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Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671

www.elsevier.com/locate/tourman

Perceptions of organizational structure in the hospitality industry:

Consequences for commitment, job satisfaction and
perceived performance
Torvald Øgaarda,c,, Einar Marnburga, Svein Larsena,b
a
The Norwegian School of Hotel Management, University of Stavanger, NO-4036 Stavanger, Norway
b
University of Bergen, Norway
c
The Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration, Bergen, Norway
Received 31 March 2006; accepted 6 July 2007

Abstract

The discussion about characteristics of organic and mechanistic organizational modes and their effects has a long history within
organizational writing and research. The mechanistic mode has its roots in traditional bureaucratic organizations with autocratic
leadership, where managers are given a great responsibility to run the organization. Research in the hospitality field indicates that
traditional leadership styles are dominant. Research also indicates that the industry has employees who have high-quality values, are
highly motivated and seek learning possibilities, and thus may be looking for more open, organic organizational modes in which to work.
This study investigates the tension between organic and mechanistic organization forms in the hospitality industry and the relationships
of both to individual employees’ commitment, job satisfaction and performance.
The experience and effects of organizational modes are investigated in 54 hotel units with 734 managers and employees. The findings
indicate that managers’ and employees’ perceptions of their work environments are different; employees find the organization to be less
organic. The experience of both organic and mechanistic organizational modes is positively associated with subjective performance
evaluation, commitment and job satisfaction. Interaction effects are also analyzed, and suggest that only when a well-structured
mechanistic organizational form is present will organic organizational forms be beneficial. The implications of these findings are
discussed in relation to previous and future hospitality research.
r 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Organic organization; Mechanistic organization; Leadership; Hospitality

1. Introduction companies try to focus on customization, market competi-

One of the continuing challenges of hospitality industry
management is to strike a balance between the need for
customization, that is, for employees to adapt the service to
varying and changing customer needs and wants versus the
need for efficiency, control and standardization to be cost
effective. Some companies opt for an efficiency strategy
and deliver standardized products at low prices (e.g., fast
food operations, budget motel chains, etc.). Others aim for
higher levels of customization and customer satisfaction
(e.g., à la carte restaurants, upscale hotels, etc.). Even if
Corresponding author. Tel.: +47 51 83 37 00; fax: +47 51 83 37 50.
E-mail address: torvald.ogaard@uis.no (T. Øgaard).
tion will always induce pressure towards efficiency. And
even if a company focuses on an efficiency strategy, in a
dynamic market there will always be a need for innovation
and change. Efficiency requires standardization, repetition,
rules and often formalized, mechanistic ways of doing
things, while customization requires openness, empower-
ment, freedom of action and more organic organizational
forms. Thus, a continuing duality in the organizational
forms is needed in the hospitality industry. Even in highly
formalized organizations, it has long been acknowledged
that aside from purposes explicitly stated by organizations,
managers and other organizational members also possess
private purposes in their job situations (Burns & Stalker,
1994/1961, p. 97). This issue has been firmly pointed out in

