Management Theory and Conflict in Internet Organisations - Essay Example

Internet is basically a collection of interconnected and autonomous networks which implements open standards and protocols. An Internet organisation is a corporation that sets standards and protocols for the web organisations to conduct their business operations in highly effective manner. There is no concise definition of Internet organisation and many researchers such as Speakman and Ryals (2010) and Watson (2008) explained that internet organisation is a volunteer organisation that is set up for controlling the future of the Internet. For instance, ISOC (Internet Society) appoints a technical advisory group known as Internet Architecture Board (IAB) for evaluation and setting up of standards. The protocols and standards are gathered in the form of various studies and drafts and the Internet organisation evaluates whether the specifications will be put forward by means of a process that will elevate the existing specifications to a new level to set the ‘Internet Standards’ (Graffigna, Libreri & Bosio, 2012). For instance, the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) develops working groups to develop the list of specifications which are further evaluated by Internet Engineering Steering Group (IESG) and IAB; the Internet Society will then publish the latest standards for Internet companies. All web standards are then promulgated by World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) along with other groups. In the last few years, the field of management and organisational behaviour has diversified into a wide range of subjects as the organisation structure has changed drastically (Speakman & Ryals, 2010; Watson, 2008). The changes in the organisation and other aspects of business has been due to the world moving towards a digital era and bringing immense changes in management of organisation and the way businesses are conducted. As the study of management and organisation has broadened, the central point or area of study is the development that has taken place in the thought process of management and it is known as management theory. As numerous researchers have differing views on organisations, management teams and their structures, they have classified their work into different kinds of approaches (Graffigna, Libreri & Bosio, 2012). These approaches are based upon the assumptions and situations that the researchers have undergone while designing their management approaches. In order to compile similar viewpoints under one category, the work of corresponding researchers is categorised into specific approaches so that the management team is provided a simple framework of study and ensure that the focus of study is set in one particular direction. A framework in perspective allows the management to design and develop all plans for the organisation in a systematic manner. The traditional management studies are classified into four major categories namely, the classical approach, the human relations or behavioural approach, the systems approach and the contingency approach (Yu & Canella, 2007). Since the study of management has undergone various stages of evolution, the latest theories have included aspects of the postmodern organisations which are known as Internet organisations. It can be observed and categorised that in the present era, all organisations can be regarded as internet organisations as they are involved in one type of data network or another. Regardless of organisations having physical offices and shops, conducting physical business processes such as warehousing and distribution, they still require the use of applying digital solutions in the business organisation. Internet is a vital tool for communicating with customers as well as majority of the customers for the business organisations may be targeted through online mediums. Email, social networking websites, the various job portals and etc are the popular digital tools used by organisations. The marketing functions of businesses are conducted using the internet.   Up till now, all of the approaches developed have both pros and cons for the organisations as they tend to focus on any particular aspect of the management and overlooked other vital factors. For instance, the classical theory emphasised the importance of the structure and purpose of the organisation which were related to its technical aspects (Alijloni, Almashaqba & Al-Qaeed, 2010). The writers of this approach based their assumptions on the logical and rational behaviours (Watson, Blackstone & Gardiner, 2007). The management and organisational structure is no doubt extremely important factor for any organisation but the importance is not limited to only these factors. The organisational structure is just one aspect of the internal factors of success for the organisation. There are a number of other important factors to be considered as well. On the other hand, experts of the human relations or behavioural approach studied the impact of informal organisations on the satisfaction level of employees and believed that these form of organisations are ideal for meeting the social and psychological needs of the people (DePablos, 2006; Ma, Lee & Yu, 2008). The theorists working on this approach did not consider the impact of socio-technological factors on the work behaviour of employees and kept their focus on attitudes and behavioural study of people (Green, 2008; Jacks et al., 2011). This approach therefore may not be completely applicable to the modern day organisations as this approach is overlooking the socio-technological factors which are a very crucial element in regard to the modern organisations. Considering the negative points of the previous workers who had strong viewpoint about classical and human relations perspectives, a new approach was developed known as ‘system theory’ that viewed organisations enclosed in a systematic loop (Huang et al., 2007; Ruzita & Parnell, 2008). According to this latest body of management theory, external environment factors are important for the organisation as they have an immense impact on the operational activities of a corporation. The main focus of this approach is on the interaction that takes place between two vital variables i.e. social and technical so that new systems of organisations can be made part of the management team with utmost ease (Richardsen, Collins & Genet, 2006). All of these approaches focused on specific aspects of management and did not emphasise the importance of other vital factors of effective management such as communication processes, interaction alternatives available within the organisation, management of both interrelationship and external conflicts, managing changes within the work culture and many more. Managing communication processes in organisations is extremely important. The impact of face to face communication would always differ from online communication. The prior theories also did not focus on diversity related issues which is one of the major concerns of all organisations due to the emergence of global village concept. In order to allow the organisations to have a flexible and well-integrated process, the contingency theories were introduced that highlighted a range of applicable ways of differentiating among alternative forms of organisation structures and management systems (Alampay & Hechanova, 2010; Rani & Joshi, 2012). Within these categories, various researchers developed other theories known as decision making theory, social action theory and chaos theory. The basic foundation of these theories was that the organisation structures require huge amount of