How an organization is structured is becoming more and more important in today’s business world. The structure of the organization is one of the important factors that determine employees’ efficiency in performing their tasks. This paper will concentrate on how organizational structure affects the efficiency of work done by employees’. Six key elements of an organizational structure will be followed by three common organizational structures. Efficiency of employees will be brought about relating to the above mentioned.
“An organizational structure defines how job tasks are formally divided, grouped, and coordinated” (Robbins, Judge and Campbell, 2010, p.429). Efficiency means, “When someone or something uses time and energy well, without wasting any” (Cambridge Learner’s Dictionary-3rd edition). When managers decide on an organizational structure, they should take the six key elements in consideration. According to Robbins and Langton, the six key elements are; “work specialization, departmentalization, chain of command, span of control, centralisation and decentralisation, and formalization” (Robbins & Langton, 2006, p.475).
The first key element work specialization (also known as division of labour), is dividing the activities of an organization into discrete tasks. For instance, in a car manufacturing company, one person will just put on the doors and the other will put on the wheels. It is said that work specialization increases the efficiency of workers. But everything has its limits, so does work specialization. When work specialization becomes perennial, it results in employees’ being sloppy in their work or increased absenteeism of employees. However, some companies learnt that putting employees into groups and allow...
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Taylorism is a system that was designed in the late 19th century, not only to maximise managerial control, but to also expand the levels of efficiency throughout workplaces. With this being said, productivity levels increased and fair wage distribution was the main result. However, with other, more recent theories and systems, such as Maslow and Herzburg’s theories, these helped to focus on the satisfaction and motivation of the workers rather than the concern of managerial control and empowerment. Fredrick W. Taylor ended up developing 4 main principles to help increase the work efficiency and productivity in workplaces; these will be discussed later on. Other theories relating to this include, Fayol, Follett, Management Science Theory as well as Organisational-Environmental Theory. All theories listed have an influence on the way businesses work effectively and put their skills to action. This essay will highlight how Taylorism was designed to maximise managerial control and increase productivity, furthermore, showing how more recent theories were developed to focus on empowering employees and to extend the use of organisational resources.
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