BUSS 951
Critical Issues in Information
Systems
Lecture 3
Organisations, Communities and
Workplaces
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Notices (1)
General
 Make sure you have a copy of the BUSS951
Subject Outline
 BUSS951 is supported by a website (available
from Tomorrow), where you can find out the latest
Notices and get Lecture Notes, Tutorial Sheets,
Assignments etc
www.uow.edu.au/~rclarke/buss951/buss951.htm
 Pick up assignment 1 now!
Clarke, R. J (2001) L951-03:
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Notices (2)
Readings for Week 4
1. Watson, Rainer and Koh (1991)
“Executive Information Systems: A
Framework for Development and a
Survey of Current Practices”
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Agenda (1)
Organisational Metaphors
Machines
Organisms
Specific Organisational Theories
Complex Organisations
Network Organisations
Population Ecology Models
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Brief History of IS
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Organisational Metaphors (1)
Metaphors:
conventional ideas about organisations
and management are based on a small
number of ‘taken-for-granted’ beliefs
these ‘taken-for-granted’ ideas are
referred to as metaphors
but metaphors are ‘real’ in that they have
real social consequences
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Organisational Metaphors (2)
metaphors are a way of understanding
‘reality’ in organisations
need to understand them:
affect type of management practices that occur
determine what constitutes information
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Organisational Metaphors (3)
Several different metaphors. The most
common in IS are:
organisations as machines
organisations as organisms
organisations as brains
organisations as cultures
organisations as political systems
the most important organisational metaphors
are:
organisations as machines
organisations as organisms
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Organisations as Machines
a common IS Metaphor
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Organisations as Machines
carefully defined activities linked by clear
lines of command & communication, and
coordination & control
designing organisations: managers design
formal structure of jobs into which people
can be fitted
two types of management theory use this
metaphor
classical management theory
scientific management
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Organisations as Machines
Classical Management Theory (1)
unity of command
chain of authority from superior to
subordinate
span of control
distinction- staff and line (staff provides
advise but must not violate management
authority)
emphasises initiative at all levels
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Organisations as Machines
Classical Management Theory (2)
division of work- specialisation
 authority and responsibility (right of
management to give orders and to exact
obedience)
centralisation of authority
discipline
subordination of individual interest to the
general interest of the company
stability of tenure- workers are rewarded
with permanent jobs
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Organisations as Machines
Scientific Management (1)
 shift all responsibility for work from workers to
management
 managers should do all the thinking relating to
the planning and design of work
 workers are left to the task of implementation
 use scientific methods to determine the most
effective way of doing work
 design workers tasks accordingly
 specify the precise way in which work should be
done
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Organisations as Machines
Scientific Management (2)
select the best person to perform the work
train the worker to do the work effectively
monitor worker performance to ensure
appropriate work procedures are followed
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Organisations as Organisms
another common IS Metaphor
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Organisations as Organisms (1)
 many varied ideas about organisations, as:
open systems
contingency theory: adapting the organisation
to its environment
organisational health, behaviour, development
& ecology
 understand relations between organisations &
environments
 understand organisations as ongoing processes
rather than as collections of parts
 management looks at organisational ‘needs’ to
help the organisation ‘survive’
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Organisations as Organisms (2)
organisations adapt to their environments
environments select the organisations that
will survive- but contrast this with the
Complex Organisations work of Perrow
who contradicts this tenant of IS Systems
Theory
assumes functional unity- but
organisations are often in conflict
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Organisational Metaphors
Summary (1)
 dominant metaphor: Organisations as Organisms
to understand why, need to understand the
previous dominant metaphor of Organisations as
Machines
IS uses Systems Theory therefore it also uses the
dominant metaphor
 metaphors are ways of thinking about organisations,
determine:
the way management is structured
 organisations are managed
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Organisational Metaphors
Summary (3)
determines relationships between
management & worker function
determines what constitutes information
 therefore the types of systems to be
developed and used
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Complex Organisations
Charles Perrow
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Complex Organisations
Industry & Environment
 Perrow points out, that organisational theory has
always recognised the environment to some
extent
 the Institutional School placed more emphasis on
it than any other theory or school
 however, the Institutional School viewed the
environment:
fairly pragmatic, and
poorly conceptualised.