0261-5177/$ - see front matter r 2007 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.tourman.2007.07.006
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
662 T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671
the classical organization theory literature (e.g., Barnard,
1946; Homans, 1951; Selznick, 1949). Although the
classical writers focused primarily on how these private
purposes conflicted with the companies’ formal organiza-
tions and business purposes, some positive effects of
informal organizations were also recognized, such as, for
example, ‘‘extra role behavior’’ (Katz & Kahn, 1978).
Hospitality organizations represent complex organiza-
tions wherein coordination of several types of services gives
a task environment that has to be well organized, but also
has to have openings for ad hoc problem solving in
continuously changing environments. The employees’ will-
ingness to deal with such a work environment, their quality
standards and motivation to learn and develop new
routines will, of course, be one of the key factors in
successful hotel operations. Studies of hotel employees’ and
potential hotel employees’ attitudes, motivations and
intentions indicate that the hospitality industry in general
has access to employees who are highly motivated and
seeking to learn (e.g., Fossum, Helgerud, & Vaeng, 2004;
Gjelsvik, 2002; Ross, 1994a, b; Zacarelli, 1985). Complex
organizations need routines, policies and formal systems
that coordinate tasks and secure efficient fulfillment of
business goals as well as strategic objectives. Nevertheless,
formalized routines given by management can slow down
or hinder employees’ ad hoc problem solving and learning.
The mechanistic and organic modes of organization
(Burns & Stalker, 1994/1961), respectively, represent the
very formalized and the very ad hoc organization.
Although these have often been seen as mutually exclusive
(cf. Burns & Stalker, 1994/1961), there is reason to believe
that managers and employees perceive the same organiza-
tion differently, and that both modes can have a positive
effect on the organization members’ job satisfaction and
commitment. This paper explores how different actors in
the hospitality industry experience their work environment
and how perceptions of the organizations are related to
individual job outcomes and job performance. Interaction
effects of organic and mechanistic forms of organization
are also discussed.
2. Literature review
The continuum between the need for permanent routines
and the need for ad hoc problem solving was described by
Burns and Stalker (1994/1961) in the two modes of
organizing: organic and mechanistic.
Differences in reported experiences of a work environ-
ment as organic or mechanistic can probably be explained
by how people recognize the influence of the formal or
informal organization on task performance and social
interactions. According to Burns and Stalker (1994/1961,
p. 98), the employees’ private purposes form the basis of
the ‘‘informal organization’’, in contrast to the ‘‘formal
organization’’, which is supposed to serve the purposes of
the corporation. One of the reasons for the existence of an
informal organization within business systems is that
individuals resist being treated as means to an end, and
they interact as ‘‘wholes’’, bringing with them their own
problems and purposes that give rise to spontaneous
behaviors that seeks to control their conditions of work
(Homans, 1951, pp. 250–251). The effects of this can for
instance be that communication is not efficient: subordi-
nates might consider managers’ decisions and instructions
merely as information for them to use (or not use) in line
with other information when they make their own
decisions (Burns, 1954).
In an organic organization, the individual is allowed to
follow and combine his or her own purposes with the
company’s mission. In a mechanistic mode, the individual
has to follow and adapt to rules and stringent routines that
reduce these possibilities.
2.1. Leaders and management
In our time, trading systems and industries are char-
acterized by short lifecycles and a rapidly changing history.
However, conceptions of how a business should be
organized and how it achieves its results have not changed
much compared to, for example, the development in
administrative technology, trading systems, liberalized
markets, common welfare, level of education and democ-
racy, etc. In fact, current thoughts about management and
leadership are largely influenced by the feudalism paradigm
(Barker, 1997), which describes leaders at the top of the
hierarchy where they direct and control all activities of the
people working below them. Organizational success or
failure could then be explained by actual managers’
attributes. The much-used and popular bureaucratic model
(Weber, 1922/1992) was given a rational basis: in order to
give young, well-educated and bright people the opportu-
nity to realize their thoughts and wills, the rest of the
organization had to be arranged in such a way that these
wills were realized. The distribution of intelligence made
division of thoughts and actions necessary.
The idea of strong leadership as a condition for
organizational success has elicited an enormous research
effort (see, e.g., Yukl, 2002), investigating what explains
the good leader by focusing on individuals’ traits,
characteristics of the situations and behavioral styles. It is
a bit curious that only these few theories and models have
dominated the research within this field (cf. Bass &
Stogdill, 1990, p. 37), considering the large differences in
how people understand and define leadership (see, e.g.,
Yukl, 2002).
An important theoretical distinction is the difference
between management and leadership. Management is
focused primarily on maintaining patterns of successful
actions (routines), while leadership is focused on develop-
ing new patterns of actions (Barker, 1997). In the study of
businesses like the hospitality industry, however, it can be
difficult to divide the functions of leaders versus managers
