuted by others and doesn’t trust them and so behaves in guarded and secret
ways, believing that subordinates are lazy, incompetent, and secretly whish to “get” him
or her. He or she feels hostile toward others, particularly peers and subordinates, and
acts aggressively toward them.

The top managers in paranoid firms are not proactive. The fear and suspicion that
dominates the organization reduces its ability to respond quickly and spontaneously to
important strategic opportunities. Managements are constantly searching for information
about what is going in their environments. It is acquired through elaborate control
systems that provide information the top management believes is required to cope with
the external crises those they fear are coming. The information, however, tends to be
highly distorted to confirm the suspicions of threat that are the basis for the paranoid
organizations. The decision makers look for deeper, hidden reason for the events that
occur around them.

In a trusting culture this unrealistic fear is not present. There is a sense of tryst, fairness,
and openness toward others, managers, professionals, and workers in the firm have the
competence and motivation to succeed. This could result in active searches for new
strategic niches in which the firm can gain some competitive advantage if such ventures
are undertaken.
 Avoidant-achievement
The depressive personality orientation leads to an avoidant culture. Depressive
tendencies arise out of feelings of helplessness and dependence on others. The
depressive person has strong needs for affection and support from others and feels to
act on and change the course the course of events. These feeling of inadequacy are
related to very passive behavior and inaction. Depressives often seek justification of
their actions from other significant actors, in the case of managers; these might be
experts and consultants.

A feature of organizations with avoidant cultures is that the dominant coalition seeks to
avoid change. They are passive and purposeless. Managers avoid making decisions.
Change is resisted because it may threaten the current organization values and power
structure; appropriate action is avoided. The relative low level of external change and the
desire of the management to retain control result in little activity, low self-confidence,
high anxiety, and extremely conservative culture.

In a achievement culture, member of the top executive group value logical analysis and
rational processes. They seek to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the firm
relative to its competitors. Those managers recognize a need to change and feel
confident that changes can made. Having information about the availability of
opportunities, managers are willing to make decision and take action to take advantage
of them.

Politicized-focused

Politicized cultures occur in organizations when the modal organization personality is a

detached orientation. Those with this orientation have a strong sense of detachment
from others and of not being connected to the environment. They believe that interaction
with others will lead to harm and avoid emotional relationships because they fear they
will be demeaned by others. Aloofness and coldness characterizes their relationships.
They are socially and psychologically isolated and do not care about it.

In politicized organization cultures there is no clear direction. The chief executive is not
strong, but detached from the organization. Liking leadership, managers at lower level
try to influence the direction of the firm. There are often several individuals or coalitions
competing for power because of the lack of leadership. Managers are involved in these
divisive power struggles to enhance their own position and status, and there is only
minimal concern with the success of the organization.

In a focused culture, members share similar perspective about the organization’s sense
of direction. This flows from the clear direction set by the executives, and there is
member commitment and enthusiasm towards these objectives.
 Bureaucratic-creative
The Bureaucratic culture is a result of a compulsive model organization personality.
Compulsive peoples have a very strong need to control the environment. Such people
view things in terms of domination and submission. They behave in meticulous ways and
focus on very specific but often trivial details. Compulsive managers are devoted to their
work and tend to show difference towards those at levels above them and act in
autocratic ways towards subordinators. They have strong preference for well ordered
system and processes.

In the bureaucratic culture the concern is more with how things look rather than with how
things work.

In the creative culture, members are more self- disciplined. They can work together as a
team without excessive reliance on rules and procedures. They are knowledgeable
about the work of others and the task interdependencies. Coordination among members
is a somewhat intuitive process that develops from experiences of working together and
being successful. The members know that cooperation is for success.
1.4) Examine nature of human behavior, complexity of each human behavior and
the importance of translating individual objectives into organizational objectives

Who best exemplifies the basic essence of human nature: greedy executives engaged in
corporate fraud; Mike Tyson, the aggressive boxer; or the courageous, compassionate
Americans who risked their lives to save strangers on Sept. 11?

If you chose only the personifications of greed and aggression, you are neglecting a vital
part of our nature, according to Shelley E. Taylor, UCLA psychology professor. In a new
book, Taylor argues that nurturing others and caring for their needs are as wired into our
genes as our aggressive and competitive nature.

"The tending instinct is every bit as tenacious as our more aggressive, selfish side,"
Taylor argues in "The Tending Instinct: How Nurturing Is Essential to Who We Are and
How We Live" (Henry Holt). "Tending to others is as natural, as biologically based, as
searching for food or sleeping."

An internationally renowned scientist in the field of stress and health, Taylor conducted
25 years of research and analyzed more than 1,000 research studies before writing this
book.

"I originally assumed that biology largely determines behavior," Taylor said, "and so it
was a tantalizing surprise to see how clearly social relationships forge our underlying
biology, even at the level of gene expression. Chief among these social forces are the
ways in which people take care of one another and tend to one another's needs. An
early warm and nurturing relationship, such as mothers often enjoy with their children, is
as vital to development as calcium is to bones.

"The benefits that tending provides to children, especially those with genetic risks, are
substantial. Children who are well tended in early childhood grow up with better social
and emotional ways of meeting the world. Even in adult relationships, we tend to each
other's needs in ways that sustain long and healthy lives."

Life, business and relations between the sexes are often depicted as battlefields -- "dog
eat dog" -- where the successful outmaneuver and overpower the weak. Taylor, whose
research is federally funded by the National Science Foundation and the National
Institute of Mental Health, finds this metaphor to be a half-truth, at best.

