Culture and Structure of the School Needs - Case Study Example

Name: Tutor: Title: A discussion on whether the Current Culture and Structure of the School need a complete overhaul if the school is to have any future at all Course: Date: Introduction It will be important to argue for in this essay that the culture and the structure of United Nations International School of Melbourne (UNISM) need to be reformed. However, it is not necessary that a complete overhaul must be considered for the school to develop and have a future. In this essay, therefore, the strengths of Bruce will be discussed against his weaknesses to determine whether the school needed a complete overhaul for its future developments. The leadership competence of Bruce and the positive changes to the school that resulted from his IT investments will be assessed. The importance of Information Technology to contemporary organizational management particularly the teaching field will be considered in this essay to determine whether or not Bruce was on the right track. To a less extent, the negative changes associated with Bruce’s leadership style and the impact of the new IT systems will be assessed in relation to how they affected the organizational culture and structure, attitude and morale of working among the teaching staffs. Recommendations will be made based on relevant literature to propose the best ways that the new management should take into consideration to ensure that the current culture and structure is improved to favor the teaching staff. From the case study, it is apparent that the Principal and Board management of the school really needed software to help them collect detailed and accurate information concerning the progressive performance of the school for decision-making purposes. Through the leadership of Bruce, a software package was developed and this successfully helped to measure the academic performance of students in the school. As a result of this technological advancement, the management of the school became knowledgeable on how to efficiently control their attendance issues. This is because the attendance record and academic progress of every student as well as the entire cohorts could be easily tracked. Such technological achievement of the newly developed IT program greatly pleased the Board and principal. Given the current pace at which Information Technology is changing and the manner in which Bruce, the IT Coordinator had made efforts to re-reengineer the process of acquiring the attendance record. It would be important for the new management to involve the teaching staff in more trainings and development so as to instill in them a culture of embracing technological change rather than encouraging them to be change resistant. George and Jones (2005, p.567) argued that in order for organizations to excel in terms of efficiency or quality, it is important for the organizations to constantly adopt the latest technology. However, it is common to find that when the management tries to adopt the technologies, employees become resistible to such changes. The authors also examined that in an organization, the change introduced in one department may not be favorable to another. As a result, a conflict between the two departments may arise preventing the smooth implementation of the change Therefore, the new Principal and the Board should ensure that they get a more competent IT Coordinator who will work to improve the user interface of the program and increase its functioning speed. This will make the interface of the program user-friendly particularly for the teaching staff who will find it easy to enter the attendance record for every class attended, and thus enhance their morale of working. In doing so, the culture of respecting the staff would be restored now that one of the teaching staff, Josh Crane, the Head of Elementary section claimed that “One of the greatest focuses for the school was to accolade respect to staff.” According to Josh, it seemed that culture had changed due to the influence that Bruce had exerted on the school systems. Therefore, the teaching staff should be encouraged that both the current and future IT systems invested in the school are to enhance their teaching tasks, and thus all programs developed are associated with positive impacts not only to the school, but also to the teachers because they are knowledge providers. Majority of the teaching staff seemed to assume that school is well-positioned to provide the needed services yet it was quite clear that a lot was to be done to ensure that the school competes well with other school in Information Technology advancements. A coordinated system of working has to be encouraged through team work as well as across the structural processes of the school to develop more IT infrastructures in order to develop staff into competent IT practitioners in the school. This could help to foster a culture change management rather than creating incredibly frustrating situations when it comes to introducing change in the school. A healthy organizational culture can only be maintained if the supervisor finds it necessary to understand the kind of problems his or her organization is facing as well as determine how those issues can be dealt with accordingly and amicably. Whereas the superiors focus on developing a healthy culture, his or her employees would consider that the changes being implemented are significant. Thus, the employees would find it valuable to adjust to the newly put in place cultural tactics (Baruch 2007). For the case of UNISM School, therefore, the new top management of the school should realize that a culture becomes a liability to an organization when their shared values are not well-linked to those that are expected to enhance the effectiveness and future developments of the organization. The culture of cooperative spirit that seem to have lost because of the increased competition at the time Bruce was assigned the duty of IT Coordinator, in particular amongst the teaching staff working outside the High School should be restored. This also implies that staffs need to be encouraged to work across the sections of the school regularly and easily to reduce the competition that is already filtered into certain sections of the structural operation of the school. Robbins et al. (2011, p.466) examined that some theorists argue that the culture of a given organization offers a significant depiction of how an organization operates. Robbins defined organizational culture as a system of the shared beliefs and values that are held by members of an organization to distinguish it from the rest of other organizations. The significance of the cooperative culture of staffs appreciating each other as it used to be must be one of the major overhauls to be considered if the school has to achieve sustainable developments. This will enhance and maintain the culture of acknowledging the contributions of others on projects well-done as it was before Bruce taking on the position of IT Coordinator. It cannot be doubted that appreciating other people for their achievements in the organization motivates them to work ever better not only to individuals, but also improves the overall performance of the organization. Since communication plays an integral role in the organization. To a less extent, it can be argued based on the current problems experienced with the