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QUESTION
One of the most critical issues facing organizations is keeping up with digitization of the workplace. The reality confronting organizations is increasingly complex. Many leaders, who were trained when organizational structure was simpler, are hampered with outdated skills.
Organization design must evolve along with the organizations and its leadership to support adaptive and innovative workplaces.
Let us look at trends in organization structure. Using the class text and, predominately, articles from Trident Library’s full-text databases (like Academic Search Complete, Business Source Complete, and/or ProQuest Central) research organization structure. Do not use any quotations.
Organizational Design
A brief history. Consider modern workplaces before digitization and automation became prevalent. (1 page)
Trends in Organizational DesignResearch top trends affecting modern organizational design (1 page)
Workplace Application: Organizational Design
| Subject | Business | Pages | 6 | Style | APA |
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Answer
Emerging Trends: Designing for Agility and Innovation
This paper discusses the emerging trends in organizational design that the modern workplace adapts to become more competitive and achieve its strategic goals. The paper covers a brief history of OD before the modern workplaces became digitalized and automated, the trends impacting current OD, and agility as an OD in the tech industry.
Organizational Design: A Brief History
organization design (OD) is a procedure of affiliating an organization’s structure with its goals, with the eventual aim of enhancing efficiency and usefulness. Organizational design concerns crafting the best fit between the organization's strategic choices and the corporate setting. For instance, if company C functions in an established market and seeks to uphold its position, company C will adopt a low-cost leadership approach centred on efficiency. This firm will have a robust, centralized authority, constricted control, and several standard functioning procedures regarding OD. Company D is an innovative and progressing firm that underlines learning. Company D will have a more fluid and adaptable design, a more decentralized structure, loose control, workforce is operating directly with clients and are rewarded for resourcefulness and risk-taking. Figure 1 below shows the differences in OD between Company C and Company D
Figure 1. Differences in OD between Company C and Company D
Before digitalization and automation became prevalent in modern workplaces, mainly hierarchical and organic OD was used. Hierarchical OD was used in workplaces characterized by a top-down chain of command that is rule-centred. Thus, these hierarchies are highly centralized and utilize formal authority; roles are distinctly described and differentiated to be performed by exact specialized experts. Managers and supervisors have fewer persons operating directly under them, and the firm is controlled by rigid departmentalization (Bright et al., 2019). thus, this organization form signifies a traditional structure type that grew in stable environments with low complexity.
Historically the American Postal Service and other manufacturing kinds of industries were mechanistic. The organic OD functions best in unbalanced, complex, varying environments. Thus, their structures are flatter with hands-on communication and decision-making streaming in diverse directions. Also, tasks are performed in less-rigid means and fluidity, and jobs are more generalized and shared with a broader span of control, which means that more persons reporting to managers. Aerospace, telecommunication firms, computer and high tech are examples of firms that must handle change and improbability hence used organic OD.
Trends in Organizational Design
Evolving technologies, sustained globalization, and the ever-changing social customs are some of the challenges confronting modern firms. Therefore, firms must either rapidly adapt to transformation or be surpassed by their more agile competitors. Adaptation always demands an entire organizational re-design. The top trends impacting modern OD are digitalization, agile and virtual connection. The enormous effect digitalization has had on the marketplace has not been on the human task’s displacement however instead on the exponential enlargement of capabilities and hence opportunities. Presently, business is digitalized to some scope (Kretschmer & Khashabi, 2020). for instance, Uber and Amazon have utilized digital solutions in creating business models that never existed in the 1980s. Whereas not each business should be digitalized as Uber, virtually every industry can gain from exploring the usage of artificial intelligence and data and analytics in improving capabilities and outcomes and not only incrementally but exponentially. Therefore, capitalizing on these possibilities does not need strong leadership and inclination to transform and adapt.
Connected to digitalization is the virtual connection, an OD notion that transforms how firms develop value and obtain power and impact. Instead of trying to own and control all production means and resources, firms utilize the influence of relationships and technology in creating value (Kretschmer & Khashabi, 2020). thus, firms that entirely leverage this belief are virtually connected. An example of virtual connection is evident in the hospitality industry. For instance, Airbnb does not own real estate or manage the property. Still, all it does is foster relationships, link property owners with possible users, and provide a secure place for the transaction to occur.
Agile is also an OD trend that has a digital world background. Agile is a working method that empowers a firm to react more promptly to marketplace changes and its outcome in a quicker, resilient firm. By breaking down complex procedures into short fractures of concentrated activity, Agile functioning ways can permit a firm to develop new products and react to client feedback much quicker than by utilizing traditional methods (Kretschmer & Khashabi, 2020). likewise, it promotes innovation by empowering persons from disparate parts of the firm to solve problems. General Electric (GE) is an example of an agile firm. GE in 2015 did a performance management change that entailed a new system that depends on managers directing and coaching the workforce to attain their objectives, and they operate under a less rigid system. Likewise, GE chose to integrate the usage of an app PD@GE to foster the delivery of constant workforce feedback and fruitful performance discussions.
Workplace Application: Organizational Design
In the tech industry, leaders are aware that they must progress to survive. Whether a start-up functioning to become money-making or an established firm determined to uphold the quickly transforming consumer trends, organizational agility is becoming a prerequisite (Brosseau et al., 2019). For example, Cisco originally planned with the waterfall approach Cisco's Subscription Billing Platform (SBP) program utilized in separating design, developing, testing and deployment teams with every team operating in sequence. Thus, this tactic slackened the development procedure, outcoming in long release cycles, unexploited delivery dates, quality challenges, and overtime. Cisco implemented the Scaled Agile Framework (SAFe) and established three agile release trains on SBP- resources, deficiencies and fixes and programs. The thought was to cooperate in developing and testing small qualities in one SaaS module and render them to the system assimilation and testing team. Cisco dispensed the new SBP release on schedule and minus no overtime. Cisco decreased Defects by forty percent, likened to preceding waterfall releases and defect elimination efficiency enlarged by fourteen percent thanks to enhanced team cooperation.
In conclusion, this paper has demonstrated that evolving technologies, competition and rising globalization is driving organizations to adopt appropriate OD to function efficiently and effectively. Therefore, most firms are becoming agile organizations as a means of responding to the marketplace changes
References
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Bright, D. S., Cortes, A. H., Hartmann, E., Parboteeah, K. P., Pierce, J. L., Reece, M., ... & O’Rourke, J. S. (2019). Principles of Management. OpenStax. Brosseau, D., Ebrahim, S., Handscomb, C., & Thaker, S. (2019). The journey to an agile organization. McKinsey & Company, May, 10. Kretschmer, T., & Khashabi, P. (2020). Digital transformation and organization design: An integrated approach. California Management Review, 62(4), 86-104.
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