simply because managers are generally supposed to carry
out leadership and are given the means to do so. However,
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T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671
as Bass and Stogdill (1990, p. 383) note, a manager is not
necessarily a leader, which opens up for others, informally,
to take on leader roles. Nevertheless, according to the
traditional view of formal leadership and a leader’s role vis-
à-vis those of his or her subordinates, the leader/manager is
the one who takes responsibility for the destinies of others
(McGregor, 1960), including the importance of reducing
any disturbances in the subordinates’ executions of
routines. Thus, managers should reduce stimuli that could
have such an effect (Thompson, 1967). A review of
empirical knowledge, however, demonstrates how difficult
this is: studies from the mid-1950s to the present routinely
show that 60–75% of employees in any organization and in
any occupational group report that their immediate
supervisor represents the dominant factor among factors
hindering them from doing a good job (Hogan, Curphy, &
Hogan, 1994). Generally, it is well documented that
managers and work environments have a great effect on
employees’ motivation (see, e.g., review in Ross & Boles,
1994).
The quite limited research into leadership within the
hospitality industry has mainly revealed that such a
leadership is important and necessary (see review in
Pittaway, Carmouche, & Chell, 1998). Because of the large
and well-documented change in the industry’s environ-
ment, there is a need for better leadership. A reasonable
assumption, however, is that large parts of the hospitality
industry are managed by traditional leadership styles (see,
e.g., Pittaway et al., 1998; Tracey & Hinkin, 1994, 1996).
A study by Worsfold (1989), for example, indicated that
managers in some US hotels appreciated a participative
leadership style, but were inclined to use a more
authoritative style. More recently, Mok, Pine, and Pizam
(1998) also found that Chinese managers were autocratic
and paternalistic in their leadership style.
Surprisingly few empirical studies address the question
of how to lead and manage hotels (cf. Pittaway et al.,
1998). An exception is the research of Tracey and Hinkin
(1994, 1996), who report that transformational leadership
(also called charismatic leadership) functions better than
transactional leadership. The transformational leader is
characterized by the ability to influence subordinates’
attitudes and assumptions, and by building a commitment
for the organization’s mission (Yukl, 2002, p. 204). The
transactional leader bases his or her leadership on
contingent exchanges of valued resources for the subordi-
nates’ support (Bass, 1995). Other important elements of
transactional leadership are ‘‘management by exception’’,
that is, exercise control, implement corrective actions if
routines deviate and prescribe routines or exercise a more
passive form by intervening only when problems become
serious. This type of management will always include
rulemaking to govern the behavior of subordinates (Bass,
1997). Theoretically, transformational and transactional
leaderships have been closely associated with organic and
mechanistic organization structure, respectively. These
observations were supported by Pillai and Meindl (1998),
663
who investigated 101 work units of US governmental
health agencies and found that members of the units
perceived their leaders as more charismatic when the
structure was organic and more collectivist oriented.
Burns (1978) described these types of leadership as
‘‘polars’’, but Bass (1985) postulated that leaders could be
both transformational and transactional. Such a combina-
tion of apparently contrasting claims was identified among
middle managers in restaurants (Ogaard, Larsen, &
Marnburg, 2005), where the middle managers expressed
preferences for an organic work environment and more
straightforward rules to follow. In general, some evidence
suggests that parts of the transactional leadership princi-
ples, that is, the contingent rewards, are positively
correlated to transformational leadership (see review in
Judge & Bono, 2000). Lord, Brown, Harvey, and Hall
(2001) point out the most reasonable argument that
context is of importance when leadership principles are
chosen. However, studies of the effect of leaders and
cultures on subordinates’ identities (Erez, 1997; Tylor,
1997) have demonstrated that transformational leadership
principally addresses a collective identity (procedural
justice), and transactional leadership addresses an indivi-
dual identity (distributive identity). Both of these identities
are of great importance, and in order to secure both, one
can argue that elements from both transformational
(organic) and transactional (mechanistic) leadership styles
are needed.
2.2. Employees in the hospitality industry
Lord and Levy (1994) point out that Anglo-American
motivational research has focused primarily on choice,
laterally ignoring volitional issues, and thereby limiting our
understanding of effective work performance. Such will
and volition are probably not merely limited to those who
hold a management or supervisory position, but comprise
all employees. If this were true, it would be wise not only to
search for the best method to lead people, but also for
volitional attitudes, values and intentions of employees. In
other words: an understanding of which private purposes
employees generally possess, if the companies are able to
take advantage of them, can promote the effectiveness and
development of the company.
From a humanistic point of view, people will act in a
way that is mutually best for all parties if they get the
necessary information, authority and resources (Hall,
1980). In a study of hospitality employees in Northern
Australia, Ross (1994a, b) found that the employees’ needs
for achievement and accomplishment motivation are
predictors of high quality. Studies within the hotel sector
