WEBER / BURNS & STALKER / PEDLER et. al.
Business Systems - The Bureaucratic Model
Max Weber (1864-1920) termed this organisational form a
"rational-legal system" - its structure and processes expressly
designed to achieve certain goals. The bureaucracy is rationally
designed for optimum functional performance and every part (depts,
levels, posts) contributes to the whole (unity of purpose). The
bureaucracy is legal. Authority is exercised via rule and procedural
systems & the offices people occupy.
Organisational members and clients accept (conform to) its authority
because the rules are defined and administered fairly. Rights &
privileges protect individuals from organisational (officer) injustice equity prevails regardless of "who you are". Rules include policies
and standard procedures for implementing these. They are solutions
to past problems demanding known responses (we avoid reinventing
the wheel). Rules guide behaviour ensuring consistency at every
level. Nine out of ten problems encountered are covered by regular
procedures. This is a risk minimising, consistent apparatus.
Bureaucracy and Inefficiency.
Many feel that bureaucracy is synonymous with inefficiency, an
emphasis on red-tape and excessive writing and recording especially public administration. However lets be very careful about
this. The claims are sweeping and perjorative. They fail to recognise
the great capacity of the bureaucratic form to be elegant, to work
slickly, to empower people and let them operate in coordinated ways.
The rational legal systems embodies values which people respect.
The form offers occuptational opportunities and challenges to people.
The rules and regulations protect the members of the organsiation
and its external clients. It is founded on principles of honesty and
integrity, of regular, predictable behaviour and the application of
competent, well rehearse action by members. Clients come to expect
this conformity.
Yet of course conformity is not always valued particularly where it
may block abd limit the capacity for parts of the organisation to
respond quickly to events that have not been programmed into the
organisations systems of policies, procedures and rules. The classical
picture of the very able bureaucrat is that where they say:
"I am awfully sorry. I would love to help but the rules you
know ...... "
Writers of popular literature from Dickens (e.g. Little Dorritt and the
"Circumlocution Office") to Kafka (The Trail) and Mervyn Peake
(Gormenghast) build intricate mazes of bureaucratic splendour -
where bureaucrats block and conspire. Bureaucracies do not get a
good press. They are the meat and veg. of popular writers, writers
who have particular leanings politically and whose creatively is
based on imagining, colouring, emphasising, shaping and
commenting on all they see around them.
Yet the contribution of the bureaucratic form to human productive
endeavour is enormous and still is. Simply consider the bureaucratic
system of the Inland Revenue Service - which basically works - give
or take a few, mind-bogglingly complex forms that have to be filled
in.
For Weber - the organisation is "neutral" (a big, big assumption and
one to be challenged). It is presented as a technically useful model of
the most logically efficient form of structure possible.
"Precision, speed, unambiguity, knowledge of files,
continuity, unit, strict subordination, reduction of friction and
of material and personal costs - these are raised to the
optimum point in the strictly bureaucratic administration".
Though metaphorically a smooth machine its rules and set
procedures can be inflexible instruments of administration experience of the past may not be in-tune with present conditions.
Some rules cannot be readily adapted to suit individual needs and
thgey can become barriers behind which the vulnerable administrator
to hide. Bureaucratic alienation is reinforced by conformations with
"face-less administrators"
A tension occurs in organisational design between preserving control
and encouraging flexibility & freedom of expression. Bureaucracy
favours the former. Cries of "bureaucratic inefficiency" marks
frustration of taxpayers, drivers, holiday makers, radical activists,
people from other departments - who feel their personal domain has
been infringed. Bureaucracy today is attacked for its inability to
innovate, aspects of its alienating and demotivating effect on
employees, and the dependen "unhealthy" relationships some feel it
creates (rather than self- help).
Bureaucratic culture rewards safe, conformist attitudes - constrained,
riskfree work is good. Non-conformist, creative and outwardlooking, opportunistic approaches to management are suspect. The
bureaucratic model by definition embodies depersonalisation.
Bureacrats become more absorbed with maintaining the official form
(the means). They lose sight of what they are supposed to achieve.
Smooth, efficient running removes hassle for officers but may be
effective (as valued by clients)?
Delegation and the Bureaucratic Form
Bureaucratic structures emphasise specialisation between jobs and
departments, reliance on formal procedures and paperwork, extended
managerial reporting structures and clearly marked status definitions.
Job demarcation is an informal, interpersonal response by individuals
and groups which may be at odds with the firm's objectives.
Demarcation may be supported by trades union preferences. It is
manifested also in officer rivalries and empire-building. If the firm
becomes large & complex it bears formal & informal overheads of
possible inefficiency.
Bureaucracies employ a system of delegation down these hierarchies.
