Organisational culture

Organisations are economic and social entites in which a number of persons perform various tasks in order to attain common goals. They are effective instrument in that they help individuals to accomplish personal objectives which they cannot achieve alone.
Organisation is a means to an end. It takes certain inputs from the environment and converts them into specified outputs desired by the society. Organisational design deals with the structural aspects of an institution. It aims at analyzing roles and relationship so that collective effort can be explicitly organized to achieve specific end. The design process leads to the development of an organisation structre consisting of units and positions.
There are three components of organisation structure viz., complexity, formalisation and centralization. Complexity refers to the horizontal, vertical and location differentiation. Formalisation is the degree to which jobs within the organisaiton are standardized. Centralisation is the degree to which decision-making is concentrated at a single point in an organization.
Basically, organisation structures can be classified into two types viz., machanic and organic. Mechanic structure is one which is characterized by high complexity (great deal of horizontal differentiation), high formalisation, a limited information network (mostly downward) a little participation by lower level members in decision-making, organic structure is low in complexity and formalisation. It possesses a comprehensive information network and involves high participation in decision-making.
Mintzberg’s Five Design Configurations
Henry mintzberg suggested that all organizations are essentially make up of five elements viz., operating core, the strategic apex, middleline men, technostrucute and support staff. Operating core is the heart of the workforce of an organization. The strategic apex is composed of the senior managers of the organization. The middleline consists of he middle level management of the organisaiton. The technostructure is make up of the control activities of the oganisation like strategic planning, organisation and methods etc. Support staff include lawyers, public relation officers, counselors etc.
The following are the main types of structures identified by Mintzberg.
Simple Structure: In this structure only the strategic apex and the operating core are fully developed. Control is at the strategic level only. This type of organisation structure is charactersied by low complexity, little formalisation and high degree of centralization. Employees in this type of organisation contribute to the organizational goals and they fell sense of achievement.
Machine Bureaucracy: In this structure, the middle level is flat. The strategic apex is remote and control being by means of formalized rules and regulations, standardization and highly routine nature of work, checks and controls. Generally, top management prefers this type of structure. But employees feel frustration due to alienation, boredom and absence of sense of belongingness.
Professional Bureaucracy : This structure is dominated by operating professionals and control is at operating level by the highly skilled operating core. Employees achieve effectiveness from standardization. This structure combines standardization with decentralization. Job in this organisation are highly enriched. This type of organisation is suitable for hi-tech large organisation. Employees in this organisation enjoy freedom of work.
The divisional Structure: This structure is effectively operated with a series of coordinated machine bureaucracies. Each division manages its business depending upon the local needs and requirements. Middle level management exercise control.
Adhocracy: This type of structure is characteised as low complexity, low formalisation and centralization. This is organized for a specific project. This structure is characterized by great horizontal, differentiation, a few rules and regulations, decentralized decision-making and flexible teams. This structure is highly humanized. Employees in this organisation feel social and psychological tensions as setting up and dismantling relationship would be difficult. Further, it is also difficult to cope up with rapid change and live in temporary teams.
Organisational concepts and principles are developed over the period. A number of decades have passed since most of these principles were originally proposed. The classic principles of organisation are modified in tune with the changing requirements and the nature and goals of today’s organisation functioning in highly competitive environment. The principle of centralization of authority is not relevant to the large, widely spread modern organisation as it limits the effectiveness and efficiency of decision-making of the executives at various levels.
Centralizations refers to the degree to which decision-making is concentrated at a single point in the organization. On the other hand, decentralization refers to the degree to which decision-making is spread at different levels and points in the ogranisation. Classical theorists believed centralization. But, typically it is said that, if top management makes the organisation’s key decisions with little or no input from lower level employees, the effectiveness of the decisions would be doubtful. On the other hand, in a decentralized organization, action can be taken more quickly to solve problems, employees at the help of affairs provide input into decisions and people are less likely to feel alienated from those who make the decisions that affect their work lives. Further, the large, widely spread and highly competitive organisation cannot afford to have less effective and delayed decisions making. Decentralised structure enables the employee involvement in decision-making at every level in the organization. As such, decentralized structure would serve the requirements of today’s organization.
Against this background, an attempt is made to know the features of organisation structure of various respondent banks through the analysis of the opinions of management representatives. Table 5.1 shows the opinions of management respondents about the features of organisation structures. Majority of the management representatives (58%) have opinioned that the authority is centralized to a great extent in UCO Bank(BOB). Scope for participative management in this bank is limited (44%)
Formality and Standardization
Formality of rules refers to the degree to which jobs, procedural formalities, rules and regulations in the process of performing jobs are standardized. If a job is highly formalized, then the incumbant has a minimum amount of discretion over what is to be done, when is it to be done and how he or she should do it. When formalisation is low job behaviours are relatively non-programmed and employees have a great deal of freedom to exercise discretion in their work. The employee is allowed to contribute less of his resource in a highly formalized structure and the employee is encourage to contribute his maximum resource in a less formalized structure as they have to utilize human potentialities fully in order to achieve their goals.

The classical theorists were strong proponents of division of labour or stratification and specialization. They believed it as a way to significantly increase the economic effectiveness of organizations. Specialization makes effectiveness of organization. Specialization makes efficient use of the diversity of skills that workers hold. In view of the more of the diversified tasks/job and less of highly sophisticated tasks inmost of the organizations, employees would be working below their ability in most cases under the division of labour. Further division of labour results in boredom, fatigue, stress, low productivity, poor quality, increased absenteeism and higher turnover. But, it is found that, productivity can be increased by enlarging better than narrowing the scope of job activites. As such today’s organisation depends on less degree of specialization and stratifications.

Job Enrichment
Under job enrichment there is a conscious effort to build the jobs with a higher sense of challenge and achievement. Job enrichment is vertical loading of a job. In a job enrichment is programme, the worker decides, how the job is performed, planned and controlled and makes more decisions concerning the entire process. This approach is to give the individual employee more autonomy and freedom in doing the job. Employees decide how the job will be performed and receive less supervision on the job. Consequently, the employee receives a greater sense of accomplishment as well as more authority and responsibility.
Almost all organizations today face a dynamic and changing environement, in turn, requires these organizations to adapt. Every organisation should be dynamic, accept change, change the polices and introduce change in a planned way. Normally, organizations with less formality, decentralized character and less degree of complexity and proponents of change, develop the human resources along with the internal opportunities on the organisation prefer less complexity and decentralization and introduce change effectively and successfully.