in Scandinavia and the US indicate that employees are very
motivated about their work (Fossum et al., 2004; Gjelsvik,
2002; Zacarelli, 1985), and Ross (1991) reports that
Australian hospitality aspirants have positive attitudes
towards the industry and express vocational intentions in
future jobs. A remarkable anecdotal study from Norway
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(Eide, 2005) elaborates the case of a hotel that was
profoundly mismanaged and how the employees worried
about their company. The employees took silent action and
had a union meeting once a week. In these meetings, they
studied the accounting books, reservation statistics, etc.,
and carried out plans for marketing, happenings, rates,
personnel plans and other activities. During the week, they
suggested these plans bit-by-bit to the management which
in turn, was appreciative of such suggestions and of the fact
that the operations seemed to turn out well!
However, the positive picture of the high motivation of
hospitality employees has been challenged. Gjelsvik (2002)
reports that high motivation fades after employees have
worked in a specific hotel for a while due to reduced
learning possibilities. Also, short-term or part-time em-
ployment reduces employees’ experiences of the learning
climate (Gjelsvik, 2002). Gjelsvik concludes that more
long-term planning and long-term employment with career
opportunities appear to be conditions for a good learning
climate.
Although these referred studies within the hospitality
industry are certainly not conclusive about hospitality
employees’ intentions, values and motivations, they in-
dicate that the hospitality industry is privileged with a
working force that has a potential for high intrinsic
motivation and an intention of learning and developing
as professionals. However, an appropriate question to ask
is whether the industry’s managers are able to make the
best possible use of motivated employees?
2.3. Perspectives and paradoxes in hospitality organizations
Judging or characterizing the degree of organic and/or
mechanistic characteristics in a specific hospitality com-
pany can depend on a person’s perspective. Several
empirical studies have proven the difference in perceptions
between managers and their subordinates. Ross (1994a)
investigated quality ideals among 274 Australian hospital-
ity employees and how they perceived their own and
management’s ideals. He found that being frank and
genuine dominated in the employees’ minds, while the
perceived management quality ideals were practical experi-
ence and being apologetic. Ross further notes that the
results might indicate that staffs are more subjectively and
personal-disposition oriented as opposed to management,
which prefers values that are visible and objective. If this is
true, there exists a problem in understanding employees’
motivations and occupational intentions. When consider-
ing the extremely high personnel turnover that charac-
terizes the hospitality industry worldwide (see, e.g., Zuber,
2001), such a misunderstanding might be part of the reason
for the high turnover rate (cf. Ross, 1994a). Based on
empirical data, Zacarelli (1985) argues that managers in the
hospitality industry have systematically misunderstood the
motivation of their subordinates, believing that they were
motivated by external factors such as wages, when the
actual motivation was of a more dispositional and
psychological character. An explorative study of Norwe-
gian restaurant franchisees’ incentives (Marnburg, Ogaard,
& Larsen, 2004) confirms the importance of psychological
factors when the franchisees had, in contrast to what
should normally be expected, stronger commitment to the
franchisor than the franchisor’s full-time manager employees.
More recently, the emphasis on the competitive im-
portance of knowledge has actualized the importance of
operational work environments (see, e.g., Toumi, 2002):
the knowledge that gives knowledge-intensive companies
strategic capabilities is mainly of operational nature and
not, as Max Weber assumed, concentrated alone at the top
of the hierarchy. Management’s one-sided focus on routine
effectiveness in the hospitality industry is recognized in
industrial macro studies as an explanation of stagnation of
learning processes (Baum & Ingram, 1998; Ingram &
Baum, 1997).
2.4. Effects of organic and mechanistic organization
Our goal is to examine the effects of organic and
mechanistic organizational modes on service workers’
responses to their jobs. Ideally, we would have preferred
a wide array of objective and perceptual performance
evaluations, but resource limitations excluded this option.
Instead, we focused on attitudinal measures of individual
outcomes that have been well documented to relate
to actual performance (see for example Harris &
Mossholder, 1996). In particular, we included three job
outcomes: (1) organizational commitment; (2) job satisfac-
tion; and (3) subjective performance evaluation. Although
they are not the only determinants of performance-related
outcomes, organizational commitment and job satisfaction
generally predict performance and turnover (Donavan,
Brown, & Mowen, 2004; Homburg & Stock, 2004; Parker
et al., 2003). And, subjective performance evaluations (i.e.,
employees’ self-assessments of performance) have been
systematically related to actual performance (see, e.g., van
der Heijden, 2001).
Organizational commitment is the relative strength of an
individual’s identification with and involvement in a
particular organization (Mowday, Steers, & Porter,
1979). It is characterized by at least three factors: (1) a
willingness to exert considerable effort on behalf of the
organization; (2) a strong belief in and acceptance of an
organization’s goals and values; and (3) a strong desire to
maintain membership in the organization. Commitment
thus represents something beyond mere passive loyalty to
an organization. ‘‘It involves an active relationship with the
organization such that individuals are willing to give