Employees use discretion only within delegated limits. Job roles are
defined formally (often in writing) by profiles of task responsibility
and /her authority - scope of discretion to act. An organistional
principle is that job responsibilities require equivalent authority to
carry these out. But authority comprises:
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formal (job) authority - others know your responsibilities and
their reporting relationships
personal (interpersonal) authority - secure others co- operation
resource authority (hours, staff, budget, rewards) for the task
expertise authority: having the skills, knowledge and
experience to carry out the responsibilities.
The authority of language and rhetoric which may be difficult
to argue against as all seems so plausible.
Though posts are hierarchical with successive steps embracing all
those beneath it - problems of role ambiguity, conflict & overload
frequently occur. Delegation is a complex process reliant on managers'
ability to communicate well with subordinates and obtain common
perception of jobÊrequirements (so too with colleagues with whom the
post interfaces).
Coping with Contingencies.
Within Weber's model, rules and procedures aim to anticipate every
possible contingency. Top management "know" that lower level staff
are acting in controlled ways. This control is underpinned by training,
briefing and observation/guidance by the superior. Loyalty and
cooperation is expected. Officers should carry out their duties to the
letter - without overstepping their role and conflicting with others
duties. This assumes a perfect communication and cooperation formally and interpersonally.
Of course where the person in terms of aptitude, skill and motivation is
cheesed off or feels rivalry towards others or feels like being bloody-
minded - problems arise. Fitting the job to the person and the person to
the job is a key task for the personnel management of bureaucracy.
For officers, there clear separation between personal and business
affairs.
"When I am at work, I do my job without personal
feelings/biases entering into it!"
This is bolstered by contract & technical qualifications (technomeritocracy). Instructions are obeyed because appointment assumes
competence to issue such commands. A sign of developing
bureaucracy is the growth of professional managers and more
specialist/departmental experts. Manager-experts maintain the fabric of
the existing firm and develop new responses (policies and practices) to
external and internal events/conditions.
Information, Records and Decision-support.
The "bureau" keeps records and files. System rationality demands that information is
written down. The organisation can reference and compare past decisions to ensure
consistency. Records and structure make the organisation concrete. It will continue
even though the people who run it change. Policies, procedures, minutes, reports,
records show it operating dynamically. The bureaucratic model implies a programmed
organisation. Procedures and rules are algorithmic ie routinised solutions to known,
common problems ie like computer programs. Records, policies and procedures
provide a knowledge-base minimising risk and maximising consistency in decisionmaking..
Power and Bureaucracy
Weber's rational, legal model of organisation is an important
one for members and stakeholders. They accept the purpose of the
organisation as rational. The authority of role relationships, the
hierarchical structure of vertical and horizontal links, the dependencies
in duties, obligations and accountabilities are logical. Authority is
accepted/legitimised because the structures for decision-making and
action are defined with objective purpose.
However Weber modelled three forms of power giving rise to authority structures.
Power vacuums and struggles for position result if these structures fail to provide a
holding framework for members. The three forms are charismatic, traditional and
rational-legal.
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Charismatic
The organisation is based on the leader. His/her special qualities attract the support of
followers who value the benefits that association with the leader brings. The leader
organises, directs and distributes rewards. Harrison places such a leader as being at
the hub of a wheel (representative of a power culture) from which decisions and coordination radiate outward. Organisational success depends on the single-mindedness
and expertise of the leader and his/her inspired followers. Naturally problems result if
the leader's capacities decline and followers expectations are disappointed. Infighting,
factionalism and succession problems emerge. Charismatic influence may live on if
the leader's values and doctrines are elevated to a higher spiritual plain and integrated
by followers into a way of life.
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Traditional
Roles, customs and practices have become accepted into the ritual of life. Things
happen because they have always happened that way (precedent). They have symbolic
and even sacred significance. Authority and position is an inherited commodity vested
in those who for reasons of birth or ritual selection represent the traditional customs
e.g. the monarch/dynasty, the temple, the lord- knight-yeoman and serf, the guild
master and journeyman apprentice. The roles (born into) are not challenged. Rights
and duties are accepted for reasons of this is the way things are done. The ideals and
values of the charismatic leader are carried forward by the apostle successor. Personal
servants - appointed by the leader - benefit from patronage and can become officials.
Under feudalism - even they can inherit titles, demesnes and tithes subject to paying
homage to the appointee leader who may withdraw or disenfranchise these rights.
Traditional values and behaviours can be found in the modern world - the authority of
the father in some families is an example.Those who are totally willing to dedicate
themselves to a spiritual doctrine or ideology may adopt a very powerful position - an
insular reality - which cuts across secular or scientific logic. Theirs is the one right
way regardless of evidence to the contrary.
