1) Question:
Answer: Strategic management effectively merges strategic planning, implementation, and control.
2) Question:
Answer: Popular forecasting techniques among today's managers are informed judgment, surveys, and trend analysis.
3) Question:
Answer: Event outcome, event timing, and time series forecasts help strategic planners anticipate and prepare for future environmental circumstances.
The writig module
III. Writing exercises:
Exercise 1. Complete the sentence with the suggested words:
trace, that, through, decline, strate gically
Three tools ____ can help managers think ______ are synergy, product life cycles that _____ the life of a product _____ its introduction, growth, maturity, and ______ stages and Porter's three generic strategies.
Exercise 2. Compose a story on one of the topics (up to 100 words):
“ Strategic thinking”
“Major steps of strategic management”
“Forecasts in management”
Read the text: Organizations
Organizations need to be understood and intelligently managed because they are an ever-present feature of modern life. When people gather together and formally agree to combine their efforts for a common purpose, an organization is the result. All organizations, whatever their purpose, have four characteristics: (1) coordination of effort, (2) common goal or purpose, (3) division of labor, and (4) hierarchy of authority. If one of these characteristics is absent, an organization does not exist. Coordination of efforts multiplies individual contributions. A common goal or purpose gives organization members a rallying point. By systematically dividing complex tasks into specialized jobs, an organization can efficiently use its human resources. Division of labor permits organization member to become more proficient by repeatedly doing the same specialized task. Organization theorists have defined authority as the right to direct the action of others. Without a recognized hierarchy of authority, coordination of effort is difficult, if not impossible, to achieve.
Organizational classifications aid systematic analysis and study of organizations. There is no universally accepted classification scheme among organization theorists. Two useful ways of classifying organizations are by purpose and technology. In regard to purpose, organizations can be classified as business, not-for-profit service, mutual benefit, or common weal. In regard to technology, there are long-linked, mediating, and inten sive technologies. Each of these technologies has characteristic strengths and weaknesses.
Modern organization theorists tend to prefer open-system thinking because it realistically incorporates organizations' environmental dependency. Early manage ment writers proposed tightly controlled authoritarian organizations. Max Weber, a German sociologist, applied the label bureaucracy to his formula for the most rationally efficient type of organization. Bureaucracies are characterized by their division of labor, hierarchy of authority, framework of rules, and impersonality. Unfortunately, in actual practice, bureaucracy has become a synonym for a red tape and inefficiency. The answer to this bureaucratic paradox is to understand that bureaucracy is a matter of degree. When bureaucratic characteristics, which are present in all organizations, are carried to an extreme, efficiency gives way to inefficiency.
Barnard's acceptance theory of authority and growing environmental complexity and uncertainty questioned traditional organization theory. Open-system thinking became a promising alternative because it was useful in explaining the necessity of creating flexible and adaptable rather than rigid organizations.
I. Reading Exercises:
Exercise 1. Read and memorize using a dictionary:
impact, purpose, goal, not-for-profit service, mutual benefit, common weal, division of labor, hierarchy of authority, framework of rules, impersonality, bureaucracy, red tape, inefficiency
Exercise 2. Answer the questions:
1) Why do organizations need to be understood and intelligently managed?
2) What systems do modern organization theorists tend to prefer?
3) What are bureaucracies characterized by?
4) When does efficiency give way to inefficiency?
Exercise 3. Match the left part with the right:
1. By systematically dividing complex tasks into specialized jobs,
a) are by purpose and technology
2. Bureaucracies are characterized
b) an organization can efficiently use its human resources.
3. Modern organiza tion theorists tend to prefer open-system thinking
c) by their division of labor, hierarchy of authority, framework of rules, and impersonality.
4. Two useful ways of classifying organizations
d) because it realistically incorporates organizations' environmental dependency.
Exercise 4. Open brackets choosing the right words:
When bureaucratic characteristics, which are present in all organizations, are (carried/divided) to an extreme, efficiency (grows/gives) way to inefficiency.
The speaking module
II. Speaking Exercises
Exercise 1. Describe : organizations, division of labor, authority, organization by purpose, organization by technology
using the suggested words and expressions as in example:
organizations
purpose, effort, characteristics, together, common, hierarchy, authority, coordination
example:
When people gather together and formally agree to combine their efforts for a common purpose, an organization is the result. All organizations, whatever their purpose, have four characteristics: (1) coordination of effort, (2) common goal or purpose, (3) division of labor, and (4) hierarchy of authority.
division of labor
proficient, the same, permits, member, repeatedly, task, specialized
authority
coordination, hierarchy, effort, direct, achieve, recognized, action, others
organization by purpose
benefit, not-for-profit, commonweal, business, mutual, can be
organization by technology
intensive, long-linked, technologies, mediating
Exercise 2. Ask questions to the given answers:
Answer: Max Weber, a German sociologist, applied the label bureaucracy to his formula for the most rationally efficient type of organization .
Answer: Organizational classifications aid systematic analysis and study of organizations.
Answer: Coordination of efforts multiplies individual contributions .
The writing module
Exercise 1. Complete the sentences with the suggested words:
flexible, thinking, because, complexity, acceptance
Barnard's _____ theory of authority and growing environmental ______ and uncertainty questioned traditional organization theory. Open-system _____ became a promising alternative _____ it was useful in explaining the necessity of creating _____ and adaptable rather than rigid organizations.
“Major characteristics of organizations”
“Traditional and modern views of organizations”
“Bureaucracy”
Lesson 7 The reading module
Read the text: Staffing and Human Resource Management
A synergistic relationship exists between individuals and their employing organizations. But students have strong concerns about their future organ izational life, especially about the quality of supervision they will experi ence. Apart from the formal employment contract, an informal and often unspoken psychological contract exists between employee and employer. Serious dissatisfaction can set in when the terms of an individual's psycho logical contract are not met. According to Argyris's incongruency thesis, the principles of formal organization tend to encourage psychological immaturity in the average employee. He believes that the demands of the typical organization are incongruent with the psychological needs of the individual, and individuals naturally strive to be mature but the organizations that employ them often encourage immature behavior.
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