something of themselves in order to contribute to the
organization’s well-being’’ (Mowday et al., 1979, p. 226).
Job satisfaction refers to the individuals’ overall satisfac-
tion or lack of satisfaction with the job they currently do in
a specific company (cf. Cammann, Fichman, Jenkins, &
Klesh, 1983).
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Subjective performance evaluation is a variable that
describes a person’s self-reported perception of his or her
own job performance. One might expect that the under-
lying norms for evaluating oneself would be a combination
of individual self-expectations and formal and informal
expectations and norms existing in a working environment.
Commitment describes, on one hand, the fit between an
individual’s preferences and how the organizational en-
vironment is arranged, as suggested in the mechanistic–
organic dimension, but is also an outcome variable and
relates to job satisfaction and performance (Locke &
Latham, 1990).
3. Research questions and hypothesis
The main question addressed in this study is whether the
organic and mechanistic aspects of the work environment
is perceived differently by employees and managers, and
what relationships, if any, the degree of organic–mecha-
nistic organization perceptions have to individual out-
comes such as job satisfaction, organizational commitment
and self-evaluation.
The literature review has suggested that potential and
actual hospitality employees are highly motivated to their
jobs, and express values and attitudes towards service
quality and job performance that indicate they have
personal purposes and intentions of how jobs should best
be performed (Fossum et al., 2004; Gjelsvik, 2002; Ross,
1991, 1994a, b; Zacarelli, 1985). On the other hand, several
researchers have pointed out that managers in the
hospitality industry are influenced by a traditional concept
of leadership and management (cf., e.g., Pittaway et al.,
1998; Tracey & Hinkin, 1994, 1996), where the leader and
manager does the thinking by structuring and controlling
his or her subordinates, and the subordinates follow
specific instructions and systems given by their superiors.
When discussing this empirical research, both Ross (1994a)
and Zacarelli (1985) note that there are indications that
employees and managers in the hospitality industry can
experience and perceive the work environment differently,
that is, employees in a more subjective manner and
managers in a more objective manner. This implies that
even if managers experience the work environment as
organic, employees who are highly motivated and seeking
to learn will experience that the systems set limits for
executing subjectively based quality standards and perso-
nal and professional development. This implies the
following hypothesis:
H1. Managers in the hotel industry will experience the
companies’ work environments as more organic than their
subordinates.
There is neither strong theoretical agreement nor
systematic empirical support for the relationships between
organizational modes (organic/mechanistic) and employee
outcomes. However, traditional organizational develop-
ment values suggest that an emphasis on human relations
665
and open system values is a key for enhancing satisfaction
and fulfillment in individuals (Mirvis, 1988).
From these theories, one would expect that a strong
emphasis on organic values would result in greater
individual well-being. This suggestion has been consistently
corroborated in empirical findings (e.g., Cameron &
Freeman, 1991; Quinn & Spreitzer, 1991), which warrants
the following hypotheses:
H2. The degree of organic work environments is positively
associated with job satisfaction, organizational commitment
and a high score on subjective performance evaluation.
Organic and mechanistic organization modes are theore-
tically (Burns, 1978; Burns & Stalker, 1994/1961) and
empirically (Pillai & Meindl, 1998) associated with transfor-
mational and transaction leadership styles. These dimensions
were originally perceived as poles (Burns, 1978). However,
several researchers (e.g., Bass, 1985; Lord et al., 2001) have
noted that combinations are possible, and that the ‘‘best’’
form of leadership depends on the situation. Empirically,
the transaction element ‘‘contingent rewards’’ has been
associated with transformational leadership (see review
in Judge & Bono, 2000). Ogaard et al. (2005) reported that
middle managers in a restaurant chain favored both
organic and mechanistic organization. Erez (1997) and
Tylor (1997), by studying leadership styles and cultures,
respectively, have demonstrated that work environment
modes and leadership styles serve different kinds of
employee identities. This suggests that not only organic
organization, as hypothesized in H2, explains an indivi-
dual’s well-being and behavior, but that the mechanistic
organization mode might also be positively associated with
personal outcome. Also, if organic and mechanistic
organizational modes serve different kinds of employee
identities, an interactional effect should be expected. This
warrants H3 and H4, as follows:
H3. The degree of mechanistic work environments is
positively associated with job satisfaction, organizational
commitment and a high score on subjective performance
evaluation.
H4. The interaction of a high degree of organic and
mechanistic work environments is positively associated
with job satisfaction, organizational commitment and a
high score on subjective performance evaluation.
4. Methods and materials
4.1. Sample
A pilot study indicated that a direct sampling technique
(i.e., distributing questionnaires directly to hotel employees)
would be very ineffective. The response rate would be small,
and thus we decided to do a cluster sample of employees by
contacting and securing the cooperation of hotel manage-
ment. Another pilot study further indicated that it would be
very difficult to obtain a satisfactorily large and random
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666 T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671