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Bureaucratic (rational-legal)
- authority in this structure is based on purposeful reasoning and formally defined,
accepted structures of rules and procedures. The power of those in authority depends
on their acceptance of due legal process and qualification
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ownership according to purposeful, agreed rules
appointment on technically defined grounds (merit and technical expertise)
election
membership of a decision-making group and adherence to the rules of
decision-making.
Why consider such models?
Each model simplifies how authority becomes legitimised in organisations. A family
business for example is a hybrid. Incorporated as limited company, the head of the
family may always become the Chairman, a bright son or daughter may be the
admired, energetic entrepreneur. Employee managers and specialist staff engaged on
contracts of employment do their jobs according to policies and procedures. They
respect the entrepreneur and accept the traditional values and role relationships within
the firm.
Well-established, modern business relies on the bureaucratic form - albeit constrained
in what it can do by the bureaucratic regulation imposed by community legislators for the community's benefit.
Roles, rights, duties and behaviour are guided by policies, rules, reporting regulations
and controls, standard operating procedures, hierarchical and functionally specialised
work structures.
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Job holders have clear scope within which to act, instruct others or implement
and adapt policy.
Delegation (devolved responsibilities and tasks from the top down) provides a
command and control structure of hierarchical relations vertical and lateral.
Co-operation is expected as department and staff must co-operate to achieve
the purposes of policies which - all - agree are necessary (rationality).
People are appointed into their roles because they have the ability to do the
job. Each accepts and supports the roles of those they report to and must coordinate with.
Clearly power is devolved from the top, down through a hierarchy.
records are kept of decisions made - the data of the organisation becomes
independent of those who made the decisions in the first place.
The Dysfunctional Bureaucracy
The legitimate power of a bureaucracy can be mediated from the bottom upwards.
Individuals and groups may act informally in ways running counter to the impersonal,
one-source of authority assumptions of the model. Such actions of course would be
labelled as being dysfunctional.
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Officials become overbearing.
They may apply administrative systems as ends in themselves - after all their
role, position and continuity depend on them.
Individuals may protect their position and build up the power of the office.
Union activity and countervailing collective processes may emerge.
Structural regulation and control
In a bureaucracy, methods and rules are devised to support decision-making and
operations. Such forms of regulation are solutions to functional problems such as
processing sales transactions smoothly and efficiently. They are also solutions to
political control problems.
Standardisation of methods and rules ensures that members of the organisation behave
in predictable conformist ways and not personal whim. Their discretion is limited by
the methods and rules that apply within the scope of their duties and responsibilities.
Divide and Rule
In a modern business, managers may pursue differentiation, rationalisation or outsourcing as policy devices to re-assert personal control, maintain and enhance their
status. They may offer reasons for the move but covertly they may have another
agenda.
Divide and rule may minimise the influence of a large department or group. The
efficacy of project teams (Harrison's task culture) set up to co-ordinate work across
functional departments, would be significantly inhibited if project managers did not
have the full co-operation of Heads of Departments. The latter could easilyset up rulebased and procedural barriers to matrix managers.
Reforming the Bureaucracy
Re-redesign efforts illustrate the workings of organisational power structures. Senior
managers - the top power holders - may see that the organisation's structures have
become rigid. This may partly be a protection of derived power as departments and
people, reluctant to make deep changes in operations and methods, cling to out-dated
roles. This is ironic. Job roles and standard operating procedures were designed to
control employees. But their complexity and the organisation's need to maintain
operational continuity means that incremental change is preferred over radical. It is
easier to close a department or unit than achieve radical change in the behaviour of
employees who control their jobs and functions.
Rules, regulations and other formal procedures
Rules and regulations can be used against the bureaucracy as illustrated by the power
of trade unionists if working to rule. Generally the employee does not forfeit pay.
They do exactly what required by regulations.
Many such rules were designed to control empoyees, ensure safety and protect
employees, the public and the railway authorities. If a major accident occurred then
clear regulations/rules define responsibilities and accountabilities. Yet paradoxically
in, say, a railway organisation, zealous application of rules made over decades and not
modified or rescinded means that few trains would leave on time. Work done to the
letter and with all rules being inflexibly applied together can render a system
inoperable. Normal working requires the application of individual discretion and
interpretation of rules to the situation. The individual learns integration of rules not
sequencing. The procedural aspects of a bureaucracy become streamlined by the skills
and competences of those carrying them out.
If there is a major accident, a public investigation frequently follows. Investigators
compare actual events with norms of formal regulations - who is in error - and try to
record deviations in practice, gaps in rules and where negligence has occurred. The
accident may be an act of god. Such a probability Perrow would argue is
acknowledged by the system itself.
