Definitions Flashcards
Bureaucratic
Describing the process of bureaucracy, sometimes used in a derogatory sense
McDonaldization
the principles of efficiency, calculability, predictability and control by which fast food restaurants are managed and organised, as applied by Ritzer to other contemporary organisations
Hawthorne Studies
A series of studies which ran from 1924 into the late 1930s. Widely credited wit discovering the human side of the organisation.
Group
A collection of people with a sense of shared identity and something in common but not with a shared purpose.
Team
A group who meet together with a common purpose and some degree of mutual interdependence.
Personality
A set of characteristics and behaviour displayed by any individual.
Motivation
The will and desire that a person has to engage in a particular behaviour or perform a particular task.
Knowledge and learning
An aspect of organisational behaviour which emphasises the importance of information, understanding and practical skills for organisational success. In particular it examines the capacity of the organisation to share this knowledge in effective ways.
Change
The process by which an organisation changes in practice, process, culture etc. in a planned or emergent fashion.
Leadership
The process of leading or influencing the behaviour of others. In the broadest definition, it can be carried out by anyone in the organisation.
Power games and politics
The process where one individual or group tries to gain advantage or get another group to do things that they might not do otherwise.
Globalization
Defined in many different ways, globalisation is where activities take place on an increasingly global scale
Service Sector
Non-Manufacturing industries, such as retail, leisure, transport, finance and media
Corporate social responsibility
A contested term with different interpretations but generally taken to be the social and environmental responsibly corporations have towards their stakeholders
Direct Control
Face to face control of workers by a manager or owner
Impersonal control
Control of workers that is NOT done face to face , e.g. through delegation or through rules and procedures
Rational Organisational Design
The design of organisational structure and activities in order to achieve the organisation’s goals in the most technically efficient manner.
It also suggests an organisation which is designed logically and systematically, even scientifically, so as to achieve its aims.
Bureaucracy
Covers official, formal elements of rational organisational design, such as hierarchal structure, rules and procedure and official paperwork which exert impersonal control over the organisation.
Hierarchy
The levels and ranks within an organisation. Any one level reports to the level immediately above.
Office
A defined role within the organisation
Records
Information held by the organisation relevant for bureaucratic functioning, including information about workers.
Span of Control
The number of worker controlled by a manager at anyone particular level in a hierarchy
Organisational structure
The roles and positions in an organisation, often organised horizontally and vertically in the form of an organisational chart diagram.
Vertical differentiation
The process whereby a hierarchy creates a number of different lanes of management within the organisation.
Horizontal/ functional differentiation
The process of whereby different parts of the hierarchy are grouped according to criteria, such as function performed, the geographical area served to the product or service produced.
Official
A person who fills a particular role in an organisation. When working in that role, a person is said to be working in an official capacity.
Discretion
The ability of an individual to act according to their own independent judgement, rather than being told exactly what to do
Human resource management (MRM)
The part of the organisation that concentrates on policies and procedures relevant to the management of people within the organisation.
Pro-Forma
A type of paperwork, sometimes called a form. It is a blank template with standard fields for different types of relevant information , which is filled in as a means of capturing information for the records of an organisation.
Rational legal authority
According to Weber this is the power that is legitimated by rules and procedures associated with an office rather than by tradition or charismatic ways.
Formal Rational
Technically efficient means of achieving particular ends without thinking of the human or ethical consequence
e.g Nazi
Substantive Rationality
Rationality from a human and ethical perspective if something is formally rational and efficient it does not make it substantively rational when considering its human and ethical consequences.
Disenchantment
For Weber this was a loss of magical elements in society and suggests some of the dehumanising elements of bureaucracy.
Iron cage of bureaucracy
term coined by Weber to describe how it traded people in routine and procedures.
Dysfunctions of Bureaucracy
Unintended consequences of bureaucracy which lead to it not functioning in the efficient manner for which it is designed.
Red tape
An unintended consequence of bureaucracy, where rules and paperwork get in the way of work and activities, rather than helping tasks to perform efficiently.
Bureaucratic personality
A tendency to follow rules to the letter rather than seeing the wider picture and making more common sense judgements.
Trained incapacity
Where people are so used to their behaviour being controlled by bureaucratic rules that they become inflexible and unable to think for themselves and show initiative.