sample of hotels. Norwegian hotels are generally small with a In the final sample, 65% were females, the mean age was
limited number of employees in management positions and, 32, and the respondents had been with the present
quite often, the requested survey of employees would not be employer for an average of 6 years. Seventy-five percent
prioritized in the managers’ daily routines. Industry repre- reported that they held full-time positions, 25% were part-
sentatives strongly advised us to do a more concentrated time employees, 23% belonged to management, while 77%
effort, and the final sampling plan involved three very were regular employees.
heterogeneous hotel chains with independently owned and
operated hotels as well as hotels at two major Norwegian
destinations. The method of selecting hotels chains as a 5.2. Data analyses
means for establishing contact with hotel employees has been
used in a number of studies, for example, Hartline and The data analyses were performed with SPSS for Windows,
Ferrell (1996). Release 11.5.1 (SPSS Inc., 2002). First, we generated composite
scores for all variables measured by multiple items. Since the
4.2. Measures measures of organizational forms are new, their measurement
properties are more thoroughly evaluated in Appendix B.
The data were collected using a pen and pencil Next, we evaluated Hypothesis 1 with a simple analysis of
questionnaire. The questions were formulated in a Likert- variance. Results are presented in Table 1.
like format with an 11-point response scale ranging from The results indicate that managers perceive the com-
5 (very poor description) to +5 (very good description). pany’s work environment as more organic than their
The organic and mechanistic dimensions of organizing subordinates. A closer evaluation of the specific differences
were measured with an adaptation of the competing values reveals that general managers as well as department
approach (CVA) of Cameron and Freeman (1991) and managers perceive the environment to be significantly
Quinn and Spreitzer (1991). Some of the original questions more organic than the perceptions of regular employees
were slightly reformulated in our study and some were split (pp.000). The perceptions of general managers are only
into two independent items to improve clarity. Items are marginally significantly higher on the organic scale than
presented in Appendix A. those of middle managers (pp.051).
Job outcomes. In line with Harris and Mossholder Table 1 also indicates that no significant differences exist
(1996), we measured job satisfaction using two items among the perceptions of mechanistic work environments
adapted from the Michigan Organizational Assessment between different hierarchical levels.
Questionnaire (Cammann et al., 1983): ‘‘All in all, I am Hypothesis 2 was evaluated with the correlations
satisfied with my job’’, and ‘‘I would recommend a good displayed in Table 2. The results indicate that job outcomes
friend to apply for work in this hotel.’’ are positively related to mechanistic and organic percep-
Organizational commitment was measured using the tions of the environment.
short form of the Organizational Commitment Question- Hypothesis 3 was investigated using moderated regres-
naire (Mowday et al., 1979), which measures affective or sion analysis (Aiken & West, 1991; Jaccard, Turrisi, &
attitudinal commitment. In line with Mathieu (1991), we Wan, 1990). To do this, the independent variables were first
used the nine positively worded items. Examples of items mean-centered to control for colinearity problems. Then,
used include: ‘‘For me, this hotel is the best of all possible
organizations for which to work,’’ and ‘‘I would accept Table 1
Perceptions of work environments by employee category
almost any type of job assignment in order to keep working
for the hotel.’’ Employment Mechanistic Organic
Job performance was measured with two items adapted
from Singh, Verbeke, and Rhoads (1996), where each General manager
Mean 3.26 3.11
employee was asked to evaluate him- or herself in N 19 19
comparison to co-workers and to hotel industry employees SD 1.01 1.33
in general. The items and scale properties are presented in
Department manager
more detail in Appendix A. Mean 3.21 2.44
N 168 168
5. Results SD 1.12 1.53
Regular employee
5.1. Sample description Mean 3.21 1.24
N 589 619
The sampling procedure established contact with 54 SD 1.05 1.95
hotels that agreed to participate in the study. From these Total 3.21 1.54
hotels, 734 usable questionnaires were obtained. The
Overall F .022 34.40
response rate for each hotel ranged between 35% and Significance .98 .00
100%, with a mean of 62%.
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T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671 667