Rules and regulations are often created, invoked and used in proactive or retrospective
ways as part of power play. They give potential power to both controllers and
controlled. Controllers may try to "streamline" procedures and thus lock the
relationships they seek to control. They are then in a position to use the rules to their
advantage. These are important sources of organisational power. They define a
contested terrain
Business Systems - Mechanistic vs Organismic,
Bureaucratic vs Team Cultures
T. Burns and G M Stalker in their 1961 book, "The Management of
Innovation" reported on difficulties facing organisations in adjusting to
new environmental conditions. Their focus was on Scottish electronics
companies operating in increasingly competitive and innovative
technological markets. A new edition has been recently published.
They described two organisational types representing a continuum
along which most organisations can be placed.
At one end is the mechanistic organisation - similar to Weber's
bureaucracy (adapted to relatively stable conditions). At the other end the organismic type (adapted to more dynamic, fast-moving
conditions in which new and unfamiliar problems continually arise
which cannot be broken down and distributed among the existing
specialist roles).
Problems of bringing about change are shown strikingly in the
mechanistic (bureaucratic) model. They point to problems of shortcircuiting in communication, role conflicts occuring with committees,
"super-ordinate" officials reporting directly to the boss and interdepartmental conflicts. They saw the "mechanistic form" as being:
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appropriate to conditions of relative stability.
highly structured, members have well-defined, formal job descriptions/roles,
and precise positions vis a vis others .
direction is from the top - down through the hierarchy. Communication is
similarly vertical.
The organisation insists on loyalty and conformity from members to each
other, to managers and to the organisation itself in relation to policies and
methods.
members need sufficient functionary ability to operate within organisational
constraints
Problems of Mechanics?
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organisational creativity and effort can focus on internal problems only systems and procedures.
heavy administrative overhead - internal procedures consume more resources
than external customer-focused operations.
slow in responding to external change - lose touch with customers and external
stakeholders.
Parochialism, defend-my-patch behaviours occur. Organisational members can
develop unhelpful, bounded mind-sets - perceptions of external and internal.
Job and departmental boundaries can lead to the rational-legal organisation
becoming bogged down in a spaghetti of tortuous processes and "need-toconsult" everyone and anyone.
the status quo is defended rather than changed to meet new circumstances.
The organic/organismic form
Organismic departments vie with mechanistic, functionally-organised
departments.
Burns and Stalker saw organismic forms as being:
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suitable for unstable, turbulent and changing conditions.
The organismic firm tries to re-shape itself to address new problems and tackle
unforeseen contingencies
rather than a rigid, highly specialised structure - a fluid organisational design
is adopted which facilitates flexibility, adaptation, job redefinition
departments, sections and teams are formed and reformed. Communication is
lateral as well as vertical - with emphasis on a network rather than a hierarchy.
organisational members are personally and actively commitment to it beyond
what is basically operationally or functionally necessary.
Criticism of mechanistic cultures, their endemic problems and
behaviours is an easy thesis as many organisations today are pushed for
change and seek greater operating and coordinative flexibilities.
Modern approaches to management are cogniscent of this and invest
great effort to secure project-based forms of (temporary) organisation
grouping such as matrix structures and team cultures (participative
management style) within the basic bureaucratic framework.
A similar appraisal of organisation cultures offering a expanded
classification is that of Harrison whose work on roles and cultures is
summarised in Handy - Understanding Organisations. Harrison paints a
picture of four types of organisation. he suggests that each type
represents a "culture". The types are
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Power culture
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Role culture - corresponding roughly with bureaucracy - with varying degrees
of centralisation and decentralisation. This remains, from a control point of view,
the essential architecture of the large scale modern organisation.
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Task culture - corresponding with small-team culture or the project teams in
a project -based organisation or matrix structure. The integration of "small-team"
culture can be achieved within a bureaucratic system but it requires considerable
investment in a human-relations approach by management who must guard against
incongruent behaviour on their own part - upsetting the trust relationships that are
essential for the team to flourish. They need to be aware and skilled in creating the
support environment needed to realise the potential for human achievement
possible.
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Personal culture Overall - notwithstanding the dysfunctional aspects of
implementation, the Weberian model of bureaucracy, and for big business, still
supplies the main 'structuring' apparatus that puts the economic rationality of
modern capitalism into practice.
Moving from mechanistic to organismic
Burns and Stalker highlighted the problems of moving from
mechanistic to organismic forms. Their conclusions - in 1966 were
remarkably predictive.
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Burns T and Stalker G, The Management of Innovation,
Tavistock, 1961
Burns T, The Management of Innovation, OUP, 1994
The Learning Company Model
The idea of any organisation being a "learning organisation" is really an
abstraction, a concept offered by management pundits. A contingency view of any
business organisation holds that "the firm" must be responsive to forces and
developments in its environment otherwise it will atrophy and die - rather like a
political party which after 16 years of running a government runs out of steam (a
thought for Polling Day, 1st May 1997).
