Page 192 - DMGT520_ORGANIZATION_CHANGE_AND_DEVELOPMENT

Unit 14: Future Trends in Organization Development

Reengineering: This fundamental rethinking and radical redesigning of business systems urges Notes
an overhaul of job designs, organizational structures, and management systems. Work should
be organized around outcomes, not tasks or functions.
Core Competencies: The idea is for companies to identify and organize around what they do best.
Corporate strategy should be based not on products or markets, but on competencies that give
a company access to several markets and are difficult for competitors to imitate.
Organizational Architecture: A metaphor that forces mangers to think more broadly about
their organization in terms of how work, people, and formal and informal structures fit together.
This often leads to autonomous work teams and strategic alliances (Byrne, 1992).

Notes Because of the rapid changes, predicting the future trends in OD is difficult, if not
impossible. However, a number of “cutting-edge” trends appear to be affecting the future
directions of OD

14.2 Macrosystem Trends

Organizations are becoming ever more complex and are affected by competitors and conditions
globally. A small machine ship in Topeka, Kansa, is affected by another machine shop in Bombay,
India. Macrosystem trends focus on the organizational system, including:
 The impact of culture change: It will become increasingly important to understand the
impact of culture on morale, productivity, competence, organizational health, and
especially the relationship of culture to strategy.

 Total resource utilization: Another trend is the need for a system approach to ensure
efficient use of the organization’s resources.

 Centralization vs. decentralization: In organizations of the future, it will be necessary to
both centralize and decentralize functions, structure, and governance. Organizations
decentralize so that they can respond quickly to changes. Yet the organization must be
centralized to ensure that units are coordinated and working together.
 Conflict resolution: Conflict management has become an important element in today’s
complex organizations, and value and goal differences are continuing problems. Future
OD activities should include helping managers to diagnose conflicts and resolve disputes.

 Interorganization collaboration: As limited resources and increased complexity confront
the manager of the future, increased sharing, collaboration, and cooperation among
organizations will be necessary. Networking offers alternative routes for organizational
action.

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