the interaction term was computed as the product of the are in the highest quartile is there a relationship between
independent variables (mechanistic  organic). Finally, two perceptions of organic environment and performance.
regressions were run for each dependent variable. In the
first regression, the independent variables—mechanistic 6. Discussion
and organic—were entered alone. Then, the interaction
term was included and the regression coefficient of the Data from 54 hotels with 734 respondents were analyzed
interaction term was evaluated for significance. The results and tested according to four hypotheses. It was found that
are displayed in Table 3. middle managers experienced the work environment as
Results displayed in Table 3 indicate that organic and significantly more organic than regular employees, and
mechanistic organizational environment dimensions interact general managers experience (marginally) a significantly
significantly to influence subjective performance evaluations. more organic work environment than middle managers.
To check for the functional form of the interactions, the No difference was identified in the experience of degree of
sample was split into four quartiles of the perceptions of mechanistic work environment among the actor groups.
mechanistic environments. Within each quartile, a new The analyses revealed a positive and significant relation-
regression was run between organic perceptions and ship between the experience of both mechanistic and
subjective performance evaluations. The results are displayed organic work environment and personal outcome variables
in Table 4, and indicate that only if mechanistic perceptions (commitment, subjective performance evaluation and job
satisfaction). Testing interaction effects of experience of
organic and mechanistic work environments indicates a
Table 2
significant positive effect on subjective performance
Correlations between perceptions of organic and mechanistic environ-
ments and job outcomes evaluation, but not on commitment and job satisfaction.
A further analysis revealed that only in the highest quartile
Mechanistic Organic of mechanistic perception is there a positive relationship
environment environment
between perceptions of organic work environments and
Commitment .46 .61 subjective performance.
Subjective performance .29 .22 Research into the hospitality industry indicates that
evaluation existing hotels within the industry have difficulties when it
Job satisfaction .35 .51 comes to carrying out innovations (see, e.g., Baum &
 pp.000. Ingram, 1998; Ingram & Baum, 1997). There are also
strong assumptions about a traditional autocratic leader-
ship style within the industry (Mok et al., 1998; Pittaway
Table 3 et al., 1998; Tracey & Hinkin, 1994; Worsfold, 1989). And,
Moderated regression of interaction effects
empirical studies indicate that the industry has a highly
Independent variables Dependent variable motivated and high quality-oriented human resource base
of which the industry scarcely takes advantage (see, e.g.,
Job Commitment Subjective performance Fossum et al., 2004; Gjelsvik, 2002; Mok et al., 1998; Ross,
satisfaction evaluation
1991, 1994a, b; Zacarelli, 1985). It is this identified lack of
Mechanistica .16 .24 .25 development, the identified hindrance of development and
Organica .45 .51 .12 potential development resources, which makes research in
Interaction: .04 .03 .11 hospitality attractive and studying modes of organization
mechanistic  organic
and leadership styles particularly interesting.
a
Mechanistic and organic variables have been mean-centered. Our finding of a positive relationship between organic
 pp.01.
organizational modes and personal outcome is certainly

