Defining Bureaucracy: Pros and Cons - Example

Name ID: Class: Lecturer: Submission date Introduction Bureaucracy was used as a means of running government corporations and organizations and was highly supported by Weber. The views concerning bureaucracy according to its enthusiasts were to develop goal oriented organisations. In the bureaucratic system, the organization was organised in a hierarchical order with information being passed in an upward manner and the instructions flowing down from highest order. Bureaucracy managed to gain popularity and still continues to exist in organizations. Bureaucratic management is still cited as the best form to use when managing mass as it benefits from economies of scale and has no duplication of efforts. The modern bureaucracies are based on the models that were established 100 years ago. The models have been criticized by many due to its effects on how organizations are run. The aim of this essay is to discuss the major advantages and disadvantages of bureaucratic systems in the past and present. The discussion will be able to show that bureaucracies are not appropriate in work places today for effective and efficient management. The essay will first look into readings defining bureaucracy, analyze its advantages and disadvantages, look at bureaucracy at present and in the past and finally explore its context in management situation to determine its relevance in today management (Dwyer, 2006 p. 1239). Bureaucracy Systems Bureaucratic model utilises a hierarchical control and regulations are centrally imposed. The system uses coordination through separate department which are arranged in order. Weber definition of bureaucracy was a goal oriented organizations which were made to perform in relation to rational principles which were vital in goal attainment (Hodgson, 2004, p.81). In a bureaucratic organization, the orders of offices have to be maintained. In order for one to be appointed to a specific office, appointments are made according to set specifications. According to Weber, bureaucracy was an ideal form of organization and depended on certain types of authority. The authority associated with bureaucracy had to be made available through legitimization. The main aim of a bureaucratic system is to help an organization attain its goals in an efficient manner. According to Dwyer (2006, p.1244), bureaucracy is defined as a formal organization which is made of centralized and hierarchical mode of authority which takes importance in impersonal work relationship, technical knowledge as well as rationality. Using the Marxist tradition, the analysis of bureaucracy has two main areas. The first aspect looks at the structure used by the bureaucratic system while the second is concerned with how formal organization implicates work done by humans. The bureaucratic can be identified with the state according to Marxist formulation, and the states do not work for the interests of people but work to reflect and defend the principles of capitalism. The pioneers of bureaucracy argued that it posed the best form of administration in shaping the way organization performs. It has been argued that hierarchy when utilised in high levels may lead to distorted information and poor communication in an organization. This may lead to confusion in an organization (Hales, 2002, p.54). According to Johnson, Wood, Brewster & Brookes, (2009, p.39), bureaucracy is an ideal form and dependent on hierarchical rules which are imposed. The rules are made from rational and legal authority to come up with a legitimate means of commanding and controlling. Bureaucracy has been described as a model that is able to deal with efficient utilization of resources. This type of organization is advantageous as it benefits from economies of scale. The organization is able to maintain standards while at the same time making sure that efforts are not duplicated. A bureaucratic organization encourages specialization which leads to each of the participants to be familiar with the responsibility given hence acts to be more productive (Adler, 1999, p.37). The specialization is the key to efficiency since each worker does the part given skillfully. A bureaucratic system has specialised roles and tasks which ensures that maximum work is done. Another advantage of bureaucracy to the management is standardization. This helps a great deal when dealing with people from diverse occupations and background in an organization. Having a standardized organization acts to reduce individuality in an organization. A standardized organization benefits due to its capability to have the most effective rules in application. This helps in coming up with quality output. A bureaucratic organization has the best coordination. Since the participants are all standardized, it becomes possible to predict their behavior. Using centralized hierarchies is one way in which the bureaucratic organization attains coordination (Balle, 1999, p.190). Bureaucracy is a strong structure that cannot be destroyed easily. Once the structure has been established, chances of removing it become minimal. The model has continued its dominance in the companies through adaptations (Walton, 2005, p.571). The bureaucracy allows the decisions to be made by the top of the command. This becomes advantageous since this is the best group due to experience. The decision made through the top command has the credibility as this level is associated with people who are more knowledgeable about the organization (Hales, 2002, p.54). A bureaucratic organization follows rules which help in controlling behavior to give guidance. The organizations using the bureaucratic model have set expectations on how the individuals ought to behave while on their jobs. The system has the ability to make sure that once the employee is in the workplace, the behavior must be according to the set standards. The workers are expected to stick to the set job roles which make management easier (Stazyk & Geordel, 2010, p.647). Though the system has advantages as outlined above, bureaucratic systems incur high cost due to specialization in large organizations. As the size of the organization increases in size, Coordination the fragmented specialties become expensive. There are costs which are incurred in calling meetings, training among other issue which leads to an escalating expenditure. Bureaucratic organization uses set rules ion guiding the employees. In some cases, these rules become too much restrictive which may confuse the employees. Most people resent rules as they perceive them to inhibit their personal freedom. In some cases, the rules set may be too much restrictive. As the organization experiences changes in situations, more rules are laid out which means that the employees have a lot of rules to follow. This leads to a situation where the employees gets confused and do not know which rule to follow. The final resort may be that the employees will ignore these rules depending on their understanding as well as mood (Balle, 1999, p.191). Bureaucracy poses a challenge of distorting the information. The decisions made at the top flows slowly to the bottom and get distorted as they pass through the system due to coordination. Bureaucracies have a long life cycle and the command is executed by one person