Describe the Four Generic Organizational Effectiveness Criteria, and also explain what the Contingency Approach to organizational design involves. Discuss Burns and Stalker's findings regarding mechanistic and organic organizations.
The Four Generic Organizational Effectiveness criteria are goal accomplishment, resources acquisition, internal process and strategic constituency, these approaches work based on the situation and do not work for all situations and a combination will be most effective when determining how to make a company most effective (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 391). Goal accomplishment means that a goal was set for a specific amount of time for it to be accomplished such as a sales goal. When I worked in retail we had charts that showed us everything you could ever think of sales, returns, how much was sold in an hour and our managers gave us goals to exceed those figures that had already occurred. The district manager would stop at the stores and have a “visit” to help us figure out what products needed to be ordered, what products we needed to phase out and be sent to a different store where it was proven to sell better. Stores could compete with each other based off of these charts and we did not have to contact the other stores because all of the information was available to us every day on our computers or through faxes from corporate.
Resource acquisition is inputs rather than outputs and these are things that are necessary for production such as materials, labor, money, managers and technical expertise (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 393). Next is internal process, that means how healthy is the company, how is the information past to employees, how loyal are workers, do they trust managers and others in the company and is there a high level of job satisfaction or not (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 393)? Our book tells us about in interesting book called, "The Road Less Traveled", I am thinking about getting this book because when I checked out websites that listed the book I felt inspired by what I read. I have found that through spiritual growth that people can have communication with each other freely and without judgment it feels really great because no matter what I say I will not have to worry about what the other person may think and I just know that they are a good listener. In Peck’s book he talks about having a sense of community and being able to do just that, “It is a place where people are emotionally present with one another, and aren’t afraid to talk about fears and disappointments because it allows us to care for one another (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 393). I believe that people really do not get to establish these types of relationships at work because of lay-offs, companies closing, economy woes and some people have to do temp work just to have a basic income to pay bills. People who connect with others on this level may find this support through church, being involved in group sports, people who share an interest in fitness and spirituality tend to have these types of relationships and trust is easily built through already made communities.
Lastly strategic constituency which is a group of individuals who have a stake in the company, this person will benefit from the success or failure of the company, stakeholders can be people who own a great deal of stock in a company. People who are on board directors group definitly have a stake in how a company produces especially if it effects their position in the company and their personal bank of funds, money can drive people’s actions in either a positive or negative way. Companies who provide services, for example I temped at a place that was a relief center for people who have been impacted by natural disasters and the customers relied on Servpro to help them take care of the water in their homes. They had a small call center that they used staffing agencies to support, it was a real mess, I worked there two days and then the next day I had my car accident. I would put the information the customer gave me into the computer and then I would communicate with the person who was sending out crews to specific high needs areas that needed attention right away. Communication was a mess there on all levels and people who worked there did not know anything about the business we were just told to get on the phones and return calls to people who had called in. People could not return to their homes in some cases so there was the problems related to the natural disaster, the communication between the dispatchers and their crews and then the internal communication between people at the home base with just about anybody in general was muddled because there was not set plan for how to handle the situation. I did a good job on the phones but they did not like the fact that I put the information into the computer instead of on a piece of paper that I would hand in at the end of the day. It was a really strange situation.
Contingency Approach to organizational design means the approach is most effective when it fits the demands of the situation (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 386). Burns and Stalker's findings regarding mechanistic and organic organizations they discovered that there are two very different types of approaches to running an organization. Mechanistic organizations like McDonalds are rigid bureaucracies with strict rules, narrowly defined tasks and top-down communication (Kinicki & Kreitner, 2009 p 386). There is no room for creativity when making a hamburger and the customer appreciates the fact that there hamburger will always be the same and to workers that is just the way it is done. If someone has an idea on a new product it is a safe bet that he or she would have to address that idea to someone on a corporate level who will do market research to determine if it is a good idea. Then that idea may be test marketed with further market research and focus groups that will give good feedback on what they think about the product, so the worker who wants to slap on the hot sauce to see how people would like a snappy burger will probably get in big trouble for doing so.
Dr. Edward Hess wrote an article called, “Wholesome Organic Profits: The Six Keys to Growing Your Company the Old-Fashioned Way, it was easy to understand and when looking up the word organic you are more than likely to find some articles about food, this one was not. He did a research study in which he looked at twenty-two high-performance organic growth companies which included some very well known names Best Buy, Harley-Davidson and Tiffany & Co are three that I recognized. He explains that because of a simple structure that an employee understands where the company is going, what their role is and how their job fits into the big picture (Hess, 2012). When companies have an organic organizational style people have a sense of ownership and entrepreneurial sense that they have control over their destiny, which is pretty cool considering many companies do not give their workers a sense of empowerment (Hess, 2012). The workers are also rewarded and held accountable for their success or failures and I think in this type of work environment even mistakes would be seen as a learning experience, not a first class trip out the door. A great organic leader will have the following qualities or characteristics, humble, passionate and focused operators, must have excellent communication skills and be able to relate to the workers on an emotional level with employees and customers to show that everyone has a fair shake in organization (Hess, 2012).
I could see myself working in an organic environment and since I am looking for a job I will start researching organic organizations that are near me, wish me luck but it may take awhile there are more trees than jobs in New Hampshire.
Hess, E. (2012, January 7). Wholesome organic profits. Retrieved from http://humanresources.about.com/od/managementandleadership/a/growth_2.htm
Kinicki, A., & Kreitner, R. (2009). Organizational Behavior: Key Concepts, Skills &
Best Practices (customized 4th ed.). New York, NY: McGraw-Hill Irwin
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