A Review of Hatch’s
“Organization Theory:
Modern, Symbolic, and
Postmodern Perspectives”
Nic Weatherly
Why Study Organization
Theory?
 Managers must be able to comprehend,
apply, and build upon a wide array of
organizational decisions
 Concerns:
Diversity
Pluralism
Why Study Organization
Theory?
 Understanding the theories of others and how
they developed them will allow for functional
applications
 Focus on continuous improvement of theory and applications
 Organization theory requires both the mastery
of existing theories and personal development
of the methods and skills of theorizing
Histories, Metaphors, and Perspectives
in Organization Theory
 Classical Period Perspective:
Machine metaphor
View of an Organization:
 A machine designed and constructed by
management to achieve predefined goals
View of Management:
Engineers who design, build, and operate the
organizational machine
Histories, Metaphors, and Perspectives
in Organization Theory
 Modern Perspective:
Organism metaphor
View of an Organization:
 A living system that performs the functions
necessary to survival, including adaptation to a
hostile world
View of Management:
An interdependent part of an adaptive system
Histories, Metaphors, and Perspectives
in Organization Theory
 Symbolic-interpretive Perspective:
Culture metaphor
View of an Organization:
 A pattern of meanings created and maintained by
human association through shared values,
traditions, and customs
View of Management:
An artifact who would like to be a symbol of the
organization
Histories, Metaphors, and Perspectives
in Organization Theory
 Postmodern Perspective:
 Collage metaphor
 View of an Organization:
 An organization theory is a collage made from bits of
knowledge and understanding brought together to form a
new perspective that has reference to the past
 View of Management:
 A theorist as an artist
The Environment of
Organization
 First, define the organization or respective level
of the organization you’re analyzing
 Second, identify the links between the
organization (or level) and other organizations
(or levels) that can influence environmental
relations
The Environment of
Organization
 Third, identify the variables responsible for
changes resulting from these relations
 Finally, identify the areas in need of
improvement within this analysis.
The Environment of
Organization

Relation to Behavior Systems Analysis
(BSA):

Steps of BSA:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
Analyze the natural contingencies responsible for the
target behavior(s)
Specify the performance objectives
Design an intervention (based on the above analyses)
Implement the intervention
Evaluate the intervention
Recycle until performance objectives are reached
Strategy and Goals
 Modernist views dominate the study of
organizational strategy
 Main view of strategy:
Strategic management provides a link
between the organization and its
environment through which information and
influence pass
i.e. continuous analysis of variables and
interlocking behavioral contingencies
Technology
 An organization is directly dependent on
the output of certain technologies
 These outputs permit the organization to
obtain further inputs
e.g. Revenue
 Behavior analytical comparison:
Goal-directed systems design
Input-Process-Output model
Organizational Social Structure
and Culture
 Hierarchy of authority:
 Defines formal reporting relationships
 These only account for some of the interactions
necessary to support an organization
 Behavior analysis - Cultural change model:
 In order to change the process and product variables
at one level of an organization (e.g. the line workers)
you must change the variables at all applicable
levels (e.g. other departments, management)
The Physical Structure of
Organizations
 Designed with a geography and a layout of
workspaces, equipment, and employees
 Physical aspects have important implications
for the behavior of the people involved in the
organizational community
 Structural symbolism:
 Architecture designed to make a strong/intimidating
visual statement
 Symbols designed to show a visual depiction of the
organizations identity (mission)
Organizational Decision
Making, Power, and Politics
 Power:
Flows into an organization from the
environment by virtue of changing
environmental demands and opportunities
 Politics:
Can create conflict out of nearly any
situation and will do so if the stakes are high
enough
Conflict and Contradiction in
Organizations
 Opposition to cooperation:
“Negative manifestations” of conflict
undermine cooperation
Destroys trust
Closing channels of communication
Behavior analytical perspective:
 Conditional probability
Aversive control
Procedural/treatment integrity
Control and Ideology in
Organizations
 Contingency model of control:
 Manage conflict so as to produce the benefits of
optimal “stimulation of ideas”
 Strengthen “intragroup cohesiveness”
 Minimize negative effects of uncooperative behavior
 Obviously very mentalistic
 Main points:
 Proper analysis and monitoring of individual contingencies
 Cultural change
 The Behavior-Based Safety approach
Control and Ideology in
Organizations
 Cybernetic model of control:
 Application of systems theory
 Outlines how control of organizational activities can
be achieved through setting standards, monitoring
activities/outcome, and providing feedback
 Agency model of control:
 Focuses on the tendency of agents to avoid
responsibilities by subverting the control systems
that make performance evaluation possible
Discussion
 Understanding various perspectives of
organizational theory may be beneficial to the
understanding unique organizational cultures
 However, Hatch’s analyses of various
theoretical perspectives demonstrate the heavy
mentalistic emphasis dominating mainstream
organizational solutions
 With this in mind, trying to collaborate with
theorists from these perspectives may hinder the
proper application of sound empirical organizational
solutions
The End
nicweatherly@hotmail.com