With jargon like the "learning organisation", we face the problem of reification.
We convert bricks, equipment and structural form - into something which, like a
living entity, can learn. Well this of course is nonsense. People come and go in
companies. They are obviously, in their own way, learners. In frantic, globally
competitive market environments - people in business must do reconnaisance,
evaluate, adapt , change, search out and take new opportunities.
"We have learned. We may be continuing to learn in fundamental ways
(over and above mere repetition of past routines). I may learn solely for
myself - this has nothing to do with my employer. Yet the employer may
want me to learn things and behaviours that suit the firm's needs. To keep
my job - I must do so."
It is those who direct the organisation and other members (employees) who, it is
suggested, need to learn and adapt. To survive occupationally and have continuous
and prosperous capacity to earn a living - they need new knowledge, behaviours
and willingness to do things they do not currently do. The individual may either
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stay the same and have the same orientations and behaviours even though the
work situation may change
 regress
 adapt to meet the demands of new situations
The occupational (got to earn a living) world is harsh. The "crowd" that forms the
firm - owners and servants - have to mobilise their stock of know-how and renew
it. Learning here is performance and company related - it usually means
knowledge and competences which enhance the ability to succeed in various
tasks. Many of the points at which adoption takes place occur along the different
points on the supply chain - from conception and specification of the product or
service to engagement with the customer, from purchasing to production and
dispatch and on to staffing and the overall infrastructures of the firm.
Supply-chain Learning
This must take in other organisations in our supply chain who, if we are primary
contractors, are ours partners. A client, such as British Airways, will want its
suppliers to learn too.
If the business message is "be excellent, bright and successful" then a client
will want all contributors in its supply chain to have the same concerns and
characteristics.
The imperatives of learning organisation pundits are focused on how
"management" of the firm can learn to be more adaptive and mobilise the capacity
of others (employees) as individuals and in various groups to learn. The raison
d'etre is two fold.
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There is a personal development flavour about the learning organisation's
manifesto. "We want our staff to take responsibility for becoming better
performers. We want them to understand how to perform better and be active
in learning to become so." They also learn for themselves.
 of course - the outcomes of this learning (new behaviours, responses) can be
used by the organisation to become quicker, more productive, more
competitive.
 Thus the "learning organisation" manifesto - is the Theory Y, normative,
managerial call to arms. Integrate the needs of the individual with the needs
of the organisation.
Pedler, Burgoyne and Boydell's Learning Company
PBB reporting on a 1988 MSC research project (Ref) , modelled the
characteristics of a "Learning Company" and suggested "how to" become one.
Here is a recipe for organisational change effort which builds on ideas previously
offered by e.g. Argyris, Revans (Action Learning) and Deming (quality
management).
PBB's Eleven characteristics
1. Adopt a Learning Approach to Strategy
2. Participative Policy Making
3. Informating (Information Systems)
4. Formative accounting
5. Internal Exchange (Client-Server relationships)
6. Reward Flexibility
7. Roles and flexible, matrix structures
8. Boundary workers as intelligence agents
9. Company-to-company learning
10. Learning climate
11. Self-development opportunities for all
PBB stress that
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the model is a simplification - not complete or rigid
its is not sequential although it starts with strategy and ends with creation of
learning opportunities.
 they think it needs more aesthetic appeal (what would this mean?).
The model is symbolic rather than concrete. The metaphor speaks of ecological
flows, energies, life forces, and balances - abstracted language is evident e.g.
"vertical and horizontal loop energy flows providing linkages between
individual and collective activity/change and dynamics between vision and
action".
Is this hot air - recursive polemic? The eleven characteristics become
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an energetic, normative, persuasive device for those wishing to manage
change. It is a professional "change agents'" model - independent of the
context of change or analysis of change processes.
characteristics become prescriptions - committments to flexible, selfmanaging, incremental, experimental, participative activities
the model has an ethically correct, personal values feel. Down-sizing and
asset stripping do not quite fit in (unilateral, surgical management action) as a
recommended approach to change
The Virtuous Manager
We can imagine learning company managers
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acting virtuously - aware of rights, duties and obligations.
being more altruistic, oriented towards the other - the client, the partner, the
employee as a peer-group member.
 consciously developing and improving their efforts to bring about change in
rational, action research, humanistically oriented steps.
Such an approach, it is argued, will - rather like Machiavelli's civic republic energise an organisation from within and from without, mobilising the creative
energies of members and contributors and providing goods and services which
delight everyone.
1.
Adopt a Learning Approach to Strategy
PBB recommend effort to structure policy and strategy formation in ways that
enable implementation and evaluation a conscious learning process. (See
Mintzberg on strategy formulation processes in various types of organisations).
