Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

Q.1) Explain the levels of Management

Ans:-

The term “Levels of Management’ refers to a line of demarcation between various managerial
positions in an organization. The number of levels in management increases when the size of the
business and work force increases and vice versa. The level of management determines a chain of
command, the amount of authority & status enjoyed by any managerial position. The levels of
management can be classified in three broad categories: -

1. Top level / Administrative level

2. Middle level / Executory
3. Low level / Supervisory / Operative / First-line managers

Managers at all these levels perform different functions. The role of managers at all the three levels is
discussed below:

LEVELS OF MANAGEMENT

Top Level of Management

It consists of board of directors, chief executive or managing director. The top management is
the ultimate source of authority and it manages goals and policies for an enterprise. It devotes
more time on planning and coordinating functions.

The role of the top management can be summarized as follows -

a. Top management lays down the objectives and broad policies of the enterprise.
b. It issues necessary instructions for preparation of department budgets, procedures,
schedules etc.
c. It prepares strategic plans & policies for the enterprise.
d. It appoints the executive for middle level i.e. departmental managers.
e. It controls & coordinates the activities of all the departments.
f. It is also responsible for maintaining a contact with the outside world.
g. It provides guidance and direction.
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

h. The top management is also responsible towards the shareholders for the performance of
the enterprise.
Middle Level of Management

The branch managers and departmental managers constitute middle level. They are responsible
to the top management for the functioning of their department. They devote more time to
organizational and directional functions. In small organization, there is only one layer of middle
level of management but in big enterprises, there may be senior and junior middle level
management. Their role can be emphasized as -

i. They execute the plans of the organization in accordance with the policies and directives
of the top management.
j. They make plans for the sub-units of the organization.
k. They participate in employment & training of lower level management.
l. They interpret and explain policies from top level management to lower level.
m. They are responsible for coordinating the activities within the division or department.
n. It also sends important reports and other important data to top level management.
o. They evaluate performance of junior managers.
p. They are also responsible for inspiring lower level managers towards better performance.

Lower Level of Management

Lower level is also known as supervisory / operative level of management. It consists of

supervisors, foreman, section officers, superintendent etc. According to R.C. Davis, “Supervisory
management refers to those executives whose work has to be largely with personal oversight
and direction of operative employees”. In other words, they are concerned with direction and
controlling function of management. Their activities include -

q. Assigning of jobs and tasks to various workers.

r. They guide and instruct workers for day to day activities.
s. They are responsible for the quality as well as quantity of production.
t. They are also entrusted with the responsibility of maintaining good relation in the
organization.
u. They communicate workers problems, suggestions, and recommendatory appeals etc to
the higher level and higher level goals and objectives to the workers.
v. They help to solve the grievances of the workers.
w. They supervise & guide the sub-ordinates.
x. They are responsible for providing training to the workers.
y. They arrange necessary materials, machines, tools etc for getting the things done.
z. They prepare periodical reports about the performance of the workers.
aa. They ensure discipline in the enterprise.
bb. They motivate workers.
cc. They are the image builders of the enterprise because they are in direct contact with the
workers.

Q.2) Discuss the genesis of Organizational Development

Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

Ans:-

Organizational development is an ongoing, systematic process to implement effective change in an

organization. Organizational development is known as both a field of applied behavioral science focused
on understanding and managing organizational change and as a field of scientific study and inquiry. It
is interdisciplinary in nature and draws on sociology, psychology, and theories of motivation, learning,
and personality.

HISTORY OF ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

In the late 1960s organizational development was implemented in organizations via consultants, but
was relatively unknown as a theory of practice and had no common definition among its practitioners.
Richard Beckhard, an authority on organizational development and change management, defined
organizational development as "an effort, planned, organization-wide, and managed from the top, to
increase organization effectiveness and health through planned interventions in the organization's
processes, using behavioral-science knowledge" (Beckhard 1969).

Throughout the 1970s and 1980s organizational development became a more established field with
courses and programs being offered in business, education, and administration curricula. In the 1990s
and 2000s organizational development continued to grow and evolve and its influences could be seen in
theories and strategies such as total quality management (TQM), team building, job enrichment, and
reengineering.

