What are the foundations of organisational behaviour? - Chapter 1

• Organisational behaviour observes the interactions and habits of people and organisations. It tries to improve the organisations effectiveness. The three levels of analysis in organisational behaviour are the individual, the group, and the organisation.
• In the 19th century, Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber studied the effects of the industrial revolution. Marx studied the development of the working class. Durkheim studied the loss of solidarity in the new society. Weber is known for his work on bureaucracy, and  was the first to study organisational behaviour.
• Frederick Taylor is the founder of scientific management. This is an approach to management in which all tasks in organisations are analysed, routinised, divided and standardised in depth, instead of using rules of thumb. This leads to more efficiency due to the increasing pace of working because of the divided subtasks.
• Henri Fayol is the founder of ‘management’. Based on his research, he introduced five basic management tasks.
• describes individuals as separate beings but not totally independent. The freedom of an individual is bounded by biological and physical limitations. The effectiveness in the workplace will increase by co-operative actions. Three necessary elements for co-operative action are willingness to co-operate, a common purpose and communication.
• Mayo conducted research into the relationship between environmental factors (such as lighting) and worker output at Western Electric’s Hawthorne plant. The Hawthorne studies found no correcation between working conditions and output. Instead, they found that output was influenced by the motivational effects of the attention they got from being part of the experiment, and the different kind of supervision (by researchers, not their own supervisor). In addition, they found that members of informal groups don't always belong to the same formal groups. Every groups creates their own norms and values. Unfortunately, re-analysis did not support the initial claims of the Hawthorne studies. Nonetheless, they did support the human relations movement.
• Douglas McGregor formulated two different approaches regarding the human nature, theory X and theory Y. Theory X is the negative way managers traditionally perceived employees, theory Y was formulated to help them break out of this negative view.
• According to Gareth Morgan, everyone has a different image of how organisations look. These images are only partial views of how organisations actually work. You need to combine them to get a realistic image. Morgan summarised the different images in eight metaphors: machines, organisms, brains, culture, politics, psychic prisons, flux and transformation, and instruments of domination.

What are personal dynamics? - Chapter 2

• The concept the individual has of himself as a physical, social and spiritual or moral being. How you view yourself. Cognitions support self-concept, represent any knowledge, opinion or belief about the environment, oneself or one’s behaviour. Among all the types of cognitions, anticipation, planning, goal setting, evaluating and setting personal standards are the most relevant to OB. The extent of self-concept differs per culture.
• Self-esteem is the value one places on themselves. Everyone agrees that positive self-esteem is a good thing, but people disagree on how self-esteem can be improved. Self-esteem is shaped by circumstances and by the way other people treat us.
• Self-efficacy is defined as ‘a person’s belief about his or her chances of successfully accomplishing a specific task.’ It refers to personal beliefs about your competencies, skills and abilities. Low self-efficacy is associated with learned helplessness, meaning the belief that one has no control over one’s environment.
• Self-monitoring is the extent to which people observe their own self-expressive behaviour and adapt to the environment. There is a positive relationship between high self-monitoring and career success.
• Locus of control is the extent to which a person takes responsibility for his or her behaviour and the consequences of this behaviour. There are two types: internal and external.
• Personality is the combination of stable physical and mental characteristics that give the individual his or her identity. How you appear to others. It is formed by interacting genetic (nature) and environmental (nurture) influences. Traits are the characteristics of people in different situations. When categorising personality, The Big Five personality dimensions have been the most influential.
• Types are based on common patterns of characteristics between people. People belong to types (traits belong to people). Two important type theories are Jung's typology and Myers and Brigg's personality typology.
• An ability is a broad and stable characteristic responsible for a person’s maximum performance on mental and physical tasks.
• A style is a pattern or preferred way of doing something.
• A skill is the specific capacity to manipulate objects physically.
• A competence is an underlying characteristic of an individual which is causally related to effective or superior performance.
• There are two categories of psychological tests:
• Typical performance: personality tests.
• Maximum performance: intelligence test.

