Evolving Lines of Management Thought: Post-Bureaucracy and the Flexible Organization - Term Paper Example

Evolving Lines Of Management Thought: Post-Bureaucracy And The Flexible Organization The twenty first century organizations face a set of “economic, socio-cultural, political, and technological” (Iedema, 2003, p. 2) factors that are quite different from that of the twentieth century firms. The organizations are undergoing a change that can be referred t in the following ways; such as; “reduction of formal levels of hierarchy” (Iedema, 2003, p. 2), greater emphasis laid on “flexibility rather than rule-following and the creation of a more permeable boundary between the inside and outside of organization” (Iedema, 2003, p. 2). At present times bureaucratic forms of organization that dominated in the last century has gone under reconstruction. This paper intends to deal with the issue of post bureaucratic organizations and the concern of flexibility with them. Post-Bureaucratic Organizational structure This new form is defined as a hybrid form of organizational structure and offers “insight into the intrinsic difficulties involved in the refurbishment of large complex organizations” (Josserand, Teo & Clegg, 2006, pp. 54-55). The form of post-bureaucratic organization has grown significant in the recent years (Erickson et al, 2009, p. 144). This term had been devised in the 1980’s (Corporate Planning and Strategic Human Resources Management, n.d). The structure of a post-bureaucratic organization exceeds the traditional bureaucratic organizations in the sense that in these newer structures facilitate the handling a vast range of conditions. Post bureaucratic organization allows a “flexible and self-(re-)fashioning enactments of work and self” (Iedema, 2003, p. 53). The “elements of an organic structure” (Josserand, Teo & Clegg, 2006, pp. 54-55) are combined with more internalized as well as indirect forms of control. Post bureaucracy is not entirely achievable in its pure form. Some organizations adopt a post-bureaucratic rhetoric as well as maintain the traditional structural hierarchies. But it often creates “tensions between post-bureaucratic aspirations and traditional work practices” (Iedema, 2003, p. 2). Enhancement of the transparency of work is one of the key goals of the post-bureaucratic organization. This is to be achieved through “knowledging, communication and interaction” (Iedema, 2003, p. 193). It is aimed at changing the practices that lead to the maintenance of preset benchmarks, standards and other meta-discursive constructs. This calls for proper communications within and among teams and verticals. This increases the credibility of the organizations and improves the level of efficacy of the team members. The structure of management system strongly influences the communication patterns existing within the teams. External participation at any stage of the ongoing process should be considered as important. Inputs from the external parties (that do not belong to the team) at any stage, from defining the structure of the project to making evaluation of the final results, increases involvement of the different departments and rules out the chances of any communication gaps. In certain cases intervention by third parties becomes necessary, particularly when the issues cannot be settled internally (Porter et al, 2011, pp. 54-55). Transparency of work also leads to formation of trust among the workers. Trust is constructed by the people in the organization through the enactment of their individual job roles. The organizational culture plays a big role in building the trust among the employees. When we adjudge somebody as trustworthy, we expect that person to exercise her autonomy in a responsible way. It leads to the conservation of good work culture in the organization. As we have seen the case of the former executive at the Goldman Sachs, who had left the organization due to the fact that the culture at the firm was toxic and destructive(Craig & Thomas, n.d). He even cited the cause that it was time for him to leave the firm since he could no longer look into a student’s eye and say in favor of his organization (Roose, 2012, Exhibit 10). Flexibility in Post-Bureaucratic Organizations Power is often looked at as something different from individual autonomy. It is believed that empowerment of the individual employee and application of progressive techniques will lead to greater commitment by the employee ensuring better results for the company. However such assessments are often based on partial data. Power should be viewed as a relationship that when exercised will help an individual; both the manager and the subordinates, achieve a sense of purpose and identity keeping parity with the demands of the situation (Knights & Willmont, 2007, pp. 253-254). Employee empowerment along with the adoption of new managerial roles can be used as post bureaucratic solutions to the uncertainties that the organizations face due to occurrences of destabilizing disturbances in the businesses (Wood, 2009, p. 29). In order to ensure employee commitment the employers have to make true assessment of the capacities of each individual employee and provide honest feedback of their performances (O’Malley, 2003, p. 8). Attempts made to impose control upon the employees would lead to feelings of resistance among the employees (Knights & Willmont, 2007, p. 35). Post bureaucratic organizations are predominantly present in sectors that require highly skilled workers. It is required of the organizations that follow the post bureaucratic structure to create employee responsibility and pay greater attention to employee commitment since the workers that are employed in these organizations are not easily replaceable. In bureaucratic organizations the employees are not indispensable since their skill set is quite commonly available among the pool of workers. Organizational control requires of the workers to strictly maintain a set of rules and follow standard working patterns. If the workers