RATIONALE AND IMPLEMENTATION

Organizational development takes into consideration how the organization and its constituents or
employees function together. Does the organization meet the needs of its employees? Do the
employees work effectively to make the organization a success? How can the symbiotic relationship
between employee satisfaction and organizational success be optimized? Organizational development
places emphasis on the human factors and data inherent in the organization-employee relationship.
Organizational development strategies can be used to help employees become more committed and
more adaptable, which ultimately improves the organization as a whole.

The organizational development process is initiated when there is a need, gap, or dissatisfaction within
the organization, either at the upper management level or within the employee body. Ideally, the
process involves the organization in its entirety, with evidenced support from upper management and
engagement in the effort by all members from each level of the organization.

To launch the process, consultants with experience in organizational development and change
management are often utilized. These consultants may be internal to the company or external, with the
cautionary understanding that internal consultants might be too entrenched in the existing company
environment to effectively coordinate and enforce the action plans and solutions required for successful
change.

Data analysis through task forces, interviews, and questionnaires can illuminate likely causes for
disconnects throughout an organization. These gaps can then be analyzed, an action plan formed, and
solutions employed. This is by no means a linear process, nor is it a brief one. Feedback from all
constituents should be elicited throughout the process and used to make adjustments to the action plan
as necessary. Constant monitoring during the entire implementation effort is important for its success
and acceptance.
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

THE FUTURE OF ORGANIZATIONAL DEVELOPMENT

There are contradictory opinions about the status and future prospects of organizational development.
Is it a theory whose time has come and gone? Does its basis in behavioral science, a "soft" science,
make it unappealing? What are the challenges for the future?

An article by Bunker, Alban, and Lewicki proposes six areas that could revitalize the field of
organizational development in the future: virtual teams, conflict resolution, work group effectiveness,
social network analysis, trust, and intractable conflict. These authors suggest that focusing on these
areas will help bridge the gap between research theory (i.e., academics) and practice (i.e.,
consultants). Getting these two groups to communicate with each other will benefit both groups and
promote organizational development efforts.

In a survey conducted by Church, Waclawski, and Berr, twenty individuals involved in the study and
practice of organizational development were questioned about their perspectives and predictions on the
future of the field. The most in-demand services, according to those polled, are:

• executive coaching and development

• team building and team effectiveness
• facilitating strategic organizational change
• systemic integration
• diversity and multiculturalism.

They list the daily challenges in the field as the need for speed, resistance to change, interpersonal
skills and awareness, and differentiating organizational development, which refers to the variety of
definitions of organizational development among practitioners and how this impacts consultants,
clients, and the clients' needs.

The opinions on the future direction of the field vary among its practitioners. Nevertheless, the
continuing interest in and value of optimizing an organization's needs and goals with the needs, wants,
and personal satisfaction of its employees indicate that organizational development will continue to be
relevant to and vital for organizational reform in the future, either in its present form or through
evolution into other theories and practices.

Q.3) Write a note on techno structural interventions.

Ans:-
Structural Interventions May be called as techno structural interventions

This class of interventions include changes in how the overall work of an organisation is divided into
units, who reports to whom, methods of control, the arrangement of equipment and people, work flow
arrangements and changes in communications and authority.

1.Sociotechnical System: is largely associated with experiments attempted to create better fit among
the technology, structure and social interactions of a particular production unit.

Premises of Sociotechnical System

(1) Effective work system must jointly optimize the relationship between their social and technical
parts.
(2) Such system must effectively manage the boundary separating and relating them to the
environment.
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

This system tend to feature the formation of autonomous work group, the grouping of core tasks so
that a team has major unit of total work to be accomplished, the training of group members in multiple
skills, delegation to the work group of many aspects of how the work gets done, and the availability of
great deal of information and feedback to work groups for self-regulation of productivity and quality.

2.Self managed teams

What is a self-managed team?
A self-managed team has total responsibility for its defined remit.
That remit might be a specific project. A self-managed team thrives on interacting skill sets, on shared
motivation and shared leadership.
The team is autonomous and its members are responsible to no one but each other. The team’s
accountability is based on team’s result and not on the performance of its members. Individual
performance is an internal team issue.
A self-managed team is not just a group of people working together but also a genuine collaboration. It
is measured by its results, not the performance of its individual member.
Self-managed teams:
• Are more independent than other types of team.
• Help to flatten organizational structure.
• Eliminate intermediate levels of responsibility and removes the requirement for middle management.
• Favour natural leaders.