What are values, atitudes and emotions? - Chapter 3

• Values are standards or criteria for choosing goals or guiding actions that are relatively enduring and stable over time.
• Rokeach developed the Rokeach Value Survey to measure instrumental and terminal values.
• Schwartz developed the model by Rokeach further. He distinguished 10 types of value, that are all on two dimensions: self-enhancement versus self-transcendence and openness to change versus conservation from change.
• Attitudes are beliefs and feelings people have about specific ideas, situations and people, which influence their behaviour.
• Cognitive dissonance occurs in situations where different attitudes are in conflict with each other. The purpose of cognitive dissonance is to solve, change attitude (dissonance reduction).
• According to Fishbein and Azjen, intentions are the key to behaviour.
• The three most studies attitudes in organisational behaviour are organisational commitment, job involvement, and job satisfaction. Organisational commitment is the extent to which a person identifies themselves with an organisation and is committed to its goals. Job involvement is the extent to which a person is personally invovled with their work role.
• Emotional intelligence is the ability to manage your own emotions and those of others in mature and constructive ways.
• Emotional contagion is the process through which people catch the feeling of others. ‘The ripple effect’ uses the metaphor of water ripples caused by the wind.
• Flow is a subjective psychological state that occurs when one is totally involved in an activity and feels simultaneously cognitively efficient, motivated and happy.

How does information and communication function in organisations? - Chapter 4

• Perception is the cognitive process that enables us to interpret and understand our environment. Perception adds meaning to the already gathered information.

Adverse selection is when one party in a transaction has information that the other does not have, giving the first party an advantage. There is asymmetric information.

• Attributions are on two dimensions:
  • internal versus external (whithin the actor or from external factors)
  • stable versus unstable (static or dynamic in time)
• Correspondent inference theory describes how an alert perceiver infers another’s intentions and person dispositions from his or her behaviour.
• Sensemaking is a social process, where unexpected cues or signals from the environment are analysed, in order to understand them. There is a discrepancy between what was expected and what was observed. The sensemaking process is interative, which means that a cue comes in which prompts action, and that action creates a new cue which prompts action again. Sensemaking is not always activated, but organisations that do apply sensemaking may be able to obtain a clearer picture of what is improtant to its members.
• The first step in information processing is social persception. It is part of a four-stage information-processing sequence. The four stages are selective attention, encoding and simplification, storage and retention, and retrieval and response.
• Listener comprehension is influenced by listener-, message-, speaker-, environmental characteristics.
• A perceptual process model of communication means that a receiver creates meaning in their own minds.
• There are many personal barriers to communication, such as varying levels of communication skills, stereotypes, the inability to listen with understanding, and the level of trust. In additon, there are semantic barriers, which are encoding and decoding errors.

What are content motivation theories? - Chapter 5

• Job satisfaction is the general attitude one has towards one's job. This is one of the attributes most frequently studied by organisational behaviour researchers.
• Motivation consists of professional processes that cause goal-orientated actions.
• Maslow's need hierarchy theory is a pyramid, where the need at the bottom needs to be fulfilled before the next one can be attained.
• The frustration-regression assumption posits that people may regress down to lower need level when a higher need is frustrated.
• Herzberg's motivator-hygiene theory states that job satisfaction leads to better job performance.
• Hackman and Oldham tried to determine how work can be structured so that employees are internally motivated.

What are process motivation theories? - Chapter 6

• Self-fulfilling prophecy describes how people behave so that their expectations come true. It is also known as the Pygmalion effect. High self-expectations lead to greater effort and better performance leads to higher expectations.
• The expectancy theory is the idea that people’s actions are driven by expected consequences. Hedonism of one component of expectancy theory: Hedonistic people strive to maximise their pleasure and minimise their pain. This theory can be used to predict behaviour in any situation in which a choice between two or more alternatives must be made.
• Motivation boils down to the decision about how much effort to exert in a specific task situation. Vroom’s expectancy model is structured in a three-stage sequence of expectations.
• Expectancy theory can be useful for creating motivating working environments where people like to work and achieve high performance.
• The Equity Theory is a model of motivation that explains how people strive for fairness and justice in social exchanges. This theory is based on cognitive dissonance theory (developed by Leon Festinger in 1950s). Equity theory focuses on what people are motivated to do when they feel treated inequitable.
• A goal is what an individual is trying to accomplish or an action or object someone is aiming for. Goal setting has been promoted through management by objectives (MBO). It is an approach that includes participation in decision-making, goal setting and objective feedback.
• Goal-commitment is the extent to which an individual is personally committed to achieving a goal. It affects the goal-setting outcomes by both strengthen the intention and lower the unwillingness to reach a goal over time.
• Goals must be Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Result- oriented, and Time bound (SMART). When people have multiple goals, goal conflict may arise. Goal conflict refers to degree to which people feel that multiple goals are incompatible.
• Feedback serves the following to two functions: It is instructional and motivational. Feedback instructs when it clarifies roles and motivates when it sWhereas social rewards involve praise and recognition from others psychological rewards come from personal feelings of self-esteem, self-satisfaction and accomplishment.erves as a reward.