The policy formulation need not be radical. Formulation of plans can evolve with
managers emphasising developmental experimentation rather than "radical, big
bang" schemes. Building milestones and sub-projects into planning processes
gives feedback. Yet the problem of quick action and conflicting pressures in fast
moving business situations emphasises flexibility in policy formulation, decisions
and business positioning.
2.
Participative Policy Making
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The idealised "stakeholder" concept is referenced.
There is a belief in the collective and the benefits of consultation and
involvement.
The enlightened, pluralistic management aim is to get all company members
sharing in policy and strategy-forming processes (take part, discuss and
contribute to major decisions).
Consciously encouraging contributions means managing in ways that resolve
tensions, conflicting views and values, positions etc - rather than just taking
unilateral management action. The "learnco" ethic idealises the scope for airing
differences and securing consensus so that all "stakeholders" can support
decisions.
The problem with the stakeholder view is in defining who the stakeholders are and
eliciting what exactly are their claim rights. The practicalities of this are never
properly understood. Instead an idealised collectivist view is taken. It is a
consensus-oriented viewpoint which, as Mintzberg points out in relation to the
ability of machine-bureaucracies to innovate quickly, has difficulties in capitalist,
market economies.
"Stakeholders" are diverse groups of staff, customers, suppliers, owners and
neighbours, the community and the environment. Sub-sets include women/men,
black/white, nationalities, young/old, physical/mental ability, differing learning
styles/needs, political/spiritual, educational and social classes, personal qualities
etc.
PBB recognise that participative policy making involves
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an ethical, moral dimension. But which goups have a right to take part and
have a say?
 complexity and diversity may leads to creativity, better ideas and solutions
rather than the lowest common denominator of trying to satisfy everybody
 striving to delight stakeholders involves costs. Stakeholders may be insatiable.
But of course satisfying customers and partners fosters long-term success.
Satisficing mere matching of customer requirements is insufficient as they like to
be pleased and surprised by quality of service. This line of argument is spurred by
the demands of consumerism.
Working with diversity requires high awareness and sensitivity to resolving
conflict. Special methods may be needed. In response to competitors, PBB suggest
that the learning organisation will employ "boundary workers" and do
environmental scanning.
3.
Informating (Information Systems)
New jargon!...which basically means informing and empowering (giving people
the scope to get on with it) rather than, disempowering (applying the mushroom
theory of management). How?
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by making information as widely available as possible.
by using information systems to help people understand more and get on top
of their jobs instead of emphasising the monitoring and controlling,
reward/punish or zealous control aspects of information capture and storage.
the content and value of data must be understood. There may be a data integrity
problem. Data captured by information systems may suffer from inaccuracy,
incompleteness and out-of-dateness. Thus when interpreting, it is vital to know
if the data is representative or not. If not why not and what can be done about it?
remember the rumour factory and GIGO (garbage in = garbage out)
New information systems may be needed to make better data available and to
disseminate it.
4.
Formative accounting
In line with the self-responsibility ethic, PBB note the importance of accounting,
budgeting and reporting systems. Set these up so that they assist learning (a new
meaning for the term formative accounting) and givg added value (delighting
internal customers). How? By developing systems that encourage (but regulate for
accountability) individuals and units to act as small businesses.
5.
Internal Exchange (Client-Server relationships)
The learning organisation develops internal units and departments so that each see
themselves in a client-server relationships.
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The ethic emphasises win-win.
They contract with one another in an internal market. Departments and workstations seeking to "delight" internal customers.
Client-server relationships involve dialogue, shared expectations, information
exchange, negotiating, contracting and giving feedback on the quality of
service. Internal clients must respect the rights and needs of their suppliers
also
The dialogue emphasises co-operation rather than competitiveness, lack of trust,
stereotyping, blame and recrimination. Servers seek to delight clients with
everyone in tune with the company's overall needs. Such harmony and generosity
of spirit. Discussion and contracting processes benefit from a "you-win, we-win"
to optimise performance.
This ethic confronts the prisoners dilemma and the importance of self-interest as a
human characteristic.
6.
Reward Flexibility
This characteristic involves changing how rewards (and power?) are distributed.
Several other characteristics also imply power redistribution. Is such redistribution
merely at the margin and not a fundamental power shift?
Together participation, learning companies are recommended to explore values
and assumptions underpinning rewards and the pay-performance relationships.
Many things over and above wages/salaries are "rewarding". Examine these to
guide policies, procedures and alternatives for salary levels, systems & etc.
Participation in pay-determination may open up alternatives. Declare and
recognised....people will be happier.
7.
Roles and flexible, matrix structures
In the learning organisation, job roles are more loosely structured creating
opportunities for individual and business development. Roles are more team and
matrix oriented to match client, stakeholder needs (multi-function contract
delivery). Job roles need to provide scope for personal growth and
experimentation.
