Chapter 12: Formal Organizations Flashcards
Rational perspective on organizations
Views the formal organization as a goal directed, purposefully designed machine.
Bureaucracy (organization)
Iron cage rationality
Weber believes it to be the most efficient form of organization.
Trapping people and denying many aspects of their humanity.
Scientific management
Directed towards maximizing internal efficiency.
Human relations theory
Social factors are just as important as technical rationality in maximum productivity.
Organizational humanism
This theory suggests that organizations can maximize efficiency and effectiveness while also promoting individual happiness and well being.
Theory X
Calls for directive management in organizations.
Theory Y
Calls for greater democratization of decision making in organizations.
Decision-making theory of organizations
Focuses on how the decisions of individuals individuals in organization affect the organization as a whole.
Systems perspective on organizations
Builds on the fundamental principle that the organization is in constant interaction with its multiple environments — social, political, economic, cultural, technological— and must be able to adapt to environmental change.
Political economy model
Focuses on the dependence of organizations on their environments for necessary resources and in the impact of organization/environment interactions on the internal structure and processes of the organization.
Learning organization theory
Developed on the premise that rational planning is not sufficient for an organization to survive in a rapidly changing environment such as the one we live.
Interpretive perspective on organizations
Organizations are creations of human consciousness and reflect the worldview of the creators; they are social constructions of reality.
Silverman’s social action model
An approach to organizations that emphasizes the active role of individual organizational actors in creating the organization.
Organizational culture model
Views organizations as ongoing interactive processes of reality construction, involving many organizational actors.
Managing diversity model
Contemporary organizations cannot be successful unless they can learn to manage diverse populations. Diversity is permanent, not transitory, feature of contemporary life.