What are group dynamics? - Chapter 7

• Groups and teams are an inescapable feature in our everyday life. The term ‘group’ can be defined as two or more freely interacting individuals who share collective norms and goals and have a common identity
• A formal group is formed by the organisation to help the organisation to accomplish a goal (e.g. work groups, team, committee). Functional reporting between subordinates and group managers is one characteristic of a command or functional group. The aim of a task group is to complete a particular task for a limited time. In organisations, employees can belong to a command group and to at least one task group.
• Social networks are social entities and the relations between them. They differ from groups or teams as they have no clear boundaries. Social networks or ‘shadow organisations’ can emerge in a given company or be prescribed.
• Groups and teams go through a maturation process in identifiable stages. The psychologist Bruce W. Tuckman proposed in 1977 the five-stage model, which is akin to Maslow’s need hierarchy model.
• Roles are sets of behaviour that people expect of occupants of a position. Role theory attempts to explain how these social expectations influence employee behaviour
• Roles overload occurs as the total of what role senders expect of the focal person far exceeds his or her ability. Role conflict is experienced when various members of the role set expect various things of the focal person. This may be also the case when values, ethics or personal standards collide with others’ expectations.
• Norms are shared attitudes, opinions, feelings or actions that guide social behaviour. They evolve due to psychological and sociological mechanisms and have a powerful influence on group and organisational behaviour.
• In general, the group size depends on the organisation’s objective. While a three- to five –member group would be appropriate to make high-quality decisions, a larger group could generate creative ideas and socialise new members. According to studies, the increase in group size leads to more directive group leaders and decreasing group member satisfaction.
• The three major threats to group effectiveness are the Asch effect, groupthink and social loafing. Even though conformity to norms, role expectations, policies and rules need to be established in an organisation, there are two drawbacks: First, the pressure to conform suppresses creativity and influences members concerning their attitudes that are not of any organisational need. Second, blind conformity destroys creative thinking.

How do teams and teamwork operate in organisations? - Chapter 8

• The term ‘Team’ is defined as a small number (between 2-25 members) of people with complementary skills who are committed to a common purpose and approach for which they hold themselves mutually accountable. The following conditions apply to a team: members of the group have shared goals and interact with each other to achieve those goals. Moreover, team members have well-defined and interdependent roles and an organisational function as team.
• Within every team are different roles with its positive qualities and allowable weaknesses in order to be successful. Meredith Belbin identified in her framework nine roles that can be classified into do-roles, think-rolesand social roles. In creative groups there is a balance of all these roles that are complementary to each other.
• Erik Sundstrom developed the general typology of work teams and identified four general types of work teams: advice, production, project and action teams. Further, he examined these types by means of four key variables: the degree of technical specialisation and of co-ordination with other work units, work cycles and typical outputs.
• An analysis of a survey states that high-performance teams have the following eight attitudes: Participative leadership, sharing responsibility, aligned on purpose, good communication, future focused, focused on task, creative talents and rapid response.
• The three most important components of teamwork are co-operation, trust and cohesiveness.
• Quality circles consist of small teams of people who work in the same field of activity and identify, analyse and recommend solution for problems. They (10-12 members) meet on regular basis during work hours once a week or twice a month. Management supports the quality circle programme by additional training. Not monetary rewards but intrinsic motivation is the primary reward for quality circle volunteers.
• Virtual teams contain of individuals across various boundaries using the communication technology. They may be defined as a physically dispersed task team that conducts its business through modern information technology.
• Self-managed teams are groups of workers that are given ‘administrative oversight’ such as planning, monitoring and staffing for their task domains. Those work groups supervise themselves and are referred to autonomous work groups are self-directed work groups.

