What Is an Organic Organizational Structure?
Organic organization (organic organization) Organic (elastic) organization, also known as adaptive organization, features: low complexity, low formalization, decentralization does not have standardized work and rules, regulations, employees are mostly professional; Low degree of centralization.
Organic organization
- Organic organization
- Organic organizations maintain a low degree of centralization in order to enable professionals to respond quickly to problems; on the other hand, one cannot expect senior managers to have the skills needed to make the necessary decisions.
- Choice of organic design solutions, including simple, matrix, network, task group and committee structure.
- Organic organization has the following additional characteristics:
- Employees work around common tasks;
- The terms of reference are constantly revised in the interaction;
- Low levels of authority and rules of procedure;
- Knowledge of work and monitoring of tasks are scattered throughout the organization;
- Emphasize two-way communication and horizontal and diagonal communication between superiors and subordinates;
- Coordination and control often rely on organizational systems (such as matrix organizations) that adjust to each other and have greater flexibility.
- The following conditions apply to organic organizations:
- The environment is relatively unstable and uncertain, and companies must be fully open to the outside world;
- Tasks are diverse and constantly changing, using exploratory decision-making processes;
- The technology is complex and changeable;
- There are many unconventional activities that require strong creative and innovative capabilities;
- The scale of the business is relatively small.
- From an efficiency point of view, an organic or flat organizational structure, assuming other conditions remain the same, because its management span is wider and larger, it requires fewer managers and costs more If it is low, then it is efficient; on the contrary, a mechanical organization structure, because of its high organizational structure, it needs more managers and costs are higher, then it is inefficient. But it's not enough from an efficiency standpoint. We also need to look at its effectiveness from a revenue (effect) perspective.
- An organic organizational structure, because of its emphasis on innovation, hopes that the organization can make rapid adjustments to the environment. Then, on the one hand, the probability of rejecting real information is very small, and on the other hand, the probability of accepting false information is also very high. Therefore, the possibility of making wrong decisions on this basis is also greater. In contrast, the traditional bureaucratic organizational structure is relatively standardized and centralized, which allows employees to reject any plan (represented by employees giving up meaningful suggestions or plans themselves, which is unlikely to be severely criticized), but the employees are autonomous The authority to accept the plan is small. Employees mainly make suggestions or plans to their superiors, and whether to adopt this plan is determined by senior leaders.
- The study found that the significance of this authority structure is to reduce the possibility of receiving false information, although the possibility of rejecting real information is inevitably increased. At the same time, because standardized and centralized organizations are generally large-scale mature enterprises, once they make wrong decisions, it will have a huge impact on its reputation and revenue.
- In summary, our conclusion is that the flattening of the organizational structure has a very important meaning in the new management environment, and it is a beneficial change for enterprises in the face of a knowledge-based economy. However, "new" in "new economy" and "new enterprise" is a relative concept, and the new management environment is only a partial change based on the past environment. Therefore, some traditional organizational structures still have room to adapt. In the analysis of this article, we have concluded that the importance of "centralization" and "bureaucratic" organizational structure in management practice (whether it is a traditional enterprise or a large emerging enterprise) is emphasized. Therefore, it is reasonable for large, reputable companies to adopt a bureaucratic authority structure.