SOC361H5 Chapter Notes - Chapter 3: American Medical Association, School Hygiene, Institutional Theory
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Opens systems approach: this approach focuses on how organizations efforts to manage external relations- with customers, suppliers, competitors, and other individuals outside the organization shape the structure. Effects of size: many studies have indicated that organizational size is strongly associated with the three dimensions of structure. A study found that increasing size is related to the increasing use of rules and suggested that size may lead to decentralization, but not the loss of control for the organization. The relationship between size and centralization is thus complex, with increasing size leading to real delegation in some circumstances and such delegation being tempered by other characteristics in other circumstances. In addition, other factors may mediate the relationship between size and different aspects of the formal structure: ex. A study found that small organizations who were professional managers (cid:449)e"re (cid:373)ore likely to adopt (cid:271)ureau(cid:272)rati(cid:272) pra(cid:272)ti(cid:272)es the(cid:374) (cid:449)here heads of s(cid:373)all organizations who were owner-managers.