How does decision-making work? - Chapter 9

• Decision-making is important for two reasons:
  • The quality of decision affects career opportunities, rewards and job satisfaction.
  • Decisions can conduce to success or failure of an organisation.
• According to Daniel Kahneman, there are two types of thinking, fast (system1) or slow (system 2).
• The rational model describes the usage of a rational, four-step sequence when making decisions: identify the problem, generate solutions, select one solution and implement/evaluate it. The decision-maker is objective and possesses all the information needed to make the decision.
• The Carnegie model, named after the Carnegie Institute of Technology, attempts to identify the process managers use when making decisions. This process is constrained by a decision-maker’s bounded rationality, meaning that decision-makers are restricted by constraints when making decisions. These constraints have personal or environmental characteristics that reduce the rational decision-making. Unlike the rational model, the Carnegie model is characterised by limited information processing. Hence, the optimal not complete amount of information is used.
• The Incrementalist model, developed in the 1950s by Charles Lindblom, is about selecting those actions that differ slightly from the previously done. Small changes reduce the risk of doing something fatally wrong as well as the costs. This model is referred to as ‘muddling through’. This model assumes that information is incomplete beyond the immediate future. Hence, the model can deal with moderate uncertainty.
• The ‘Garbage can’ model assumes that organisational decision making result from complex interaction between problems, solutions, participants and choice opportunities. These independent streams interact with each other but are not related.
• There are three dynamic aspects of decision-making: contingency considerations, decision-making styles and the problem of decision biases.
• A decision-making style reflects the combination of the individual’s perception and comprehension and the general manner someone chooses to respond. This model is based on two different dimensions: value orientation and tolerance for ambiguity.
• Decision-making in groups can have its advantages and disadvantages. To start with the advantages, groups contain a greater pool of knowledge, provide more perspectives, create more comprehension, increase decision acceptance and create a training ground for inexperienced employees. However, the advantages must be balanced and the manager must determine in which extent to apply to the advantages and disadvantages. 
• Brainstorming, developed by A.F. Osborn, increases creativity as it helps groups generate multiple ideas for solving problems. It reduces interference from the judgement reactions of other group members and it hence effective. Study has proven that collecting the brainstormed ideas anonymously is preferred.
• The Delphi technique is used by physically dispersed experts to general ideas or judgements. The ideas are anonymously obtained from questionnaires or via the Internet. The Delphi process starts with identifying the issue(s) to be investigated. Then, participants are identified; the questionnaire is developed and e-mailed to participants.
• The most common and pervasive biases in decisionmaking are the availability bias, the confirmation bias, representativeness bias, anchoring, escalation of commitment, framing bias, and overconfidence bias.

What is organisational culture? - Chapter 10

• Edgar Schein defined culture as a pattern of key assumptions which are considered true. Culture comes in layers, from the inside to the outside these layers are: implicit basic assumptions, norms and values, and artefacts and products.
• Culture is influenced by many factors, which can be divided into four pathways: the values and norms of the members of the organisation, the selection of employees, societal norms and professional ethics, and finallyh the rights of the members of the organisation.
• There are three models of competing values: culture as competing values, different competing values framework, and the culture map.
• The DOCS was made by Denison to identify links between culture and organisational performance. In this model, culture in an organisation has four traits: mission, involvement, (internal) consistency, adaptability.
• Organisational socialisation is the process where new members learn to be part of the culture.
• Intercultural differences are the cultural differences between countries and regions.
• Trompenaars developed five dimensions according to a research about the cultural differences between 28 countries.
• Monochronic time means that you prefer to do one thing at the time because time is limited.
• Polychronic time means that you prefer to do several things at the same time because time is flexible.
• Managers who are aware of culture and who are willing to examine it may be able to add a lot of value to the organisation by shaping that culture.

