Management

ORGANIZATIONAL STRUCTURES

All organized human activity give rise to two basic and differing requirements: the distribution of labour into various tasks to be performed, and the coordination of these tasks to complete the activity. The structure of an organization can therefore be defined merely as the sum total of the ways in which its labour is divided into distinct tasks and how its coordination is achieved amongst these tasks (Mintzberg, 1983). To design an effective organizational structure the elements of structure, (the organizations niche, how large it grows, and the methods used to produce) should be selected to achieve an internal consistency, as well as a basic stability with the organization's context (its size, its age, the kind of environment in which it functions, technical systems used and so on) (Mintzberg, 1983).Coordinating an organization engages a range of means. These can be referred to as coordinating mechanisms and are equally concerned with control and communication as coordination. Five coordinating mechanisms appear to explain the basic ways in which organizations coordinate their work: mutual adjustment, direct supervision, standardization of work processes, standardization of work outputs, and standardization of worker outputs. Mutual adjustments realize the coordination of work by the simple process of informal communication. Meaning, the control of the work rests in the hands of the doers. Direct supervision attain coordination by having one person in charge for the work of others, issuing them instructions and monitoring their actions. Work can also be coordinated without mutual adjustment or direct supervision, through standardization. Workers that constantly work in a certain way and know what is expected, proceed accordingly. Work processes are standardized when the contents of work are specified, or programmed. Outputs are standardized when the results of the work, for example, the dimensions of the product or the performance,...