 more recent theory and ideas are looking to better
conceptualise the environment
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Industry & Environment
Culture Industry
Perrow outlines his argument for the
importance of environment in determining
industry sector success and failure
he starts by examining bias in the culture
industry (such as TV, music, newspapers,
theatre, movies, etc)
and concludes that organisational owners and
producers can and do shape the cultural
products of the artists
he argued that this is not just a matter of
individual bias
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Industry & Environment
Culture Industry
 Perrow believes that these products are shaped
by subtle selection processes that often involves
corporate sponsors who attempt to maximise
profits and instil their own brand of ideology on
selected groups of the public
 he gives an account of the popular music industry
over the period from the 1920s through to the late
1960s- a very interesting account
 Can we use this concept to explain Microsoft?
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Industry & Environment
Popular Music: Conclusions
 the conclusions Perrow draws from this study
are as follows:
while changes in the environment such as
technological developments (TV, LP records,
transistor radios) and product substitutions
(TV for radio) do cause organisations to
adjust,
but the objective of such adjustment is to
gain control over, and thus manipulate, the
environment
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Industry & Environment
Popular Music: Conclusions
the turbulence in the environment may result
from their own efforts to rationalise the
industry and introduce new products and
services
new technological developments do not
determine cultural outcomes; but the way new
technologies are used by the elite
organisations of an industry can create ‘mass
culture’
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Industry & Environment
Popular Music: Conclusions
the most important environment of the elite
organisations in an industry are the other elite
organisations in the industry; despite competition
between them, they collectively implement
strategies to eliminate or absorb threatening smaller
competitors
the public is poorly served by this process; if we
have to rely on the unlikely conjunction of a number
of technological innovations to have diverse tastes
satisfied, then we are in great trouble as a public!
costs of these changes are generally displaced by
the elite organisations onto other dependent parts of
the industry
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Industry & Environment
Conclusions
From this Perrow draws the conclusion
that, in addition to the above list of
observations concerning the environment,
we add the following:
the power of the state to regulate and give
entitlements is probably the single most
important means available to organisations to
control their environment
and a corollary: the power of the state to block
attempts by organisations to control their
environment (eg, anti-trust and monopoly laws)
is substantial!
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Industry & Environment
Conclusions
Perrow notes a major debate about the role of the
state in capitalist societies
is it a ‘tool’ for the capitalist class
or an umpire reconciling diverse competing interests
or an independent entity with organisational needs of
its own, serving as a broker between the capitalist and
other classes, while meeting its own needs for growth
and power in the process?
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Organisational Networks
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Organisational Networks
Perrow looks at various levels of
organisational analysis
suggests that a fairly recent idea is an
extremely useful and powerful way of
analysing and understanding organisational
structure and behaviour...
Perrow notes a number of key problems with
the arguments
he fears that sociologists are again wasting
time and effort on infertile concepts
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Organisational Networks
... the network of organisations having
influence over the target organisation
as he points out, such an approach
reveals rational explanations of many
organisational behaviours and structural
arrangements that would be entirely
missed if the analysis was done purely at
the organisational level
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Population-Ecology Models
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Population-Ecology Models
Perrow briefly reviews more recent theory
that analyses organisations in terms of
social-Darwinism concepts of the struggle
for survival
Perrow notes a number of key problems
with the arguments
he fears that sociologists are again
wasting time and effort on infertile
concepts
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Population-Ecology Models
 these look interesting but break down
quickly when critically appraised in terms
of what actually happens in organisations!
 dissappointingly, these ideas while not
having much credence in sociology’
 are getting recirculated in information
systems views of organisations
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