What is an organisational climate? - Chapter 11

• Climate is the shared perception about what is important and appropriate in an organisation. The climate is determined by feelings, reflections and behaviour of people. It can change over time whereas culture is a state determined by history. Culture is resistant to change and is about the examination of underlying values and assumptions. Climate, however, only examines surface level manifestations.
• A stereotype is an individual’s belief about characteristics of a group. Stereotypes are not always negative and accurate. They are used to differentiate groups of people from another and may create barriers.
• Equality means to an organisation to achieve equality of opportunity by laws. Important directive agreed by the EU in 2000 referred to the outlawing discrimination in the workplace. Managing diversity enables people to perform to their maximum. It is about changing an organisation’s culture so that people provide the highest productivity.
• Robert Sutton researched bad behaviour in companies and found that lack of civility can ahve seriously negative consequences for organisational outcomes.
• Work stress results from many factors such as fundamental changes (increased competition, work pressure), technological advancements (mobile phones, email, the Internet), the dynamics of modern life and motivation to reach extrinsic goals (money, status).
• Stressors are essentials for stress. The model of occupational stress shows the four most important types of stressors: individual, group, organisational and those outside the organisation.
• Burnout is a stress-induced problem that occurs over time and does not involve a specific feeling. It has an impact on employee well-being.
• Social relationships can help people to better handle stress. Social support is measured in regard to the quantity and quality of an individual’s social relationship.
• Coping is the process of managing external or internal demands that exceed the resources of the person. It reduces the impact of stress and enhances the personal life and professional skills.

How do power, politics and conflict work in organisations? - Chapter 12

• Organisations struggle between individual and collective interests. Socialisation in family settings, for instance, developed in the notion of mutuality of interest. The term ‘mutuality of interest’ includes the win-win thinking and thus to serve one’s self-interest.
• These tactics influence people on all directions (downward, upward or lateral). ‘Soft’ influence tactics are perceived as fair whereas ‘hard’ influence tactics are considered as unfair. If someone uses the exchange tactics to convince someone towards a direction, three possible influence outcomes may show up: Commitment, Compliance or Resistance. Commitment is more likely when people rely on consultation and when the influence involves something important.
• Power is essential for a host of reasons. It is a positive force in organisations. Social power is the ability to arrange resources (human, informational, material) to get something done. Power can be classified into two dimensions: the two types of power (socialised and personalised) and the five bases of power. Socialised powerinvolves self-doubts, mixed outcomes and concerns for others, while personalised power expresses the set priority of personal aggrandisement.
• Power is not a zero-sum situation (person’s gain is another’s loss) and hence not threat. Empowerment should be considered as a matter of degree. From a low degree of empowerment to a high degree of empowerment, there are: domination, consultation, participation, and delegation. The goal is to increase productivity and competitiveness.
• There are three levels of political action: the individual level, the coalition level and the network level. At the first level, the individual pursues his/her personal self-interests. People with a common interest, form a coalition that it described as an informal group bound due to pursuit of a common issue. As the target of the coalition is resolved, the informal group bound disbands. The last level of political action is the network level. In contrast to coalition, networks are people-oriented and not issue-oriented. They seek for social support for their general self-interests and have a broader agenda.
• Impression management is a process by which people manipulate the reactions of others to their ideas. It is used to differentiate the organisation’s image for competitor companies and involves high self-monitoring employees (‘chameleons’ that adjust to their surroundings), systematic manipulation of attributions and organisational politics (focus on self-interest).
• A conflict is a process in which on party experiences its interests as being negatively affected by another party. Conflict can strengthen or weaken over time.
• Personality conflicts often refer to people’s personalities. These personalities are stable and different. They can influence a number of other factors. Conflicts at the individual level can grow and endanger an organisation. The manager should thus protect the organisation by documenting the nature of the conflict.
• Afzalur Rahim identified five different conflict-handling styles that are classified in high to low concern for self and low to high concern for others. These two variables produce five styles: integrating, obliging, dominating, avoiding and compromising. Each style has its strength and limitations so that there is no best style.
• When conflicting parties are unable to integrative negotiation, third-party interventions are essential to abandon fixed-pie thinking (or win-lose thinking). The alternative dispute resolution (ADR) is a more constructive and less expensive approach.

