Management and Specialization Quiz

Organisation Design

• Organisation design is an ongoing process, always under development.
• Organisational aspects encompass various elements, including how customers perceive a product, a project leader's comprehension, engineer designs, programmer coding, sales executive descriptions, project documentation, operational installations, customer billing, and the actual customer needs.
• Megatrends affecting 21st century organizations include: internationalization (globalization vs. localization), flexibility (speed), innovation, informatization (ICT vs. digitalization), and marketing (relationship marketing). These interconnected processes and characteristics are dynamic. The concept of "swimming with global trends" is contrasted with "swimming against the current."
• Global business environment changes include increasing economic relationships among economic blocs instead of individual countries, more strategic alliances, continued national economic restructuring, and the crucial role of strategic leadership and intense global marketing for competitive success.
• The idea of "think globally, act locally" is mentioned along with the concepts of economy of scale and synergies.
• In search of new value involves a focus on customer needs, decreased process time (time to market), inter-related activities (development, production, acquisitions, logistics), multi-disciplinary teams, integration of segments, lower costs, removal of non-value-added activities, higher productivity through new technologies, and increased flexibility using modern methods.
• The concept of "Free Flow in EU" outlines the historical progression of improving efficiency, from improving work processes to cost efficiency, to working remotely and online.
• The perceived 'world of organizations' is presented as a jungle, a war, a business game, and a money-making machine.
• Profit equals revenue minus costs.
• Organizational design is not about finding the "best" structure, but creating the right structure for a strategy.
• Organizational design is the process of creating, selecting, and changing a company's structure.
• Strategy and design are interlinked with goals, programs, directions, and the division between material and non-material assets.
• The design of an organization involves considering processes, structure, and rules.
• Structure considers authority and responsibility (vertical division, horizontal division), rules consider established rules, and processes concern core activities and value creation.
• Key aspects of organizational design include the horizontal and vertical dimensions of authority, responsibility, labor division (sharing), and coordination.
• Emphasis can be placed on function or process in organizational design.
• There is ongoing discussion among students (in class) regarding the perspectives of vertical versus horizontal structure and process versus function aspects of organizations.
• Characteristics of projects involve defining things or goals, and requiring specific or different types of resources.
• Different levels of national competitive are described, ranging from internal and national to international competitiveness.
• PEST analysis assesses the elements (political, economic, socio-cultural, technological) existing outside the organization but influencing it.
• Characteristics of a modern company adjusting to discontinuity are flexibility, focus on consumers, and result orientation.
• The concept of "Modern Organization" features reductions in hierarchy levels, interlinked autonomous profit centers, and a reduced importance of functional organizations.
• Outsourcing, delayering, and deconstruction are prominent features, and organizational adaptability is emphasized.
• Competitive differentiators and sustained value creators are crucial components of organizational adaptation. The shift from standardization to self-actualization, from analytical to holistic, and from local to global to "glocal" are discussed. Learning capacity, particularly in relation to quantity, quality, productivity, knowledge, creativity, innovativeness, and intuition, is emphasized.
• Core terminology for organizational design, including formalization, specialization, professionalism, centralisation, decentralisation, departmentalization, hierarchy, span of control, chain of command, and unity of command, is discussed.
• Formalisation is the degree of written documentation, regulations and policy manuals. Advantages of formalisation include rationality and visible structure, and routine control, while disadvantages include potential work load discrimination, less strict norms, and decreased individual involvement. Formal structures are contrasted with informal structures.
• Specialization outlines a specialization of job tasks and relying on others to complete the rest. Benefits include increased production using fewer resources, efficiency through practice, use of capital goods and mechanisation, and higher general living standards.
• Division of labor encompasses simple, complex, and regional/international variations.
• The characteristics of a professional are knowledge, competencies, scope of practice, agreed-upon values, a code of conduct, accountability, and professional behavior.
• A profession comprises a value orientation, knowledge, adaptable use of skills, and autonomy in decision-making.
• Centralisation consolidates power with top managers, promoting objective and coordinated decisions.
• Decentralisation distributes power to lower levels for greater autonomy, potentially spurring professionalism and flexibility.
• Balancing centralization and decentralization emphasizes empowering lower-level managers, top managers focusing on long-term strategy, and considering cost and risk factors when distributing power.
• Departmentalisation is the grouping of work activities and includes functional, product, geographical, process, and customer categories.
• Span of control refers to the number of subordinates reporting to a superior.
• Unity and Chain of Command define authority delegation from top managers to subordinates.
• Informal structures ("shadow organization") are also crucial aspects, which often have greater influence than formal structures.
• Organizing is a key managerial responsibility for arranging people and resources toward a common goal.
• Gantt charts are used for project scheduling, displaying start and finish dates and dependency relationships.
• Management philosophies and organizational forms change over time to meet new needs. Historical examples from 3000-4000 BCE include sporadic management ideas, span of control practices from Egypt, leadership principles from Socrates, and work specialization from Plato.
• Historical development of society (Pre-industrial, Industrial, and Post-industrial) demonstrates how organizational structuring philosophies change.
• The Industrial Revolution was marked by development of infrastructure, cheap power sources, technological innovations, modern communications, and professional labor. Key events like the steam engine, telegraph, Transatlantic cable, water power plant in Ljubljana, assembly line (General Motors), Hawthorne studies, Total Quality Management (TQM), introduction of computers, and the internet are noted.
• Organizations are viewed as instruments for achieving goals with a mechanistic view of the operational workings of a company that aims to be precise, unambiguous and efficient.
• Organizations are also viewed as living systems, adapting to the environment with an organic view of the operational workings of a company; a characteristic that helps them to remain in the market.
• Optimal organizational and leadership styles depend on circumstances and context. Fiedler's contingency model defines the optimal relationship between leaders, tasks and company situations.
• Adhocracy (Drucker, Mintzberg) is an adaptive, creative, and flexible organizational style, ideal for sophisticated and rapid innovation.
• Types of adhocracies, operating and administrative, are distinguished and used as flexible examples to suit various business needs such as product development, rapid invention and innovation and others.
• Organisation structures comprise various types including functional, product, geographical, process, customer, hierarchical, flat/tall, and matrix, each with advantages and disadvantages and suitable for different circumstances
• Different structures, including networks, spider nets, interorganizational cooperation, and alliances, are discussed.
• The concept of inter-relations and inter-dependence discusses the relationship between the national economy, companies, and products/services.
• Global collaboration strategies emphasize cost, capability, and context.
• ICT (information and communication technology) and its role in inter-organizational information systems (IOS), such as Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) and Electronic Funds Transfer (EFT), are highlighted.
• Virtual communication, including video conferencing, is explored.
• Team work is essential for organizational success and involves shared responsibility, open communication, and conflict resolution.
• Core competencies are vital for organizations; they are the specific skills, processes, know-how, and knowledge within the organization that are relevant to the products or services being offered, and are integral to the success and growth of these.
• Organizational restructuring involves changes, strategy, structural types, downsizing, and expansion, and the management response to change in stable and unstable environments is addressed.

Test your knowledge on the benefits and consequences of specialization in management tasks. This quiz covers crucial concepts such as interdependence, division of labor, and the evolving role of technology in management practices. Evaluate your understanding of traditional and modern management competencies.