Review of Three OT Perspectives

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Recommended: Review on organizational theories

This paper is part of the project required for Organization Theory (OT). The author of this paper will briefly review the three OT perspectives, identify and introduce a company to be studied, select two of three OT perspectives for analyzing the targeted company, discuss the methodological differences between the two selected perspectives, and reveal the major variables that contribute to the effectiveness of the targeted organization. This paper serves as a frame work for the final project (term paper) of OT course.

Review of Organization Theory Perspectives

There are three predominant perspectives in the study of Organization Theory (OT): modern, symbolic interpretive, and postmodern. Each of these perspectives comes with its own concepts and methodologies.

Modernists believe that organizations are objectively real entities operating in a real world. “When well-designed and managed they are systems of decision and action driven by norms of rationality, efficiency and effectiveness for stated purposes” (Hatch & Cunliffe, 2006, p. 14). Symbolic-interpretivists assert that “we cannot know an external or objective existence apart from our subjective awareness of it” (Hatch & Cunliffe, 2006, p. 14). They think organization are continually constructed and reconstructed by their members through symbolically mediated interaction. “Organizations are socially constructed realities where meanings promote and are promoted by understanding of the self and others that occurs within the organizational context” (Hatch & Cunliffe, 2006, p. 14). Postmodernists think organizations are sites for enacting power relations, oppression, irrationality, communicative distortion, or arenas of fun and playful irony. “Organizations are texts produced b...

... middle of paper ...

...rn, Symbolic, and Postmodern Perspectives. New York: Oxford University Press.

Keller, R. T. (1994). Technology-information processing fit and the performance of R&D project groupts: A test of contingency theory. Academy of Management Journal, 37(1), 167-246.

SAIC. (2009). SAIC annual report Retrieved November 20, 2010, from http://www.annualreports.com/HostedData/AnnualReports/PDFArchive/sai2009.pdf

SAIC. (n.d.). About SAIC Retrieved November 20, 2010 from http://www.saic.com/about/

Scribd. (n.d.). Organizational effectiveness Retrieved January 28, 2011, from http://www.scribd.com/doc/22576423/ORGANIZATIONAL-EFFECTIVENESS

Smith, M., Busi, M., Ball, P., & Meer, R. V. D. (2008). Factors influencing an organisation’s ability to manage innovation: A structured literature review and conceptual model. International Journal of Innovation Management, 12(4), 655-676.

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