How does leadership work in organisations? - Chapter 13

• Organisational leadership can be defined as the influence in which leaders seeks subordinate’s participation in an effort to reach goals. A leader is able to influence, motivate and make others contribute towards organisational success. Individual leadership includes mentoring, coaching, inspiring and motivating. Leaders are able to build culture and teams.
• The leader trait is a born predisposition to be a leader. Ralph Stogdill and Richard Mann summarised leaders into five traits: intelligence, dominance, self-confidence, level of energy and activity, and task-relevant knowledge.
• Men and women differ in the type of leadership roles: Whereas men display more overall leadership, women display more social leadership. Moreover, women make the use of a more democratic and participative style while men employ a more autocratic and directive style.
• The most popular leadership model is the Robert Blake and Jane Mouton Leadership Grid. It is formed by the intersection of two dimensions of leader behaviour: ‘concern for production’ and ‘concern for people’. These dimensions involve attitudes and patterns of thinking and even specific types of behaviour. The five leadership styles that derive from the leadership grid are ‘country club management’, ‘impoverished management’, ‘middle-of-the-road management’, ‘team management’ and ‘authority compliance’. However, Blake and Mouton’s research is criticised as being self-serving.
• Situational theories state that a different style of leader behaviour is only effective depending on the situation. As the situation changes, the style does too. There are three alternative situational theories of leadership: Fiedler’s contingency model, the path-goal theory and Hersey and Blanchard’s situational leadership theory.
• The first model, developed by Fred Fiedler, is the oldest and most known model of leadership. It assumes that the performance of a leader depends on the degree to which the leader has control/influence and the leader’s basic motivation. Fiedler, thereby, believes that leaders are either task-motivated or relationship-motivated. Moreover, leaders have one dominant leadership style that is not modifiable.
• The path-goal theory focalises on the influence leaders have on followers’ expectations. It is based on the expectancy theory of motivation and states that employees only accept the leader’s behaviour when it is seen as a source of satisfaction. This theory avoids obstacles to goal accomplishments, supports and rewards employees and is, hence, motivational. It is an intuitive approach as leaders are always trying to change people’s behaviour to product better results.
• The Situational leadership theory (SLT) developed by Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard states that effective leadership behaviour is dependant on the level of readiness the leaders’ followers have. Readiness is the amount of willingness someone possesses to complete a task. Willingness, thereby, is a mix of confidence, commitment
• Another approach to leadership is the servant-leadership by Robert Greenleaf. It assumes that leaders act as servants and serve the needs of others as priority.and motivation. 
• Assertiveness balance is a key challenge. Asymmetric attention is unavoidable, but needs to be managed. Power (in)sensitivity means that people in power are more focused on their own needs than on those of others. Because of this, leaders need to be self-aware. Taking control means that a leader needs to monitor outcomes and change their behaviour if they made a wrong choice. Dirty work needs to be done quickly, with honesty and with dignity.

