Module 9
Organizational Action in
Complex Environments
PowerPoint Presentation by Charlie Cook
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Strategic Design Perspective:
“Organization Set”
• Organization set model maps resource
environment in terms of input set and output set
 Input set includes organizations that provide required
inputs (materials, components, human resources,
financial resources, technology, knowledge)
 Output set includes customers for organization’s
output of goods and services as well as distributors,
retailers, service organizations, etc.
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–2
Strategic Design Perspective (cont’d)
• Two additional elements of organization set:
 Regulatory set—organizations with formal authority to
regulate internal processes, size of input and output
sets, and kinds of relationships organization is allowed
to build
 Set of competitors—competitors may also be parts of
input set
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–3
Strategic Design Perspective:
The Organization Set Model
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Figure 9.1
9–4
Strategic Design Perspective (cont’d)
• Internal inking mechanisms
 Liaison or integrator positions
 Temporary boundary-spanning groups
 Permanent boundary-spanning groups
 IT systems
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–5
Strategic Design Perspective (cont’d)
• External linking mechanisms
 Performance measurement systems
 Incentive systems
 Resource allocation
 Human resource development
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–6
Political Perspective:
Stakeholders Model
• Distinction may be made between internal and
external stakeholders
• Stakeholder model focuses on two key variables:
 Interests
What does each set of stakeholders want?
 How clearly defined are those interests?
 What are the priorities assigned to those interests, and can
priorities be altered?

 Power and influence

What is the basis of power or influence of each set of
stakeholders over the organization?
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–7
Political Perspective:
Stakeholders Model
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Figure 9.2
9–8
Political Perspective (cont’d)
• Key tools for action in organization-environment
relations:
 Mobilization of the interests of external stakeholders
 Coalition-building between internal and external
stakeholders and among external stakeholders
 Cooptation as one stakeholder or set of stakeholders
gets others to accept its own agenda, either through
persuasion or through offering to further their interests
in some way
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–9
Political Perspective (cont’d)
• External stakeholders generally have a lower
stake in an organization than internal
stakeholders
• External stakeholders can use influence over
organization to obtain outcomes desired by a set
of internal stakeholders
• External stakeholders can use same key tools for
action to influence an organization
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–10
Cultural Perspective:
Institutional Fields
• Shared ways in which people see and interpret
social context are as important to understanding
organizations as resources and power
• Organizations are embedded in a social system
of expectations, taken-for-granted ways of doing
things, status, and legitimacy
• Institutional field concept analyzes interactions
between organizations and their environments
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–11
Cultural Perspective (cont’d)
• Institutional field
 Key suppliers, resource and product consumers,
regulatory agencies, and other organizations that
produce similar services or products
• Institutionalization
 The process by which certain organizational patterns
come to be accepted as legitimate, as the right way or
only way to do things
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–12
Cultural Perspective:
Institutional Field Model
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
Figure 9.3
9–13
Cultural Perspective (cont’d)
• Isomorphism
 The processes by which organizations become similar
to others in their field
Coercive isomorphism—when a powerful organization or
stakeholder imposes its structural and procedural demands on
an organization
 Normative isomorphism—when professional or interest groups
insist that such patterns are the “right” way to do things
 Mimetic isomorphism —when organizations take successful
organizations as their models

Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–14
Cultural Perspective (cont’d)
• Institutional field model has displaced older
concept of national culture
• National culture models don’t allow for:
 Variations within countries across corporate cultures
 Changes occurring in organizational patterns over time
• Institutional field model addresses both these
points
• Institutional field model is at the center of debates
over globalization
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–15
Integrating Perspectives
• Organization set model focuses on how tools of
organization design can be used to improve
interorganizational relationships
• Stakeholders model directs attention to how
external stakeholders can influence organization
decision making
• Institutional field model highlights importance of
external models, legitimation, and attention from
external structuring agencies
Class Notes: Organizations and Their Environments
Copyright © 2005 South-Western. All rights reserved.
9–16