Self –managed teams:

• Should set their targets.
• Should be fully empowered.
• Must monitor performance and maintain quality.
• Should be able to request assistance from outside the team but never have it imposed.
• Must maintain contact with the organization.

3.Work redesign

OD approach to work redesign based on a theoretical model of what job characteristics lead to the
psychological states that produce what they call "higher internal work motivation."

According Hackman and Oldham organisation analyses jobs using the five core job characteristics - i.e.
skill variety, task identity, task significance, autonomy and feedback from the job.

Skill variety Related to experienced Task identity meaningfulness of the work Task significance

Job autonomy - Related to experienced responsibility for the outcome of the work

Feedback - related to psychological state of knowledge of the result of the work activities.

The outcome of these job characteristics is:

High work motivation
High satisfaction
High work effectiveness.

4.Quality of work life (QWL)

Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

An attempt to restructure multiple dimensions of the organisation and to institute a mechanism, which
introduces and sustains changes over time.

QWL Features
- Voluntary involvement on the part of employees
- Union agreement with process and participation.
- Assurance of no loss of job
- Training for team problem solving
- Use of quality circles
- Participation in forecasting, work planning
- Regular plant and team meetings.
- Encouragement for skill development.
- Job rotations.

These features include union involvement - a focus on work teams, problem solving session by the
work teams in which the agenda may include productivity, quality and safety problems, autonomy in
planning work the availability of skill training and increased responsiveness to employees by
supervision.

Q4) Write a note on future trends in OD.

Ans:-
Future Trends in Organization Development -

Organization Development
Both a profession and area of scientific inquiry
It is – “A system-wide application and transfer of behavioral science knowledge to the planned
development, improvement, and reinforcement of strategies, structures, and processes that lead to
organization effectiveness.”

It’s a New World…

· Greater turbulence
· More competitive environment
· Globalization
· Acceleration rate of change
· Technology
· Greater emphasis on leadership
· Greater emphasis on work/life balance
· The economy
· The workforce
. More diverse
. Educated
. Contingent
· Organizations
. More networking/alliances
. More knowledge based

Trends
· OD is more relevant than ever
· A push for the return of traditional OD values – led primarily by NTL
· That OD do what is ‘right’
· An emphasis on human process interventions – outcomes are secondary
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

Pragmatists ·
Emphasis on relevance and planned change
· A push toward professionalism – credentials
· Emphasis on change technologies
· Performance based interventions
· Process interventions is not an end solution – it’s a means for implementing change

Scholars · Increasing research contributions

o Organization theory
o Change
o Links between change and performance
· Focus on understanding, predicting, and controlling change in organizations
· Concerned with creating valid knowledge
· Less values based – a detached perspective

Implications ·
OD will have more conflicts in the short term
· In the long term, it there will be a more integrated approach
· More embedded in the organization’s operations
· Shorter OD cycle times
· More technologically driven
· OD will become more interdisciplinary
· It will become more diverse and cross-cultural
· More concerned with ecological sustainability and other social change efforts

Q5) List the different types of Organization culture.

Ans:-

When we walk into an organisation and get a certain 'feel' for it, whether it is fast moving and
responsive, or whether it feels old and backward looking, this 'feeling' is referred to 'organisational
culture'. Culture is about how the organisation organises itself, it's rules, procedures and beliefs make
up the culture of the company. In this section we are going to briefly look at six types of organisational
cultures.

Power Culture

Within a power culture, control is the key element. Power cultures are usually found within a small or
medium size organisation. Decisions in an organisation that display a power culture are centralised
around one key individual. That person likes control and the power behind it. As group work is not
evident in a power culture, the organisation can react quickly to dangers around it as no consultation is
involved. However this culture has its problems, lack of consultation can lead to staff feeling
undervalued and de-motivated, which can also lead to high staff turnover.

Role Culture

Common in most organisations today is a role culture. In a role culture, organisations are split into
various functions and each individual within the function is assigned a particular role. The role culture
has the benefit of specialisation. Employees focus on their particular role as assigned to them by their
job description and this should increase productivity for the company. This culture is quite logical to
organise in a large organisation.
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

Task Culture

A task culture refers to a team based approach to complete a particular task. They are popular in
today's modern business society where the organisation will establish particular 'project teams' to
complete a task to date. A task culture clearly offer some benefits. Staff feel motivated because they
are empowered to make decisions within their team, they will also feel valued because they may have
been selected within that team and given the responsibility to bring the task to a successful end. NASA
organise part of their culture around this concept ie putting together teams to oversee a mission.