Members of the organisation need to understand that departmental and job
boundaries are temporary structures - solutions to past performance requirements.
Such structures need to be flexible and adaptable to accommodate current needs
and future responses.
New forms of structure will be needed to fit the organisation's evolution. We need
to know how these have evolved and need to experiment with new ones.
8.
Boundary workers as intelligence agents
Bob Garrett in his work on Action Learning noted Stafford Beer's concern about
the "brain of the firm". Senior management need to scan the external environment
and not just become bogged down with internal affairs.
See BOLA: Systems view of the business in its environment
This characteristic of the learning company goes farther. As for (3) above
(Informating), the learning organisation needs to get ?everyone? involved in its
intelligence gathering operations. All staff - top managers, middle managers,
technicals, sales people, clerks, vand dirvers - collect external data. Thus - the
learnco model - holds that scanning is the responsibility of everyone in contact
with external clients and stakeholders.
Where an organisational member operates at the boundary between the
organisation and others that it serves - then the role is elaborated to include scope
to act as a boundary worker. Those who implement operations and deliver goods
and services need to bring in information for collation and dissemination. Sales
staff, technicians, van drivers are sources of information about what clients and
others want/feel.
9.
Company-to-company learning
If we seek to delight our clients, we will join in mutually helpful learning
activities. Joint training, sharing in project investment, in R&D, job exchanges,
linking of computer systems etc. We can also join with others to share benchmarking information. PBB note that Rank Xerox set out to learn from Caterpillar
as a "benchmark" firm for delivering heavy equipment.
Bench-marking can be done as an covert intelligence operation i.e. using publicdomain or "surveyed" data to evaluate a rival's performance against one's own.
Bench-making may also be a cooperative venture between partners who trust each
other enough (or the information is not a trade secret to be withheld) - we are not
rivals and so can be somewhat altruistic in our relationship.
Friendship and rivalry illustrate the dilemma for company-to-company learning.
PBB recognise the "come and steal shamelessly from us" slogan.
The suggestion is that in pursuit of learning and betterment, competitors may
collaborate for mutual learning. Rather than fight - we go for win-win - perhaps in
coalition against a mutal rival. The assumption is that win/lose in the long run suboptimises with lose/lose. Via shared learning mutual interests may be served by
increasing joint shares of the overall market, capitalising on technological
advances, establishing joint industry standards etc.
We do see this with companies such as Microsoft, IBM, Apple etc but for the
more vulnerable participants - the felt danger of being ripped of or that the
"partners" are not being entirely honest is a powerful force. IN October 1997 - the
US government began to take steps to regulate the monopoly power position of
Microsoft in relation to the distribution and design of its Explorer products. It will
be interesting to see how state intervention evolves and affects any colloborative
ventures between big fish and little fish.
10.
Learning climate
Climates can be wet, cold, dry, too hot, tempestuous, calm, unpredictable,
dangerous for health, bracing and invigorating. Too often we use the term climate
without realising the metaphor in use.
The learning company notion is that managers should encourage
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member projects and experiments in learning,
learning from experience and continuous improvement.
Problem-solving and the cycle of doing, reflecting, thinking, so that "action
learning" becomes the norm.
The recommendation is for senior managers
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to give a lead in questioning themselves
see mistakes are learning opportunities without generating a confrontional,
blame-culture, you are fired situation.
Trying new ideas and methods may not always work but if tried as a conscious
experiment (shared, controlled) - there are learning benefits. In a company facing
considerable business pressure where radical action may be needed - then
unilaterally decided management action is likely to be the dominant approach. In
such circumstances there may be fear and reticence to try something new without
the boss's authority. The human relations ethic of the "learnco" model tends to
gloss over stark realities.
The learning company and quality management go hand in hand. Continuous
improvement is emphasised always learning and doing better. delighting goes
beyond "good enough". The persuasion and urging of business conversations is
evident in this language. Thus human "learning is linked to business performance"
- a key hypothesis in the managerial manifesto.
11.
Self-development opportunities for all
The learning company gives its people access to resources and facilities for selfdevelopment. External stakeholders have access too as an ingredient in the
partner, client-server relationship. A culture of self-development offers support,
guidance and feedback (two-way). People are encouraged to manage their own
learning and development.
What kind of resources are available?
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courses, workshops, seminars,
self-learning materials
self-development forums and processes
development groups
coaching/mentoring
co-counselling
time-off to study
opening doors for new experience - projects, visits, representing the firm etc
encouragement of broad education for life and not just job specific training
Being an active, conscious learner is demanding. it is a theatrical role in its own
right and the bouncing "I am an active learner person" is in danger of being eaten
up by their own cliche or by those they bore. Individuals need be able to take time
out from the demands of always pushing learning forward. Other important
aspects of their life may rightfully consume attention. The learning company (here
is the managerial, performance rub) however may not be able to let them fall
asleep. Thus the PBB proviso is that those working on specific developmental
issues will be known. Support and guidance is needed.