do not like the company he or she has the option to find other employers. On the other side of the coin, the employers are also free to find out other people to fill up the positions. Thus the level of skill required in a certain kind of job role relates to the level of organizational control. With increase of skill level the level organizational control is reduced. Skill is subsequently related to technology since the level of skills acquired by an employee is determined partly by his efficiency and partly by her adaptive capacity with the emerging technologies and knowledge of the same. Since the control within the organizations are softened and the managerial system does not mandatorily focuses upon following the predetermined regulations, the flexibility of the workers as well the managers increase in a post bureaucratic organization. Post bureaucratic organizations can be categorized as knowledge intensive organizations in which the underlying power relations of an organization are laid bare and explore the language of creating knowledge and management expertise (Sitkin, Cardinal & Bijlsma-Frankema, 2010, p. 93). According to a research made on the top performing American enterprises that presented a report on how these firms handled the issue of hiring and promotion, it was found that the best companies possessed leaders, who had an obsession “with the talent issue” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9). These organizations had focused primarily and endlessly upon “finding and hiring as many top performers as possible” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9). They emphasized upon the recruitment of as many talented personnel as possible. The highly skilled workers possess “the power to command better treatment” (Knights & Willmont, 2007, p. 496). They have been termed as “gold-collar workers” (Knights & Willmont, 2007, p. 496) so as to differentiate them from the blue-collar workers (that are manual workers) and the white-collar workers (that do clerical jobs). The top rated American companies segregated their best employees and rewarded them highly. They were also pushed into senior positions as a part of incentives. In the modern world, success would be a term closely related to “the talent mind-set” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9). There is a deep rooted belief that a company can outperform its competitors by acquiring better talent. However, this trend has led to the emergence of a situation of talent war. In the zeal to acquire new talents the companies are firing their older employees. These employees are rich in experience and are aware of the ropes of the business world. This would increase the number of unemployed. “The Bank for International Settlement” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9), Switzerland, in a recent publication in “Range of Methodologies for Risk and Performance Alignment of Remuneration” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9) has stated that the global financial crisis that started in the year 2007 had been triggered by the “deficiencies in compensation practices” (Wyrsch, 2012, Exhibit 9). In the post bureaucratic organizations controls within the organizations are softened and the strategic planning processes assume a more creative form. Networking amongst the members of the organizations increase and opens the forum for greater learning. The opportunity for greater organizational learning increases making the organizations “more innovative and flexible” (Josserand, Teo & Clegg, 2006, p.55). Thus post bureaucratic organization is not about following some set of pre-determined rules. It is all about enacting the rule-making. In other words it can be said that it is an endeavor o shift the “organizational ‘relations of rule’ into ‘enactments of self-rule’” (Iedema, 2003, p. 193). Conclusion There is an area of intersection between scientific management and human relation ideas. The decisions of the managers of the organizations decide whether the organizations would succeed or fail in the long run. The success of an organization depends not only on the careful strategies designed but also on the ability of the persons in the management system to make proper anticipation of the future and make rapid responses. Post bureaucratic organizations provide a space for innovative actions by the self and hence lead to better opportunity for growth for the organization. References 1) Porter, et al. (2011). Forecasting and Management of Technology. John Wiley & Sons. 2) Iedema, R. (2003). Discourses of Post-Bureaucratic Organization. John Benjamins Publishing 3) Josserand, E., Teo, S. & Clegg, S. (2006), From bureaucratic to post-bureaucratic: the difficulties of transition, Journal of Organizational Change Management, 19(1), pp. 54-64. 4) Corporate Planning and Strategic Human Resources Management (n.d.). Nirali Prakashan. 5) Knights, D. & Willmont, H. (2007). Introducing Organizational Behavior & Management . Cengage Learning EMEA 6) O’Malley, M. (2000), Creating Commitment: How to Attract and Retain Talented Employees by Building Relationships That Last. John Wiley & Sons. 7) Sitkin, S. M., Cardinal, L. B. & Bijlsma-Frankema, K. M. (2010). Organizational Control. Cambridge University Pres. 8) Wood, G. (2009). Human Resource Management: A Critical Approach. Taylor & Francis. 9) Wyrsch, L. (2012), Is the war for talent over?, Ecademy, available at: http://www.ecademy.com/node.php?id=178096 (accessed on December 31, 2012) 10) Roose, K. (2012), Wall Street’s Latest Campus Recruiting Crisis, Dealbook, available at: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/03/15/wall-streets-latest-recruiting-crisis-on-campuses/ (accessed on December 31, 2012) 11) Craig, S & Thomas Jr., L. (2012), Public Rebuke of Culture at Goldman Opens Debate, New York Times, available at: http://dealbook.nytimes.com/2012/03/14/public-rebuke-of-culture-at-goldman-opens-debate/ (accessed on December 31, 2012) 12) Erickson et al., (2009). Business in Society. Polity. Read More