communication flow and interaction among people and all of these processes need to be effectively managed. One of the growing concerns for the writers was the increase in conflicting incidents in the businesses that were impacting the productivity of organisations. In order to mitigate the conflicting risk, a new body of theories was developed known as information technology theory and it further evolved into strategic management theory (Mullins, 2005; Coyle-Shapiro & Shore, 2007; Tay & Diener, 2011). With the advent of technology and development of information technologies, there is a growing need of managing everything in the virtual environment properly so that the corporate forms and structures can easily blend with new and changing business atmosphere (Gottschalg & Zollo, 2007; Philips & Lawrence, 2012). Managing all business functions and employees in a virtual environment is a highly challenging task as the controlling aspects physically is different from controlling aspects virtually. This new era is known as postmodernism by the management theorists and it views the entire system in a holistic form incorporating all internal and external factors that can have impact of the organisation’s functioning, projects and operations. Hence, these postmodern organisations are a healthy challenge for the management team as they stress the importance of understanding the concepts of management and behaviours within the organisation (Henry & Evans, 2007). Regardless of the type of approach followed by an organisation, it is vital for the management team to make it compatible to its business operations’ requirements so that everything within the organisation is coordinated appropriately and there are less chances of conflict among the employees (Sanders, 2007). Employee conflicts need to be managed in an appropriate manner by the management as small conflicts if not dealt at the right time may lead to further problems in the organisation regarding cooperation and coordination of activities. The recent trend in Internet organisation is implementing a scientific value approach which emphasises the need of balancing between the knowledge of theories of management and the complexities that are faced by the management in today’s modern corporations (Lia & Hu, 2007; Tay & Diener, 2011). One of the key elements of all of these theories is that they give emphasis to identifying the needs of every individual working within the environment by designing an appropriate structure of management. This is so because human resources are vital elements for any organisation to function, hence the human resources need to be given consideration and value by the management. However, Phillips and Lawrence (2012) stress the importance of managing the interrelationships by studying the working behaviours of employees and incorporating all necessary requirements within the business structure. Employees need to be equipped with resources required for performing the job role according to requirements. Although the new management theories have relevance to the Internet organisations, they have the potential to provide the desired results only when implemented wisely. One of the latest theories in the field of management is change theory also known as learning organisation structure. Since every organisation is faced with numerous challenges within the business world, it should have adaptive systems in place so that any desired modifications can be included as part of the management quickly. The pre-requisite for implementation of this theory is continuous research in the environment about the latest happenings so that timely and accurate action can be taken. On the other hand, too much flexibility causes negative impact on the company as the people get over-confident and consider every change (small or big) to have significant affect on the business entity. There should be a striking balance between the management of organisation structure, system, processes, people and conflict (Hasin, 2010; Teece, 2010). The classic literature on management and modern practices are in clash with each other at many instances. The reason is the dynamism of modern corporate culture which was not expected previously. Particularly speaking in the context of internet organisations, which are entirely different in nature, structure and operations, the challenges are more severe and the way to resolve them does not match with the one adopted in other organisations. In order to resolve this conflict, it is mandatory that the underlying spirit of management theory is identified and analysed before applying it to Internet organisation. The careful adherence to the core of management theory can give birth to certain alternatives to that theory and these alternatives can turn beneficial to Internet organisations (Philips & Lawrence, 2012). Furthermore, there is a strong need to develop literature specific to Internet organisations as these organisations are emerging in the modern century with a different business environment as compared to the prior business environment. In addition to the organisations, that are virtual many other organisations are establishing their virtual offices to facilitate the customers round the clock across the globe. These virtual offices are set with the objective of customer facilitation hence the challenges posed to these offices must be resolved carefully so that the desired objectives are achieved (Green, 2008). As today’s age is driven by the technological breakthroughs, the organisations have to develop a management culture and a structure that supports them in handling all challenges encountered by them. The traditional approaches of management can be applied to the new organisations but they need to be modified to a great extent for accomplishing the desired goals. Since there are new approaches for the Internet organisations, the corporations should focus on development of the organisation structures in accordance to the key elements highlighted by the experts of the field (Gottschalg & Zollo, 2007). Therefore management theories are of immense importance to the internet organisation especially for handling conflicts and other issues but the internet organisation need to consider the present scenarios of management while devising strategies. Every Internet organisation has to ensure that it implements a management theory that will handle all critical aspects that can raise conflict within the business operations, provide opportunities to the employees to manage the projects in a highly effective manner and ensure that the operational activities allow the companies to save huge amount of time and money. Hence, Internet organisations have to take advantage of various studies of management and create a work environment that is supportive and conducive for the corporations which will enhance the performance of the corporations in the long-run. This is also important to remain competitive in the business environment and be able to deal with the challenges pertaining in the business world. References Alampay, E.A. and Hechanova, Ma R.M., 2010. Monitoring employee use of the Internet in Philippine Organisations. Journal on Information Systems in Developing Countries, 40(5), pp. 1-20. Alijloni, M.M., Almashaqba, Z.M.S. and Al-Qaeed, M.A.N, 2010. The classical theory of organisation and its relevance. International Journal of Finance and Economics, 41, pp. 60-67. Coyle-Shapiro, Jacqueline A-M. and Shore, L.M., 2007. The employee-organisation relationship: where do we go from here? Human resource management review, 17 (2). pp. 166-179. De Pablos, P.O., 2006. 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