Exam 15: Organizational Design and Structure

What are the variables that Joan Woodward, Charles Perrow, and James Thompson considered in their approaches to understand traditional organizational technologies?

For international businesses to achieve vertical differentiation, _____.

_____ ensures that all essential organizational tasks are assigned to one or more jobs and that the tasks receive the attention they need.

Briefly describe environmental uncertainty in organizations.

_____ can be described as the design process of breaking organizational goals into tasks.

As the level of centralization increases in an organization, the probability of _____ also increases.

Describe how the personalities of an organization's managers may adversely affect the structure of the organization.

_____ help individuals understand their roles in an organization, especially in times of crisis.

In the context of Mintzberg's five structural configurations of organizations, differentiate between the simple structure and the machine bureaucracy.

In the context of Mintzberg's organizational structures, which of the following statements is true of the simple structure?

In the context of structural dimensions of an organization, the organic structure emphasizes:

In the context of Mintzberg's structural configurations for organizations, an automobile plant with routinized operating tasks is an example of a_____.

How is a bureaucratic organizational structure different from a flexible organization structure?

_____ is the degree of differentiation between organizational subunits and is based on employees' specialized knowledge, education, or training.

Describe adhocracy structural configurations in organizations.

Explain spatial differentiation in organizations.

Magical Cloves, a cake shop, is co-owned by Sarah and Zeba. All the cake recipes are their own and they directly supervise the staff at the store. No decisions are taken by the staff without prior approval from Sarah or Zeba. In the context of Mintzberg's organizational structures, Magical Cloves has adopted a(n)_____.

Three key ingredients for the development of trust in virtual organizations are technology that can communicate emotion; a sharing of values, vision, and organizational identity; and a high standard of ethics.

Besides the obvious geographic differences associated with globalization, there may be deep cultural and value-system differences between the various countries that an organization operates in.

Contextual variables refer to a set of four: