Organizational Management
During the twentieth century the development of production technology fundamentally influenced the society and the logic of business and organizations. In a similar way, the shift to the twenty-first century has been dominated by the development of information technology, affecting the way we communicate and the conditions for organizations, business and the production of goods and services. The consequences of the development of information technology include: increased interconnectedness, transparency, empowerment of individuals, speed of transactions, and decreased cost of information. These trends require organizations that can combine efficiency with flexibility and innovation (Cohen, 1999; Hamel, 2007; Sandberg and Targama, 2007).
To respond to the demand for flexibility organization forms are emerging that are assembled at short notice, for a limited period of time and a limited purpose, and then disbanded (Cohen, 1999). Products and services are produced in new constellations, in networks of actors. The ability to use both external and internal resources to solve tasks has become more common. Organizations are increasingly involved in these value networks or business ecosystems of which they have only limited control (Hamel, 2007). In this paper, the term organization includes the whole span from traditional companies to loosely connected networks of actors temporarily working together.
One of the challenges is to hand over significant control to people outside the company. The new organization forms challenge the role of management, the value of experts, the need for control over the customer experience and the importance of quality assurance (Cook, 2008; Tapscott and Williams, 2006).
Even though the organization forms are evolving, many of the existing principles for management have not changed significantly (Hamel, 2007, 2009). The principles of modern management, resting on the foundations of Fayol, Taylor and Weber, could be described as: stability as the objective, analysis by reduction to parts, and cause and effect mechanisms between the parts.
Almost 20 years ago, Senge (1990) described how managers have a language designed for simple, static problems at hand when facing the challenges of the current business environment of complex, dynamic realities. Still, the dominating metaphor of an organization is the hierarchical organization.
Morgan (2006, p. 4) argues that the use of metaphors implies a way of thinking and a way of understanding the world. There is a lack of metaphors for organizational forms such as value networks, mass collaboration, multiunit enterprises, and user contribution systems.
References
Cohen, M. (1999), “Commentary on the organizational science special issue on complexity”, Organizational Science, Vol. 10 No.3, pp.373-6.
Cook, S. (2008), “The contribution revolution: letting volunteers build your business”, Harvard Business Review, Vol. 86 No.10, pp.60-9.
Hamel, G. (2007), The Fututre of Management, Harvard Business Press, Boston, MA, .
Morgan, G. (2006), Images of Organizations, updated ed., Sage Publications, Thousands Oaks, CA, .
Sandberg, J., Targama, A. (2007), Managing Understanding in Organizations, Sage Publications, London, .
Senge, P. (1990), The Fifth Discipline: The Art and Practice of the Learning Organization, Century Business, London, .
Tapscott, D., Williams, A. (2006), Wikinomics; How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything, Penguin Group, New York, NY, .
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