References
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Pedler M, Burgoyne J and Boydell J, The Learning Company, McGraw Hill.
Bob Garrett, Action Learning in Practice, Gower
What is this thing called organisational culture?
Conversations often refer to different organisations having different cultures. For
the average person - "culture" may mean that they perceive the organisation they
are involved with to be:
 pushy, harsh and authoritarian
 very political with traps and pitfalls for people to fall into if they are not
nimble and able to wheeler-deal and hold their own in a brawl
 rule and ritual bound
 cold and separated
 brisk, dynamic, opportunistic
 exploitative, all take and no give
 caring and genuinely interested in people as people
People classify what they see as the characteristics of organisations. We construe
and organisation culture. It is socially defined and experienced. The experience of
the things we feel are displayed by the "culture and its practices" affect how we
behave and respond to the organisations we work in.
Culture Control and Engineering
Managers seek to "change" the culture of the organisation. What they therefore try
to do is shape the way that people behave, feel, contribute, interact, perform as
employees of the organisation. This is usually called leadership! They initiate the
debates, set the imperatives and priorities. If the managers want to pursue quality
improvement then meetings will be held, training will be done, banners will be
waved - new imperatives are brought in to the business to be integrated by way of
activities, expectations, values and sanctions into the culture of the business. This
is business - the business must succeed in co-ordinated, highly charged ways.
New policies, methods and roles are introduced to shape behaviours, encourage,
promote and require - to push certain expectations of performance in the business
and thus to control.
Spoken of in other ways, culture in organisational terms is broadly the
social/behavioural manifestation and experiencing of a whole range of issues such
as :
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the way work is organised and experienced
how authority exercised and distributed
how people are and feel rewarded, organised and controlled
the values and work orientation of staff
the degree of formalisation, standardisation and control through systems there
is/should be
 the value placed on planning, analysis, logic, fairness etc
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how much initiative, risk-taking, scope for individuality and expression is
given
 rules and expectations about such things as informality in interpersonal
relations, dress, personal eccentricity etc
 differential status
 emphasiss given to rules, procedures, specifications of performance and
results, team or individual working
Organisational Culture and Working Life
We are born into a culture, we take up employment in a culture. We might
therefore argue that the culture of an organisation affects the type of people
employed, their career aspirations, their educational backgrounds, their status in
society. The culture of the organisation may embrace them. It may reject them.
Visibility
Organisational culture may be visible
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in the type of buildings, offices, shops of the organisation.
in the image projected in publicity and public relations in general. Think for
example of the differences between a local authority, a computer
manufacturer, and a merchant bank.
An organisation's culture may be imperceptable, taken for granted, assumed, a
status quo that we live and participate in but do not question. Elements of the
culture may be questioned where individual or group expectations do not
correspond to the behaviours associated with the prevailing values of those who
uphold "the culture".
An organisation may display elements of several "cultures" which may contradict
each other, which may compete. We can even consider the characteristics of an
anti-organisational or countervailing culture.
Classifying/Modelling Organisation Culture
To understand organisation cultures we can begin by describing types of
organisation such as democractic, laissez-faire, participative etc. Such descriptions
in a sense become representative "models" of organisations (abstrations). The
model defines our assessment of elements, relationships, determinants and likely
effects. Our model may enable us to predict events so that we act to steer our own
behaviour and the behvaiour of others.
Defining "models or frameworks" helps us to understand what the phenomena is,
discuss it with others and identify what we might do to translate the model or parts
of it into reality.
Various models indicative of organisation culture have been suggested. Important
ones include
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Rensis Likert
autocratic, benevolent autocractic, consusltative and participative systems of
organsiation
Burns and Stalker
mechanistic and organismic organisations
Henry Mintzberg
Simple Structure, Machine Bureaucracy, Divisionalized, Professional
Bureaucracy, the Adhocracy
Roger Harrison
power, role, task and personal cultures of organisations
Pedler et al
the Learning Organisation
A Few References
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Handy C, Understanding Organisations, Penguin
Mintzberg H, The Structuring of Organisations, Addision Wesley
Reddin W, Managerial Effectiveness, McGraw Hill
Likert R, The Professional Manager, Wiley
Mintzberg H, Lampel J, Quinn J, Ghoshal S, 2003, The Strategy Process
Concepts, Contexts and Cases, Prentice Hall, I988.
 Buchanan D and Huczynski A, Organisational Behaviour, Prentice Hall