FASHION OR FIT

Fashion or Fit



Fashion or Fit

This reading argues that most of the organizations fall into one of five designs: the simple structure, the machine bureaucracy, the professional bureaucracy, the divisionalized form, and the advocacy. These five parts make up the organization. Not all needs of all parties and some are easier than others. The purpose of the structure is to coordinate the work of the parties.

The characteristics of each organization fit configurations, each different in terms of structure, situations where you are and to the historical period in which they arose. There are five basic configurations:

Simple structure: a few CEOs and a group of operators who do the work. Coordination is achieved by the strategic apex, which gives direct supervision orders, without much staff and middle management staff. It is the classic entrepreneurial company. There is little standardization or formality. The structure is simple and flexible, operating in dynamic environments. They are young and small firms, partly because it stimulates growth to bureaucratize (if they do, they are on the way). Almost all the businesses start with this structure (Mintzberg, 1981).

Machine bureaucracy: the result of industrialization, with its emphasis on standardizing work as a form of coordination, resulting in unskilled and highly specialized. A hierarchy arises in the midline, to oversee the work and resolve conflicts arising from strict departmentalization; the midline is usually institutional structure. They tend to operate in a stable environment, so internally generated all the support services they need. They tend to be vertically integrated, making their own customers and suppliers. Their main problems: work boring and repetitive, alienated employees, control freak, oversized, and inadequate. They are ideal machines for purposes, and fail to adapt to others.

Professional Bureaucracy: coordination depends on the standardization of skills. Structure is common in hospitals, universities and accounting firms. ...