组织结构论文(英文版)organizational structure essay.

Introduction

Now human society has come into the 21 century. Organization and business has changed a lot compared with thirty years ago. As the development of organization structure, organizations have to adjust and change their structure modes in order to suit to new social environment. In traditional management theory, mechanistic structure and organic structure are the two kinds of organizational structure and are widely applied by most of organizations. Whether these two kinds of organizational structures are relevant to 21st century organizations is a very important topic for most organizational management. The aim of this essay is to state organic structure is more relevant to 21st century organizations. For the structure, it will firstly have an introduction and comparison of the features of mechanistic and organic structure. Secondly it will discuss why organic structure is more relevant to 21st century organizations compared with mechanistic structure.

Discussion

Now it comes to have an introduction and comparison of features of organic structure and mechanistic structure. First is organic organization. Organic organization is also called as adaptive organization. Organic organization mainly has two features. Organic-type organization is a loose, flexible and highly adaptive form. It doesn’t have a standardized work and the rules and regulations, and it can quickly make adjustments as needed. (Litwin, S. 2002) The mainly features are low-standardization and low-centralization. Second is mechanistic structure. Mechanical organization is a stable, rigid structure; its main objective is the pursuit of efficiency and stable operation. It pursues to stabilize the operation efficiency and focus on the tasks and functions of a high degree of division of labor division. Reverse to organic structure, it has high-standardization and high-centralization. It is often adopted by bureaucracy organizations.

For comparison of their features, the following diagram shows the differences between organic structure and mechanic structure.

(Westbrook, J 2004)

According to the above comparison of the features between mechanic structures and organic, now it aims to discuss why organic structure is more relevant to 21st organizations. This should base on the features of the 21st organizations’ developing

trend. This mainly includes three aspects.

First, the 21st century situation needs organizations to have quick respond. As information technology develops better and better, business and operations become more and more complex, and there are often many uncertainties and emergency events. The IT time needs organizations can make quick respond for changes. For an organic structure organization, it has the features of low-standardization and low-centralization. When facing with emergency or unexpected changes, staffs can have their own decision—making right to deal with affairs timely. It is very important to avoid losses and mistakes in task. Also staffs can communicate with others to get the ideas for dealing with affairs. (Anders, C 2008) While for a mechanistic structure organization, when staffs face with changes or emergency, they don’t have decision making right. They must report it to their supervisors, and supervisors need to report to senior leaders. After the seniors make decision make give instruction to supervisors, supervisors can give instruction to staffs. The complex process will delay a lot of time and largely affect task efficiency. (Klarbring, A 2009) The organization cannot make quick respond to affairs and will lead to loss and troubles.

Second, in 21st century, knowledge sharing and member communication become more and more important. As knowledge and experience improves very fast in 21st century, a single person or several persons cannot have the ability to acquire all necessary knowledge and technology in job process. And technology is the key factor for competitiveness. So the communication and knowledge sharing in organizations play very important roles for 21st century organizations. For an organic organization, staffs can well communicate with others, including supervisors and other staffs to become more familiar with necessary knowledge, which is very helpful for finishing tasks. Also it can improve the professional quality of all staffs. (Harrison, M and Janice, M. 2004) While for a mechanistic structure, the communication mode is vertical, and staffs can only receive orders from their supervisors. However, the supervisors all not all—round, if they don’t have enough knowledge acquirement, it will lead to troubles