"Tending is instinctive, and affects our biology at every stage of life," she said. "We have
neuro-circuitrys for tending as surely as we have biological circuitry for obtaining food
and reproducing ourselves. How people fare in times of stress -- from how calm they are
to their likelihood of becoming ill -- depends on the quality of the tending they receive."

What role does our genetic makeup play in determining our behavior?

"The genome is like an architect's first plan, a rough projection of how a person may turn
out," Taylor argues. "This plan is revised during the course of the building process. The
kitchen is rotated 90 degrees; the living room is extended a few feet. Later, the owner
adds a bathroom, perhaps even a second story. This is what happens when genes meet
the environment in which they find expression, and tending is a large part of this
environment.
"From life in the womb to the surprisingly resilient brain of old age, the social
environment molds and shapes the expression of our genetic heritage until the genetic
contribution is sometimes barely evident. A mother's tending can completely eliminate
the potential effects of a gene; a risk for a disease can fail to materialize with nurturing,
and a genetic propensity may lead to one outcome for one person and the opposite for
another, based on the tending they received.

"Who we are -- our character, even our physical health -- depends on the people who
tend to us and how well we get along with them -- our mothers, fathers, friends and
lovers."

Early tending has an extraordinary impact on children, Taylor documents. Showing an

example of the devastating effects on children who received little love or tending, Taylor
cites the hundreds of thousands of Romanian orphans housed together in desperate
conditions at the end of the Ceausescu regime in 1990. With few workers to care for
large numbers of children, relief workers were shocked to find "room after room of
children who rocked back and forth, hit their heads against the walls, and grimaced
oddly, giving no sign they had registered that anyone new was present," she writes.
"Others simply stared at the strangers with big, sad eyes.

"Their emotions were stunted. They took little joy in their surroundings, and were not
bothered by reprimands or criticisms. They just didn't care. They weren't tortured or
raped. They just weren't loved, held, hugged or taught to feel emotions or how to
recognize them in others.

"The first few years of life are critical for building these emotional responses to life. If a
child fails to get warm, responsive contact with another person during those years, the
disadvantages may never be fully overcome."

As the Soviet bloc crumbled, Eastern Europe's newly free countries experienced an
abrupt decline in the marriage rate, a staggering increase in divorce, a steep decline in
the birth rate, dramatic increases in heart disease and fatal accidents, and a plummeting
life expectancy. People who were expected to live into their 70s were dying in their 40s
and 50s instead. The threat to life expectancy hit young and middle-aged men especially
hard, particularly those who were single. In 1994 a Russian man's life expectancy had
decreased to just 57 (from 64 five years earlier). Men in the former East Germany
suffered a 40 percent increase in their death rate.

"Women fared better than men because they had informal ties in place that helped them
negotiate the new social and economic order," Taylor writes. "Using well-honed
networking skills, they were able to acquire food and other goods to maintain their now
reduced standard of living. Women and children died, too, but in far fewer numbers,
sustained through the transition by the social bonds they had created and nurtured.
When a society's tending system breaks down, illness and death can follow, sometimes
in astonishingly short order. Men, in particular, are vulnerable."

Among older workers in the United States, those with little social support die earlier,
Taylor said. How well workers are treated by their immediate supervisor makes a large
difference in their physical and mental health, especially for men, Taylor writes. This
"tending," or lack of it, by your supervisor, affects your risk for coronary heart disease or
a heart attack, as well as depression and anxiety.

Nurturing contact with parents in early childhood, combined with social support during
times of stress, good friends (especially female friends), and a strong, loving relationship
(especially with a wife) "all protect against the psychological and health problems that
stress otherwise promotes," she writes.
People with social support have "younger" stress systems and better protection against
major chronic diseases, Taylor writes. Strong ties with family and close friends protect
against health ailments, while social isolation increases the risk for all causes of death,
including heart disease, cancer, strokes and accidents.

"More than 100 scientific studies show that people who have social support and who are
connected to their families, their colleagues at work, their communities, their churches
and their friends all prosper biologically," Taylor said.

Women often get much of their social support from other women, and women's
friendships are vital to their mental health, she writes. Throughout life, women seek more
close friends than men do, and create larger social networks for themselves.

Women's networks become especially important in stressful times, meeting a variety of

needs, including raising children, protecting against violence and coping with stress.

Even among animals, she writes, females enjoy the comfort of one another's company.
In a study of Norway rats, for example, females housed together in groups of five lived
40 percent longer than rats that were housed alone. Among prairie voles (a small
rodent), males react to stressful conditions by seeking contact with their female mates,
while females turn not to their mates, but to other female "friends." Female bonobos
(monkeys) form intense, long-lasting bonds with other females, much more so than
males.

From velvet monkeys to humans, mothers often treat their young the way they were
treated in childhood. In monkeys, mothers who were mistreated or deprived in infancy do
not mother their own offspring as well as nurtured monkeys do, Taylor writes. Men and
women who were abused as children are likely to become abusive parents themselves,
she writes, and children who do not receive much physical attention or warmth are at
risk for a wide range of serious physical and mental health problems.

Taylor's own research over many years shows that turning to one's social group for
safety and support is a common way for people to cope with stress. "The fact that one
can see a similar pattern in animals suggests that turning to others may have quite old
biological origins," she writes.

Across cultures, girls typically receive training in tending from an early age, Taylor
writes, beginning with playing with dolls and caring for younger siblings, baby-sitting for
others' children, and later caring for their own children, a sick husband and elderly
parents.

With the enormous popularity of cell phones, Taylor noted, we now carry our social
support network with us wherever we go. Friendships are vital, she said, and "social ties
are the cheapest medicine we have."