Shared information is important to every organization, but it is more important to a learning organization than it is to an efficient performance organization.
Discussion Board Forum 1: Response to the assigned questions.
Shared information is important to every organization, but it is more important to a learning organization than it is to an efficient performance organization. Efficient performance organizations generally, focus on achieving the organization’s goals of transforming the inputs of energy and materials into a given level of output (Daft, 2019, p. 24). Legacy manufacturers are an example of efficient performance organizations and often use a mechanistic design, where not every member of the manufacturing team is concerned about sharing information on a large scale. In contrast, a learning organization may have a more organic design allowing for the free flow of information between units. Hsu and Lamb (2020), observed that learning organizations offer, “a recipe for management to remove bureaucracy and create a more flexible and flatter organizational environment” (p. 32). It may be wise for many more mature efficient performance organizations to implement a more organic organizational structure that facilitates organizational learning to stay ahead of the competition.
Some of the differences between stakeholder expectations of a nonprofit organization and a for-profit organization are, who are the most influential stakeholders, and what are the goals of the organization. According to Boesso and Kumar (2016), stakeholders constitute customers, employees, community, and non-governmental organizations. A nonprofit organization’s most influential stakeholders are the customers or causes that the nonprofit seeks to serve. The customers or cause are the most influential stakeholders because embody the reason for the organization’s existence, and without them, the organization’s purpose would cease to exist. A for-profit organization’s most influential stakeholders will likely be the shareholders, especially those with a controlling share of the company because they hold the power to direct its movement and decisions. The goals of a nonprofit will likely be very altruistic where the goals of the for-profit organization will likely be centered on profit generation. The author of this post does not believe that nonprofit managers must pay more attention to stakeholders than business managers do. In both nonprofit and for-profit organizations, the management is answerable to the stakeholders, and because of this accountability, both sets of managers will find it in their best interest to ensure their stakeholders are satisfied with work conducted by the organization.
A company’s goals for innovation and change should drive the direction in which it is developing its employees. For example, if a company is building its virtual presence then it will need to train employees on engagement in the virtual domain. Engagement in the virtual domain may include teaching website design, social media marketing, or cybersecurity. If a company is trying to innovate new products or services in say, the aerospace sector with a focus on satellite deployment, then it may choose to develop its employees by increasing their proficiency in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics thus improving the company’s ability to launch satellites into orbit. In the same fashion, a company focused on productivity may train their employees in lean manufacturing or Six Sigma. The goals of innovation and change may come into conflict with the goals of productivity because they tend to have opposite requirements. Innovation and change require new thinking, research, and a willingness to fail where high levels of productivity require becoming exceeding efficient at a few specific tasks.
If the author of this post was asked to measure the effectiveness of a police department for a medium-sized community, he would use the goal approach (Daft, 2021, p. 73) by first developing performance measures, then setting goals based on those performance measures. According to Matthews (2011), “In almost every organization, performance measures are used to assess and measure organizational effectiveness” (p. 85). This author would start with a quantitative measure, specifically the quantity and degree of violations of law within the assigned jurisdiction. The goal would be to keep the violations of law below a certain numerical level each year through a combination of overt operations and public awareness alerting the general public to the presence and efforts of officers. Once that qualitative performance measure was in place the author would move onto the qualitative performance measures of, the satisfaction of the community with policing efforts, and the satisfaction of the police officers with their place of employment. Both measures could be obtained through survey data and used to make appropriate changes to the police department’s policy.
There is no formula for what may or may not be outsourced in the current highspeed business environment. In time past, one could have determined that low labor costs in emerging markets were the primary driver of outsourcing, but now due to the need for highly specialized technology even things like areas of product development may be outsourced to secondary vendors. Wadhwa and Ravindran (2007) observed, “that the primary reason for outsourcing is not cost-reduction; rather it is the ability to focus on the core competencies” (p. 3726). Core competencies are often what give an organization its competitive advantage in a sector or industry. The author of this paper believes that in general manufacturing or similar work is the most likely to be outsourced because there is a significant difference between labor costs in the emerging and developed markets, but as technology advances and emerging markets mature the landscape of what is being outsourced is changing. Management and corporate governance roles are the least likely to be outsourced because the individuals in those roles guide the direction of the company.
A biblical worldview can and should be applied to every aspect of an organization because a biblical worldview best reflects the reality of life. Proverbs 16:11 says, “Honest scales and balances belong to the Lord; all the weights in the bag are his making” (New International Version). Implementing a biblical worldview may consist of aligning organizational goals with biblical values, for example, good stewardship of the environment stems from Genesis 2:15 where Adam is directed to take care of the garden of Eden. Many Christians extrapolate the need to steward the environment from this verse. A second example may be providing far wages for employees which could be derived from 1 Timothy 5:18, where Paul reminds Timothy that a “worker deserves his wages” (NIV). There are many ways that a biblical worldview will work itself out in business, and as a biblical worldview is implemented, the organization should become a more effective place where both earthy and heavenly goals are achieved.
Reference
Boesso, G., & Kumar, K. (2016). Examining the association between stakeholder culture, stakeholder salience and stakeholder engagement activities: An empirical study. Management Decision, 54(4), 815-831. doi:10.1108/MD-06-2015-0245
Daft R. L., (2021). Organization Theory & Design 13 ed. Boston, MA: Cengage
Hsu, S., & Lamb, P. (2020). Still in search of learning organization?: Towards a radical account of the fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. The Learning Organization, 27(1), 31-41. doi:10.1108/TLO-09-2019-0142
Matthews, J. R. (2011). Assessing organizational effectiveness: The role of performance measures. The Library Quarterly (Chicago), 81(1), 83-110. doi:10.1086/657447
Wadhwa, V., & Ravindran, A. R. (2007). Vendor selection in outsourcing. Computers & Operations Research, 34(12), 3725-3737. doi:10.1016/j.cor.2006.01.009
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