Page 144 - DMGT520_ORGANIZATION_CHANGE_AND_DEVELOPMENT

Ginni Nijhawan, Lovely Professional University
Unit 10: Structural Intervention

Unit 10: Structural Intervention Notes

CONTENTS
Objectives
Introduction

10.1 Selected Structural Intervention
10.2 Summary
10.3 Keywords

10.4 Review Questions
10.5 Further Readings

Objectives

After studying this unit, you will be able to:
 Explain structural intervention

 Describe Changes in how the overall work of the organisation is divided into units

Introduction

The term socio-technical system or STS is largely associated with experiments that emerged
under the auspice of the Tavistock Institute in Great Britain. STS theory has two basic premises
One is that “effective work systems must jointly optimize the relationship between their social
and technical parts”. The second premise is that “such system must effectively manage the
boundary separating and relating them to the environment.”

10.1 Selected Structural Intervention

Socio-technical Systems (STS) Theory

It is based on joint optimization of the social and technological systems of organisations. Further
more:

 The boundary between the organisation and its environment should be managed in such
a way as to allow effective exchanges, but protection from external disruptions,
 The implementation of STS should be highly participative, and

 The creation and development of self-managed teams is an important factor in STS
implementation (Cummings and Worley; Trist, Higgin, Murray, and Pollock; and others).

Creation of Self-managed Teams

 Providing teams with a grouping of tasks that comprises a major unit of the total work to
be performed;
 Training group members in multiple skills, including team-effectiveness skills;
 Delegating to the team many aspects of how the work gets done;

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