Hervey
Jones (1993) thinks that organizational systems can too easily restrain the
imagination and capability of the people who work in the company.
The aim of this paper is to discuss the organization in relation to the effects in retards of the employee’s capability and creativity in the currant business environment, with particular attention to the management of organizations specializing in the built environment.
Organization is an organized group of people who do
something together (Oxford, 1999), and in management, any organization is a
group of people banded together to serve some consciously defined common
purpose (Kuriloff, 1972).
Kerzner (1998) stated that the classical management is
usually considered to have five functions or principles: Planning, Organizing,
Staffing, Controlling, and Directing. Cole (1996) argued that organizing is
concerned with activity, and it is a process for:
1-
Determining,
grouping, and structuring activities
2-
Devising and
allocating roles arising from the grouping and structuring of activities
3-
Assigning
accountability for results
4-
Determining
detailed rules and systems of working, including those for communication,
decision-making and conflict-resolution.
A system is collection of interrelated parts which form some whole (Cole, 1996), and the system approach in management focuses on the role each part of the organization plays in the whole organization, rather than dealing separately with each part (Course, 2001).
The organization is established to react with its
environment, this could be the organization open system, while the staff of the
organization need to deal with each other in parts or departments in which
could be considered a close system.
The organizational structure is how to divide the
group of people who work for the organization into different groups according
to specific purposes, and to define the relationships between them. Cole (1996)
listed five of the most common forms of structures as follows:
• Functional organization – based on grouping of the
major business functions, e.g. production, marketing, finance, personal.
• Product-based organization – based on individual
products, or product ranges, where each grouping carries its own functional
specialisms.
• Geographical organization – centered around
appropriate geographical features, e.g. regions, nations, subcontinents.
• Divisionalised structures – usually based on
products, or geography, or both, and with certain key functions such as
planning and finance reserved for headquarters.
• Matrix structures – based on a combination of
functional organization with project-based structures, and thereby combining
vertical and lateral lines of communication and authority.
The purpose of the structure is to provide control
mechanisms, communication channels and separate focal points for
sub-organization planning and the allocation of resources (Heap, 1992).
However, there are often real and important conflict between the type of
organizational structure called for if the tasks are to be achieved with
minimum cost, and the structure that will be required if human beings are to
have their needs satisfied (Kerzner, 1998).
A sort of unofficial organization has
almost always been develop over time, which finds the short cuts and rests the
balance of power, and this will constantly changed by the people who actually
have to get the work done. Moreover, people distrust paternalism and have a
greatly increased belief in their own capabilities. Practically all the trend
that are discernible in individual expectation and aspirations seem to point in
the same way. People want more diversity and if it is not forthcoming they will
seek it under their own steam (Harvey, 1993).
The meaning of organization as stated before is an
organized group of people who do something together, this means people are
playing an important role in the organization, this directed us to what called
in management by “human resources management” and its related studies.
People are with no doubt the frame of the
organization, generally, no organization can exist without people, and in any
organization, and people’s actions are always based in part on the assumptions
they make and that this was especially true in regard to human resources
management. The basic assumptions you make about people – can they be creative?
Why do they act as they do? – Comprise your philosophy of personal management
and the people you hire, the training you provide, your leadership style all
reflect (for better or worse) the basic philosophy (Dessler, 1994).
With relying on the people, organizations can achieve
their functions and according to the people and the management systems,
organization can get either profit or forfeiture. Harvey (1988) argued that
with the best will in the world, and the best board in the world, and the best
strategic direction in the world, nothing will happen unless every one down the
line understands what they are trying to achieve and gives of their best to
achieve it.
In the built environment, project is not a one-person
operation, it requires a group of individuals dedicated to the achievement of a
specific goal (Krezner, 1998), and the construction process is largely a
“people” management business. The construction industry is complex, dynamic and
uncertain, and requires high-motivated workers (Smithers and Walker, 20001).
The success of a project is due, in large part, to the
project management team. Certainly these individuals have to have the requested
skills, knowledge, and traits to handle the project technical problems that
arise, but they must work together to provide the leadership and coordination
for the other resources that are utilized in the execution of the project
(Rowings and Federle, 1996).
What people need from the organization? And what
organizations need from people? It
is for the benefits of both, organization has a function and tasks to be done
in order to get the return and survive, and people works to make the organization
function attainable and the return obtainable.
People – in order to do so – need to work in a
convenient environment and get what meet their necessities and exigencies,
material or immaterial. The convenient environment plays a strong role in
people’s support to give their maximum productivity.
The environment may be described by its major
components: attitudes of people, morale and motivation, communications,
rewards, climate, and organizational effectiveness. These components, which
shape the environment, are in turn influenced by a number of major factors,
including organizational structure, the communications system, policies and
procedures, the compensation program, and the managerial style (Kuriloff,
1972).
In this regards, the term ‘reward management’ suggests
a much more holistic approach to managing employee performance, which embraces
not just the tangible rewards of pay and benefits but also the intangible
rewards which employees could reap from the organization (e.g. job
satisfaction, good environmental working conditions, good training and
development opportunities, friendly and supportive working relationships, job
security, involvement in work decision, etc). Reward management is therefore
about both extrinsic motivators – those things external to the employee, such
as pay, promotion and praise – and intrinsic motivators – those things which
are derived from within individual employee, such as the level of job
satisfaction, responsibility, freedom to use his or her own judgment and have
control over his or her own work (Druker and White, 1996).
