Daft Chapter 3

Horizontal linkage

refers to communication and coordination horizontally across organizational departments

Strengths of a virtual network structure?

- Enables even small organizations to obtain talent and resources worldwide - Gives a company immediate scale and reach without huge investments in factories, equipment or distribution facilities - Enables the organization to be highly flexible and responsive to changing needs - Reduces administrative overhead costs

What are the two most common approaches to structural design?

- Functional Grouping - Divisional Grouping

Weaknesses of Virtual Network Structure

- Managers do not have hands on control over many activities and employees, - Requires a great deal of time to manage relationships and potential conflicts with contract partners - There is a risk of organizational failure if a partner fails to deliver or goes out of business - Employee loyalty and corporate culture might be weak because employees feel they can be replaced by contract services

What are the Strengths of a Matrix organization?

- Achieves coordination necessary to meet dual demands from customers - Flexible sharing of human resources across products - Suited to complex decisions and frequent changes in unstable environment - Provides opportunity for both functional and product skill development - Best in medium-sized organizations with multiple products

What are the strengths of Functional Structure?

- Allows economies of scale within functional departments - Enables in-depth knowledge and skill development - Enables organization to accomplish functional goals - Is best with only one or a few products

What are the weaknesses of a matrix organization?

- Causes participants to experience dual authority, which can be frustrating and confusing - Means participants need good interpersonal skills and extensive training - Is time consuming, involves frequent meetings and conflict- resolution sessions - Will not work unless participants understand it and adopt collegial rather than vertical- type relationships -Requires great effort to maintain power

What are the types of Departmental Grouping Options?

- Departmental Grouping - Functional Grouping - Divisional Grouping - Multifocused Grouping - Horizontal Grouping - Virtual Network Grouping

Weaknesses of Horizontal Structure?

- Determine core processes is difficult and time consuming - Requires changes in the culture, job design, management philosophy, and information and reward systems. - Traditional Managers may balk when they have to give up power and authority - Requires significant training of employees to work effectively in a horizontal team environment - Can limit in-depth skill development

What are the Weaknesses for divisional structure?

- Eliminates economies of scale in functional departments - Leads to poor coordination across product lines - Eliminates in- depth competence and technical specialization - Makes integration and standardization across product lines difficult

What are the three components define organizational structure?

- Organization structure designates formal reporting relationships - Organization structure identifies the grouping together of individuals into departments and of departments into the total organization -Organization structure includes the design of systems to ensure effective communication, coordination, and integration of efforts across departments

What are the three conditions for the Matrix structure?

- Pressure exists to share scarce resources across product lines. - Environmental pressure exists for two or more critical outputs, such as for in-depth technical knowledge and frequent new products. - The environmental domain of the organization is both complex and uncertain

what are some other common names for a divisional structure?

- Product Structure - Strategic Business Unit Structure

Strengths of a Horizontal structure?

- Promotes flexibility and rapid response to changes in customer needs - Directs attention of everyone toward the production and delivery of value to the customer - Each employee has a broader view of organizational goals - Promotes a focus on teamwork and collaboration - Improves quality of life for employees by offering them the opportunity to share responsibility, make decisions, and be accountable for outcomes

What are the weaknesses of Functional Structure?

- Slow response time to environmental changes - May cause decisions to pile on top; hierarchy overload - Leads to poor horizontal coordination - Results in less innovation - Involves restricted view or organizational goals

What are the Strengths for a divisional structure?

- Suited to fast change in unstable environment - Leads to customer satisfaction because product responsibility and contact point are clear - Involves high coordination across functions - Allows units to adapt to differences in products, regions, customers - Best in large organizations with several products - Decentralizes decision making

A popular form of organizing is to have employees work on what they want in whatever department they choose so that motivation and enthusiasm stay high?

- false, a small number of firms have tried this approach with some success, but a typical organization needs to structure its work activities, positions and departments in a way that ensures work is accomplished and coordinated to meet organizational goals. Many managers try to give some consideration to employee choices as a way to keep enthusiasm high

Geographic Structure

An organizational structure in which each region of a country or area of the world is served by a self-contained division.

Collaboration

means a joint effort between people from two or more departments to produce outcomes that meet a common goal or shared purpose and that are greater than what any of the individuals or departments could achieve alone

Reporting relationships are often called?

Chain of Command

Outsourcing?

Contracting with an outside company to provide a service or product instead of providing it from within the organization.

Divisional Grouping

means people are organized according to what the organization produces.

Full-time integrator

Located outside departments and coordinates several departments. Jobs types include: Project manager, program manager, project manager, brand manager

hierarchical Referral

Problems are referred up the hierarchy for more senior managers to reconcile

Tasks forces temporary or permanent?

Task forces are an effective horizontal linkage device for temporary issues

functional matrix

The functional bosses have primary authority and the project or product managers simply coordinate product activities.

economy of scale

a proportionate saving in costs gained by an increased level of production.

multifocused grouping

a grouping in which the organization embraces two or more structural grouping alternatives simultaneously, often called matrix or hybrid

Liaison Role

a manager or team member is held formally accountable for communicating and coordinating with other groups

Task force

a temporary team or committee formed to solve a specific short-term problem involving several departments. Each member represents the interest of a department or division and can carry information from the meeting back to that department.

Departmental grouping

affects employees because they share a common supervisor and common resources, are jointly responsible for performance, and tend to identify and collaborate with one another

divisional structure

also called M-form or a decentralized form, separate divisions can be organized with responsibility for individual products, services, product groups, major projects or programs, divisions, businesses or profit centers.

Functional Structure

also called a U-form (unitary structure), activities are grouped together by common function from the bottom to the top of the organization.

Matrix Structure

combines functional and divisional approaches to emphasize project or program teams

Committees and task forces whose members are from different departments are often worthless for getting things done.

disagree - the point of a cross- functional committee and task forces is to share information to coordinate their departmental activities. Meeting talking, and disagreeing are the work of the committee. These groups should not try to "get things done" in the sense of being efficient.

Horizontal Grouping

employees are organized around core work processes, the end-to-end work, information, and material flows that provide value directly to customers

Information Systems

enables managers or frontline workers throughout the organization to routinely exchange information about problems, opportunities, activities or decisions.

Reengineering

fundamental rethinking and radical redesign of business processes to achieve dramatic improvements in critical measures of performance, such as cost, quality, service, and speed

Teams

groups of two or more people who interact and influence each other, are mutually accountable for achieving common goals associated with organizational objectives, and perceive themselves as a social entity within an organization

vertical information system

increasing vertical information capacity, includes periodic reports, written information and computer-based communication distributed to managers.

Horizontal Structure

organizes employees around core process.

Functional grouping

places together employees who perform similar functions or work processes or who bring similar knowledge and skills to bear

Product Matrix

project/product managers have primary authority and functional managers simply assign technical personnel to projects and provide advisory expertise as needed.

Relational Coordination

refers to frequent horizontal coordination and communication carried out through ongoing relationships of shared goals, shared knowledge, and mutual respect

virtual teams

teams that use computer technology to tie together physically dispersed members in order to achieve a common goal

virtual network structure

the organization subcontracts most of its major functions to separate companies and coordinates their activities from a small headquarters organization

Organizational structure is reflected in:

the organizational chart

chain of command

the vertical line of authority that clarifies who reports to whom throughout the organization

Vertical Linkages

used to coordinate activities between the top and bottom of an organization and are designed primarily for control of the organization

Virtual Network Grouping

with this grouping the organization is a loosely connected cluster of separate components that are electronically connected for the sharing of information and completion of tasks