who makes the decisions in a pyramid like chain. This system where the decision is deferred from top to bottom leads to lack of responsibility unless the person is forced to this leads to a situation where all problems are passed to the top management. This leads to the problem since the top of organizations have few individuals. Pushing all the decision making processes to the top of organization leads to decision bottleneck. The people at the bottom have to wait for long before decisions are delivered. During this period, the employees may lose faith in management and can result into improvising. This can lead to disastrous results in coordination (Balle, 1999, p.194). Another disadvantage of bureaucracy is the view perceived by the employees. Bureaucracy is on most cases viewed negatively by the employees of large organizations. Most employees perceive the system to be a failure and blame it on lack of effectiveness. Few employees believe in bureaucracy which may lead to them ignoring some of the bureaucratic procedures. The bureaucratic system is slow, and some of its problems started a long time ago (Hodgson, 2004, p.82). The bureaucratic system tends to hold people back from performing their work as they want to. This may lead to management suffering as the workers starts ignoring the set procedures. Some of the principles that are held by the bureaucratic models are already obsolete and poses a danger to organizations. For examples, the bureaucracies used clauses which protected them from other influences. This poses a danger especially in situations such as hospitals where lives of patients may be at danger (Balle, 1999, p.193). Despite changes that has been evident in organizations, modern bureaucracies still exists along post-bureaucracies. One of such modern bureaucracies is the hospitals which still operate using the guidelines that were set more than 100 years ago. The ideals that are used by these institutions are those of bureaucracy such as utilising dedicated system for everyone’s good. The problems that are faced with the modern bureaucracy range from financing and lack of effectiveness in the work done. Unlike the past when the bureaucratic management was viewed as the most appropriate model, today, employees have lost faith in bureaucracy. There is the assumption at the present that bureaucracy cannot work and hence it is bypassed. The hierarchical organizations are dysfunctional and act to burden the employees. The recent research looking at the bureaucracy portrays it as slow and inefficient and hampered with hierarchy. High levels of the hierarchy are taken to distort and inhibit the flow of information in the organization. Some researchers have concluded that the bureaucratic model still hold relevance in today’s organizations’ structures. There are still organizations that continue to exist and perform using the bureaucratic control in their structures. These are organizations with labor segmentation, and hierarchical order in their administration. The early bureaucratic organizations were based on the Weber’s ideal theory of bureaucracy. The new form of bureaucracy has empathized on the flexibility of the systems and employees involvement using new technology and quality control. There is also using of external networks and alliances (Adler, 1999, p.44). The today’s organization still exhibits bureaucracies despite the rise of post-bureaucracy. Post-bureaucracy has been supported by technological changes and globalization (Johnson, Wood, Brewster & Brookes, 2009, p.39). Post-bureaucracy has delegated more power to the employees (Hodgson, 2004, p.85). The existence of bureaucratic structures is from the fact that they offer the best alternative in controlling and coordinating works in large organizations compared to post-bureaucracy. The system has been in place for a long time and managed to survive the test of time. In large organizations, bureaucracy helps through economies of scale and production of standardized quality. The problem arises due to the fact that there may arise from poor communication within the organization. This when combined with other disadvantages of the bureaucracy may lead to ineffectiveness of the model (Hales, 2002, p.53). To be able to make relevance in today’s management, the disadvantages associated with bureaucracy must be resolved first. Resolving these disadvantages, the management is required to have meetings where there are discussions regarding the organizations’ state and what needs to be done are discussed. These coordination meeting are key factors which can revive the organization spirit of competition. The final outcome is a high efficiency in the bureaucratic organization. Bureaucratic organizations have also made sure that the top management explains to those lower in hierarchy how they want the job to be done differently from way ob was done in the past. The top management job must be taken as an educational role. Using these steps, bureaucratic organizations can become more relevant in today’s management (Balle, 1999, p.197). Conclusion In conclusion, bureaucracies are goal oriented organizations. These organizations are designed with set principles which help them in attaining their goals. The information in these hierarchical organizations flows from the top to the bottom in the command chain. Bureaucracy helps in providing standardization within an organization while at the same time avoiding duplication. Having a standard in an organization helps a lot in coming up with high quality products. The bureaucratic structure is strong and can not be easily destroyed. An organization that utilizes bureaucracy has an advantage since it can be able to benefit from economies of scale. This is evident in large organizations and highly beneficial. The main disadvantage lies in the fact that the models may leads to distorted information and negative perceptions from the employees. The model is still applied today by some organizations. If properly applied with care being taken to counter disadvantages, bureaucracies still are appropriate in the workplace today for effective and efficient management. References Adler, P 1999, ‘Building better bureaucracies’, Academy of Management Executive, vol. 13, no. 4, pp 36-47. Balle, M 1999, ‘Making bureaucracy work’, Journal of Management in Medicine, vol. 13, no. 3, p. 190-200. Dwyer, R 2006, ‘Formal organizations in contemporary society’, Management Decision, vol. 43, no. 9, pp 1232-1248. Hales, C 2002, ‘”Bureaucracy-lite” and Continuities in Managerial Work’, British Journal of Management, vol. 13, p. 51-66. Hodgson, D 2004, ‘Project Work: The Legacy of Bureaucratic Control in the Post Bureaucratic Organization’, Organisation, vol. 11(1), pp 81-100. Johnson, P., Wood, G., Brewster, C, & Brookes, M 2009, ‘The Rise of Post-Bureaucracy: Theorists’ Fancy or Organizational Praxis?’, International Sociology, pp 24-37. Stazyk, E & Geordel, H 2010, ‘The Benefits of Bureaucracy: Public Managers’ Perceptions of Political Support, Goal Ambiguity, and Organizational Effectiveness’, Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, Vol. 21, pp 645-672. Walton, E 2005, ‘The Persistence of Bureaucracy: A Meta-analysis of Weber’s Model of Bureaucratic Control’, Organization Studies, Vol. 26, No. 4, p. 569-600. Read More