The question was about what can maximize people’s
output or productivity, in organized organizations, most jobs defined by job
descriptions, describing the qualifications (capability) and what is required
from the employee (output). What organization need is the output in order to
continue and complete the production line. This comparison of qualification and
capability is not always veracious. In the same time, output required for
organization positions is not indication for of the capability of the employee,
most people are capable to do more if they get what may satisfy their inner
needs. Harvey (1988) exclaimed that companies will only survive if they meet
the needs of the individuals who serve in them, not just the question of
payment, important as this may be, but people’s true inner needs, which they
may be reluctant to express to themselves.
Successful project management, regardless of the
organizational structure, is only as good as the individuals and leaders who
are managing the key functions (Krezner, 1998), and the projects of the built
environment organization is different than other production and business
organizations, because of a project has relatively short time to complete it,
and to transfer to different projects with different requirements in which a
new organizational system may be applied.
Gary and Sushocki (1996) listed the main factors which
influence work:
• Motivation to work, the effect, valency and
expectation of work.
• Relevant work, to the individual and the
organization.
• Supports of work, the appropriate tools and
materials.
• Capacity to work, the skill, experience and ability
of the individual.
• Organization of work, the structure, workflow and
relationship.
• Management of work, the leadership and management
style.
• Behavior at work, the activities in which the
individual engages.
• Performance at work, the quantity and quality of
work output.
• Rewards for work, including both intrinsic and
extrinsic rewards.
It is important that any initiative introduced must
consider all work aspects. Many of the factors are beyond the scope of a
project changes as they involve the individuals work content. The variable
factors involve management, motivation and organization. It is these, which
should be targeted when introducing change on construction projects.
The point about project system is two-fold. Firstly,
the technical core functions themselves may span the boundary of the
organization where they involve reciprocally-interdependent working
relationships between individuals and group from a Varity of organizations
involved in various ways in the specification, design, resourcing, manufacturer
and inspection of component products. Secondly, that direct inter-organizational
working relationship wit its immediate task environment. It is not simply that
constraints and contingencies arise due to technical nature of the task being
preformed, but also that these constraints and contingencies may be directly
articulated by external agents: through the specification of targets, methods
or materials; or changes to them as the task is preformed (Bresnen, 1990)
One of the factors related to the organizational
structure and has a great effects to the people working for the organization is
communication, this make the flow of ideas and reactions with some kind of
inventiveness can easily be recognized or get inadvertence with the long way
and organization structure restriction of reporting and referential.
Organizational health flows from accurate
communication, which reflects the value of group norms. The quality of
communication depends upon to dimensions: the level of honest openness in
transactions between people, and the extent of non evaluative listening that
occurs simultaneously. (Kuriloff, 1972).
In projects environment, Krezner (1998) stated that
poor communication exists on four major levels: problems of communication among
team members, between the project leader and the team members, between the
project team and top management, and between the project manager and the
client. In fact, it is more than this with the complex relationships of the
projects parties.
Krezner (1998) defined Leadership as a style of
behavior designed to integrate both the organizational requirements and one’s
personal interests into the pursuit of some objective. All managers have some
sort of leadership responsibility which is composed of several complex
elements, the three most common being:
• The person leading
• The people being led
• The situation (e.g. the project environment)
The leadership style or the leader or the manager way
of dealing with the employee is –in my opinion and experience- the most
important factors of encouragement of frustration of the employee creativity or
capability, by the respected deals, employee usually gives all what he can to
the organization. While he will do only what is required in minimum with the
arbitrariness way of management. And this may explain the loyalty and commitment
of an employee in the Psychological contract, which may be defined as an
unwritten set of expectations operating at all times between every member of an
organization and the various managers and others in the organization (Mcdonald
and Makin, 2000).
Usually one or more of the following words are
included in the definition of motivation: desires, wants, wishes, aims, goals,
needs, drives, motives, and incentives, and motivation is a process that start
with physiological or psychological deficiency or need that activates a
behavior or drive that is aimed at a goal or incentive. Thus, the key to
understanding the process of motivation lies in the meaning of, and
relationship among, needs, drives, and incentives (Luthans, 1998).
Motivation can improve the endeavor of people in the
organization, because it is a way for them to get more than normal if they give
more than normal.
People are self-motivated; they do their best work
when they have come to believe, through their own process, that what they are
going to do is worthwhile. The free man is always better the slave (Harvey,
1988).
What make people become negligent? It is
the neglect of what they are doing, it is different meaning, the neglects of
their inner starvation to feel respected in feel that got the dignity as a
recompense of their achievements.
The treatment of the manager to his
employee can either make them healthy for the benefit of the organization, or
to push them to work like diseased.
Beside this there are many factors like the
benefits, fair deals, clarity of work requirements, unity of command,
management style, location and work place, human requirement, safety and
security, and a lot more.
Empowerment is recognizing and realizing
into the organization the power that people already have in their wealth of
useful knowledge and internal motivation. It is the authority to make decisions
within one’s area of operations without having to get approval from anyone
else. And there are several basic conditions necessary for empowerment to
become embedded in the organizational culture and become operational:
participation, innovation, access to information, and accountability (Luthans,
1998).
The organization systems and structures are
tools to organize the work and help the organizations to communicate internally
and externally to achieve the required functions, it can restrain the
capability and creativity of the people if it is not understood well, and this
make its role in the restriction of the people capability considered as miner
beside the other factors, and because of the management origin is the
organization structures to be understood in order to manage the organization
perfectly.
The other factors which seems to be more
important, in restraining the people capability and imagination in their work
for the organization is related to the people needs, the factors which may
satisfy individual’s desire for participation and empowerment and involvement
in decision making, in this way he feel being respected and treated as a part
of the involved members in directing the organization.
How are we ever going to extend our
capabilities? Muscles only strengthen by being continuously pushed to their
limits, and it is the same with people. People must be encouraged to go to the
limits of their own self-belief, and only by so doing can they embark upon the
moving staircase of continual improvement (Harvey, 1993).
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