What is organisational architecture? - Chapter 14

• Organisations are defined as a system of coordinated activities. An organisation exists to get things done for a group of people. All organisations have four things in common: division of labour, hierarchy in authority, coordination of effort and the people in an organisation have a common goal. These factors are called the determinants of organisational structure. In order to describe organisational structure, we need more than precision. Organisations can be given labels. These labels depend on the type of organisation one is dealing with. Some of the most common types are simple, functional, divisional, matrix and ad hoc types.
• In an organisational chart one can see how work is divided and which person is in charge. Every person or function is depicted as a rectangle and the different levels (hierarchy) are depicted. However, an organisational chart is oversimplified. A real structure of an organisation is more complex and with that chart one can’t understand the implications of the organisation structure.
• Specialisation can be horizontal or vertical. Horizontal specialisation is about how many different activities are covered by a job. Pressing a button is a job with little horizontal specialisation, but cleaning a building, by washing the floors, emptying the bins, cleaning the toilets, is more horizontal. Vertical specialisation is about how much a person is involved in the execution and the administration of activities.
• Coordination can be vertical or horizontal. Vertical is about direct supervision, formal rules and plans. Horizontal coordination is about different comities and liaison roles. Some coordinated tasks have become a routine and these can be carried out by a standard set of procedures. Other (unusual) situations need meetings, comities and cooperation. Every form of coordination has its advantages and disadvantages.
• Coordination and taking decisions is also a matter of boundary. Supermarkets don’t make a lot of their own products. They often do produce some of their bread, but most products are delivered by other companies. Setting boundaries is about vertical integration (how many levels of production do we want?) and horizontal integration(how many different cases do we want to use?). This is also called the make-or-buy decision.
• Some organisations have a matrix form. A matrix form is used when functional specialisation and cross-functional integration is needed. In a matrix form, every member of an organisation is part of a functional division and of a project. An advantage of a matrix is that functional expertise and product expertise are combined. Another advantage is that the additional values and use of individual experts are maximised. A disadvantage is that confusion can arise about the responsibilities and that conflicts can arise because of dual lines of authority.
• Max Weber used to think that the bureaucracy was the best form of an organisation. According to him, there were different types of organisations, all based on power and authority. The most ideal one, according to Weber, bases power and authority on objective criteria: the bureaucratic organisation.
• Mechanistic organisations are rigid bureaucracies with strict rules, top-down communication and narrow defined tasks. An example of this is working at the McDonalds. Every job is divided into little steps and the whole process is automated. Organic organisations are flexible and exists of individuals with multiple talents and who perform more than one task. In mechanistic organisations, central decisions are taken, while this isn’t the case with organic organisations. The latter form is able to adapt better to the changing situation.
• Twenty years ago, people tried to make their organisations leaner. An organisation can become more lean by more decentralisation, focussing on core components and products, strategic alliance and networks and creating more flexibility. Flexibility can focus on different dimensions of an organisation, like the number of employees, divisions, products, costs, markets and production. However, flexibility is a threat to the integration of the organisation. Strong integration can’t be combined easily with leanness. New organisational types are developed because people want to act with more complexity. Companies have become more complex and people need to adjust to that.
• The interaction between the way an organisation is construed and the situation in which an organisation is operating can be a fit or a misfit.
• The system theory approach states that every element belongs to a certain sub-system of a system that belongs to a higher order. A hierarchy of systems goes from the most simple form to the most complex form and the workings of the complex systems is based on the workings of the lower subsystems. The organisation can be seen as an open system which is in contact with its environment, the departments of the organisation can be seen as a subsystem and the individuals in these departments can also be seen as subsystems.
• The environment brings a lot of insecurity and many organisations have to deal with many influences of the environment they can’t control. Those influences can arise because of different factors. Insecurity is caused because we can’t predict differences and because we can’t understand the complexity of the environment.
• Strategies are processes that are design to create values, possibilities to seek and to reach goals. Some people think that structure follows strategy. Some scientists have found that structure can have an influence on strategy. It looks like structure and strategy influence each other mutually.
• Big and impersonal organisations can cause apathy and estrangement and this may result in the employees staying away. Size is important because it has an influence on the fit between the other contingency and structural elements. New results show that it’s better for the managers to follow a middle way between bigger is better and small is beautiful. This is because both models are too simple to explain everything.
• There are four general effectivity criteria to decide whether an organisation is effective or not. These criteria can be used for small and big organisations and also for profit and non-profit organisations.
• The downward spiral of an organisation is called organisational decline. It is defined as the decline in the resources of a company. Resources are in this case money, clients, talent, products and innovative ideas. Experts claim that decline is inevitable, unless deliberate steps are taken to prevent it. The first step is recognizing the signals of decline.

​​How can organisations be diagnosed and changed? - Chapter 15

• There are external and internal forces of change.
• Individual diagnosis for change many be initiated by demographics, job title and job assigned. Also employee record can be relevant. Also effectiveness and well-being are important. A diagnosis of communication checks how people within the company perceive, attribute and whether external signals are received and understood the way the way they were intended to. Perception is very hard to diagnose. When motivation is diagnosed, it is important the look at more factors than just financial incentives.
• Lewin developed a model which explains how to initiate, manage and stabilise the change process. The model implies that change can only take place when there is motivation for change.
• There are two ways to implement change methods. These approaches are called Theory E and Theory O. Theory E stands focuses on the financial aspect of the company, whereas theory O focuses on the development of the organisation by learning.
• Kotter states that organisational change usually fails due to senior management errors. He created sequential steps to lead organisational change.
• Episodic change is irregular, discontinuous but intended change.
• Continuous change is constant, evolving and cumulative change.
• Organisation development (OD) are techniques or tools used to implement organisational change through commitment, co-ordination and competence.