Empowerment to the Employees in Post-bureaucratic Phase - Essay Example

?MANAGING PEOPLE &ORGANISATIONS Introduction The study would reflect on whether getting paid at the end of the month is of primary importance for theemployees or not in the post-bureaucratic era. At first, it becomes essential to understand the post-bureaucratic era. In today’s world, large and complex organizations have become highly heterodox, which has led to an end of bureaucracy. The post-bureaucracy concept can be explained with respect to “hybridity” (Josserand, Teo and Clegg, 2006). These post- bureaucratic era organizations mainly deal with the democratic principles, where they focus highly on the outcomes rather than concentrating on the rules and regulations of control. The transition from bureaucratic phase to post -bureaucratic phase involved diminishing emphasis on formalised internal control mechanism and organization structure. This organizational transformation represents wider cultural, economic and social development along with the fast changing technology, which has also modernized the production techniques. It is very important for the organizations to focus on the outcomes and results as it would help in achieving competitive advantage. The next portion of the study would be reflecting whether the employees only focus on the salary, wages paid etc. It would provide justifications whether to accept this view or not. Empowerment to the Employees in Post-bureaucratic Phase The study tries to show whether getting money at the end of the month is the ultimate goal or objective of the employees and this requires highlighting several factors that are associated with the motivation, goals and objectives of the employees. The reason behind the transitional phase from bureaucratic to post-bureaucratic organizational structure has also been discussed earlier. The transition focused on the work culture, which would ultimately improve the outcomes of the organization (Josserand, Teo and Clegg, 2006). The post-bureaucratic phase is based on democratic principles, which provide high scope to the employees to prove their excellence in terms of their performances. The recruitment of employees is done strictly to ensure that skilled, experienced and highly knowledgeable employees sustain within the organization (Almeida, Fernando and Sheridan, 2012). This would positively impact the performance of the organization. Empowerment is the most important component in the post-bureaucratic phase. It reflects awarding authority or power to those employees who are lower in the organizational hierarchy. This intention of empowerment in this post -bureaucratic phase has been done for creating a work environment where the employees of the organizations would be the decision makers. This would involve awarding the employees with the authority to make various decisions so that they begin feeling a sense of personal identification and individuality. However, the fundamental concept behind this empowerment was that it would allow the business in flourishing fast. The empowerment would allow the organizational employees in functioning without high managerial governance and would increase the organizational performance. It is so because the human element is highly responsible behind disintegration of the potential. The idea of empowerment is for allowing the employees to make decisions based on their own knowledge, expertise and experience. This would statistically increase the overall efficiency of the organization. However, empowerment and reward by promoting to higher level hierarchy would enable the employees to implement their leadership skills. These act as high motivational factors for the employees, enabling them to be loyal to the organization and give their best. This gives them a scope to rise in the hierarchy level by proving their excellence. The leadership skills are big reasons of motivation to the employees and they work hard to prove themselves in order to experience this skill. Getting liberty to take own decisions and handle several business situations give them high satisfaction and this psychology drives them in achieving even higher level within the organization. Moreover, the leadership skills enable good communication of the leader with their subordinates. Thus only getting paid at the end of the month is not the sole objective of the employees working in the organizations. Empowering the subordinates with certain authority helps build a strong relation between the top management and the employees, which in turn helps in developing a good communication between them. Their human skills get enhanced as it includes knowledge and ability to work with diverse people (Northouse, 2004). In order to become a good leader, human skills are required and the leader needs to be sensitive to the needs of other workers within the organizations (Browning, 2007). A good leader requires combination of two skills: the ability to lead other people and work simultaneously. In today’s organization, the employees enjoy and strive for the hierarchical division between each other. This motivates them further to work within the organization and perform better. However, hierarchical division should not create a communication gap, which would result in deterioration of the overall performance of the organization. Rewarding techniques enable good relationship followed by good communication within the top, middle and lower management. Rewarding the employees include promotion, bonus, incentives, recognition etc. The bonuses and incentives along with salary or wages paid to the workers also act as a motivational factor for them. But these are only a part of the motivational factors influencing the employees for better work. The thirst for better recognition, top hierarchical positions within the organization etc., are powerful motivational factors to the employees. Negative aspects of the empowerment There are various negative outcomes of possession of empowerment by the employees. The employees in lower hierarchy might not be able to handle the decision making responsibilities handed over to them in proper manner which might result in deterioration in the overall performance of the organization. Moreover, the employees can try to misutilise the power provided to them. The flexible pattern of the decision making process focuses only on the rules and outcomes rather than rules and regulations within the organization. This would result in increasing unethical activities conducted by the employees. Their thirst towards achieving higher position in the hierarchy with increased salary, bonuses, incentives etc., might lead to implementation of various unethical decision-making within the organization. It is very important to provide specific limitations to the empowerment of the employees. Thus, the following statement “What is important for employees is the pay they bring home at the end of the month” has contradictory view from two different perspectives. On one hand the post bureaucracy era have given scope to employees to achieve recognition and position within the organization. On the other hand the liberal organization structure in this era has increased the attraction of the employees towards earning high income for which they often conduct unethical activities. Conclusion The implementation of post-bureaucratic organization structure has helped in the successful functioning of the organizations. This phase can be categorized under high modernity phase where the organizations require skilled, experienced and knowledgeable workers. The post bureaucracy concept has been described in terms of hybridity, where it mainly deals with the democratic principles. The post-bureaucratic organization structure focus highly on the outcomes and results rather than concentrating on the rules and regulations of control. Empowerment has been one of the vital components in the post-bureaucratic phase where rewarding the employee placed at lower levels in the hierarchy with power, authority etc., takes place. This gives immense satisfaction to the employees and work as a motivational factor for better performances. Rewarding with bonuses and incentives and getting the wages or salary at the end of the month are not the only factors which satisfy the employees. They aim towards earning high income in the post -bureaucratic phase. This influences them in making various unethical decisions for their own advantage. Thus, in some cases, earnings available at the month end become the ultimate motto of the employees. However, this is not applicable at all times. If the organizations include some definite rules and regulations along with focusing on the outcomes, it is expected that the organizations, as well as the employees within the organization, would achieve success and flourish at much faster rate in this post-bureaucratic phase. Reference List Almeida, S., Fernando, M. and Sheridan, A., 2012. Revealing the screening: organisational factors influencing the recruitment of immigrant professionals. The International Journal of Human Resource Management, 23(9), 1950-1965. Browning, B. W., 2007. Leadership in desperate times: An analysis of endurance: Shackleton’s incredible voyage through the lens of leadership theory. Advances in Developing Human Resources, 9 (2), pp. 183-198. Josserand, E., Teo, S. and Clegg, S., 2006. From bureaucratic to post-bureaucratic: The difficulties of transition. Journal of Organizational Change Management, 19(1), pp. 54-64. Northouse, P. G., 2004. Leadership: Theory and practice. London: Sage. Read More