structural operation of UNISM School that, a complete overhaul should be considered to control the confusion that was caused on the school’s chain of command due to Bruce’s close relationship with the Principal. Since Bruce is not in the school, the new management should come up with clearly defined communication links and line of authority. This will enable the teaching staff to know their Head of the Section and the kind of information to report to the relevant administrative departments. As a result, the blurred lines of authority experienced in the school will be solved because the issue of additional role will no longer be encouraged. It means that the three Heads of the School Section Head of the Upper Elementary, Head of the Middle and Head of the Elementary will be considered on the same level of authority on the school’s organizational chart. It is true that communication and team work is required across the different sections of the school in order to advance in IT as Bruce emphasized. However, mutual understanding is needed among the Principal and the Board, Heads of the School Section and the teaching staff prior to implementing any special projects. Actually, it was against the structural operation of the school that Bruce involved in the development of special projects in various sections that have turned out to be absolute disaster in their administration due to lack of communication. It is important that Kevin Devine, the new Principal is quite aware that staff particularly those in the High School section differed in their views concerning the structural leadership style of Bruce in comparison to other members in the school. As noted by Nella Young “Bruce headed so well the Section, despite the complaints made by other members about his availability Bruce spared time to communicate with us in this section.” This clearly shows that even though Bruce was much held up with so many duties as the Principal and the IT Coordinator, the communication links between him and those who worked under were open for any discussion. Nella also reported that Bruce encouraged them view themselves as a team and they cooperated so well. It means that the structural process under the leadership of Bruce served so clearly. Based on the analysis of the structural theory by Walsham (2009, p.359), it is relevant to point out that structural characteristics of the social systems are presented in form social conducts. Behavior and structure should be considered as intertwined organizational aspects. This means that people in the organization develop through socialization process, and thus become dependent of the already put in place social structures. However, it is quite evidence from the UNISM School’s case study that socialization structures work as medium of human activities and the outcome of such activities. Therefore, it can be concluded that social structures are not only used to restrict behaviors, but also enhance opportunities to develop human behavior. Probably, structural adjustment need to be made to separate the position of the Head of the Section from IT Coordinator so that other members of the school can easily reach either of the two heads. Therefore, it is relevant to mention that dominant leadership style such as that portrayed by Bruce can either change or maintain cultural values of an organization. The case for UNISM School clearly indicates that introduction of the new IT systems significantly changes the manner in which operations are executed. This requires careful management of the associated processes because they influence the building of new organizational culture. For example, the culture of cooperation that was commonly practiced at the school changed immediately when Bruce was appointed the IT Coordinator, a position that gave him the authority to introduce the use of information systems in the school. According to Lippeveld (2011, p.24) whether perfectly appropriate, technologically recognized routine or well-organized information systems could be made readily accessible, still they would not be easily introduced and immediately understood by the users. Lippeveld concluded that such difficulties occur because information systems are basically managed and used by the people who actually have different beliefs and attitudes, intentions and practices. This implies that changing them could mean taking significantly more time to allow change to take place (Lippeveld 2011). Similarly, Yehuda, Baruch (2007) in her article entitled “The Cultural Theory in Organizational Management: Analytical Approach and Case Study Organizations, argued that a number of leaders do not know the existing culture in the organization and cannot even make effort to understand the varied formal theories used in managing the corporation. Such leaders run the organizations or their groups in the manner in which they are comfortable leading in. Although it is obvious that different people may lead various groups in different ways, the fact remains that the methods used may not necessarily work in favor of how one expected. Therefore, it is critical that leaders should not be informers but also become flexible leaders. In order to be effective, it could be important for UNISM School to adopt a contingency approach to adjust and manage its structure in a more consistent manner with the information technology that is already in use within the school, environment it operates in as well as other contextual measures. The case for UNISM School provides the view that organizational culture and structure if well-managed can support the linkage operation between information technology adoption and the organizational growth. Therefore, the two organizational aspects are critical success factor whenever the management decides to develop and implement information systems. Conclusion Based on the above discussion on the case study and the relevant theories of organizational culture and structure management, it can be concluded that the culture and the structure of United Nations International School of Melbourne (UNISM) need requires a major overhaul. However, it is not necessary that a complete overhaul must be considered for the school to develop and have a future because Bruce, the previous IT Coordinator had already introduced the basic and critical technological investment. Therefore, the new management of the school should focus on improving on them and current the teaching staffs to embrace change rather than being change resistant for achieve effective performance and compete well with other schools. Bibliography Baruch, Y., 2007, "The Cultural Theory in Managing Organizations: Analytical Approach and Case for Organization Studies.” Retrieved 17th March, 2013 from, George, J.M & Jones, G.R 2008, Understanding and Managing the Organizational Behavior, 6th edn, Pearson Prentice Hall, New Jersey. pp. 3-23. Lippeveld, T., 2011, Developing Routine Health Information Systems: The RHINO workshop on the emerging issues and innovation within routine health information systems in developing countries. The Bolger Center, Protomac, MD, 14-24. Robbins, SP, Judge, T, Millett, B & Boyle, M., 2011, Organization, chapter 15 ‘Foundations of organization structure’ and chapter 16 ‘Organization culture’. Walsham, G., 2009, ‘Cross-cultural software production and use: a structurational analysis,’ MIS Quarterly 26 (4): 359-380. Read More