Person culture

Person cultures are commonly found in charities or non profit organisations. The focus of the
organisation is the individual or a particular aim

Forward & backward looking culture.

Organisations that have an entrepreneurial spirit, always embrace change and listen to staff and
customers are said to be forward looking. Forward looking organisations are risk takers and do well
because of it. We can argue that Dyson the vacuum cleaner manufacturer embraces this culture. A
backward looking culture does not embrace change and is led by systems and procedures. They do not
take risk and because of it are usually left with a business not doing so well UK store Marks and
Spencers is said to be 'backward looking' ie slow to change.

Diagram: Forms of organisational culture.

Q6) Write a note on designing interventions.

Ans:-

Choosing interventions that are well-matched to local needs and capabilities, and then carefully
implementing those interventions, are vital steps for increasing healthy eating and active living.
Designing effective interventions requires that you use all that has been accomplished and learned
about the community throughout the planning process in terms of needs, resources, and interests.
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

A comprehensive intervention action plan:

• Includes the use of multiple strategies, such as educational, policy, and environmental
strategies, within various settings, such as the community, health care delivery system, schools,
and worksites.
• Targets the community-at-large as well as subgroups within the community.

• Includes various activities to meet the community’s levels of readiness.

When considering intervention components and strategies, lessons learned from what has worked in
the past can provide a valuable foundation for future work. Those strategies, activities, and approaches
that research and evaluation have found to be effective in promoting public health are called “best
practices”. Reviewing these best practices and model programs saves communities from “reinventing
the wheel” and gives immediate direction to program planning. Information about best practices and
model programs can help the community determine how to proceed with the specifics of developing its
interventions (e.g., whom to involve, which levels should be targeted first, sequence of events and
activities). Provided as support material to illustrate current examples and recommended healthy
eating active living interventions is:

Intervention strategies:

To be effective, intervention plans should use educational, policy, and environmental strategies.
Together the three intervention strategies can be helpful in changing knowledge, attitudes, skills,
behavior, policies and environmental factors to improve the health and well-being of the community.
Examples of activities that might be included under each strategy are as follows:

• Educational Strategies: Communication and skill-building.

o Communication methods: media advocacy, lecture-discussion, print materials,
audiovisual aids, educational television, and programmed learning.
o Training methods: classes to develop skills, simulations and games, small-group
discussions.
• Policy Strategies: Policies, regulations, laws as well as informal rules and understandings of
government and local organizations.
o Policies designed to restrict or limit unhealthy actions.
o Policies designed to encourage healthy eating and active living: flex time at worksites for
employees to engage in physical activity or extended hours to use community
recreational facilities.
• Environmental Strategies: Physical or social environmental changes.
o Adding more street lights to discourage crime and encourage physical activity.
o Converting railroad beds into walking trails
o Constructing shower facilities at worksites for employees who exercise

Program Settings:

The intervention strategies in a community health promotion program are most effective when done in
as many of the following settings as appropriate. These settings serve as channels through which you
can reach your target group as well as sites for using educational, policy, and environmental strategies.

School: Schools can be viewed as the most important setting for ultimately educating the entire
population and more immediately for educating children and youth. A comprehensive school health
Sikkim Manipal University - MBA - MU0011– Management and Organizational Development

Semester: 3 - Assignment Set: 1

program can be conducted in schools, and projects can be assigned that require parental involvement,
thus educating parents.

Health care Delivery System: Including hospitals, clinics, and offices. Health care providers can lend
expertise and credibility to your intervention efforts. They can also provide preventive education
change. They can also refer patients to health promotion services in the community and distribute
health promotion materials.

Worksite: Work settings and coworkers have a substantial impact on one’s health; educational
programs and policy and environmental actions that support health can be beneficial to both
management and employees. Schools and health care facilities, are also worksites.

Community: Including the entire community, public facilities such as parks, local agencies, and social,
service, faith, and civic organizations. The community has many organizations, groups, and public
facilities that can serve as settings for interventions designed to reach people where they shop and
play. These groups can examine how they function and also serve as strong advocates for educational,
policy, and environmental changes within the community.