Table 4
Regression of organic environment perceptions on subjective performance evaluations in four quartiles of mechanistic environment perceptions

Quartile of mechanistic environment perceptions

1 2 3 4
Lowest mechanistic Highest mechanistic
environment perceptions environment perceptions

Significance of regression .16 .94 .50 .00

Standardized regression coefficient of organic perceptions on Not significant Not Not .33
subjective performance evaluationa significant significant
a
Mechanistic and organic variables have been mean-centered.
 pp.01.
 ARTICLE IN PRESS
668 T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671
not surprising and confirms previous research (e.g.,
Cameron & Freeman, 1991; Quinn & Spreitzer, 1991).
What is more interesting is that the analyses came up with
a positive and significant correlation among perceived
mechanistic organizational mode and commitment, job
satisfaction and subjective performance evaluation. Such a
relationship is previously reported from the industry in
Ogaard et al. (2005).
Considering the complexity of the many service elements
that have to be coordinated in hotel operations, it is to be
expected that employees appreciate rules and routines that
define expectations of other parts of the organization, but
also make the individual’s job less ambiguous and more
comprehensible. On the other hand, the employees also
have preferences for organic organization modes that allow
them to carry out more private purposes as well as their
own quality standards. These preferences for rules and
standards, and for few rules and few standards, seem to be
a contradiction.
However, the interaction effect seems to explain some of
the relationship between perceived organic and mechanistic
organizational mode: the significant interaction was only
found on subjective performance evaluation, and not on
commitment and job satisfaction. Further analyses showed
that the interaction effect appears primarily when the level of
perceived mechanistic organizational mode is high. This
might imply that in the hotel industry, a high level of rules
and regulations is a prerequisite for employees to utilize the
possibilities of organizational modes of organization. It
might appear that only when mechanistic organizational
forms are strong are the employees able to put their
discretion, empowerment and decentralization inherent in
organic organizational modes to good use and get a feeling
that they are doing a good job. At lower levels of mechanistic
forms (less rules and regulations), the employees might be at
a loss as to what to do with the operational freedom allowed
them. Thus, it seems that the employee, to be effective,
simultaneously needs a number of rules and regulations
associated with mechanistic organizational modes to know
what is expected of him or her, and needs the operational
freedom and social support associated with organic organi-
zational forms to effectively perform their jobs.
In sum, this indicates that in order to exploit valuable
human resources, the hospitality industry should secure a
firm organizational base along mechanistic organizational
principles and simultaneously secure an organic organiza-
tional form. The two organizational principles of mechan-
istic and organic forms are not opposite poles; rather, they
are complementary, and both are needed for organiza-
tional effectiveness.
The managers in the industry could represent a
hindrance in pursuing such a recommendation. As pointed
out above, the managers are generally considered to be
traditional bureaucrats and autocratic in style. In itself,
mechanistic organizational forms may be beneficial as long
as they are combined with organic forms. In this study, we
did however find that managers consider the work
environment to be more organic than their subordinates
do. This may imply that managers may not do anything
about things they consider ‘‘okay’’. In other words: if the
managers perceive a mainly organic organization structure,
they will certainly feel no need to make it more organic. In
today’s constantly changing environment and with claims
of continuous changes and innovations, such managers
might be obstacles to development rather than innovation
developers. Thus, managers will slow down the individual
employees’ opportunity to learn and develop.
The imbalance in perception between managers and
employees within this industry is previously reported several
times in hospitality research concerning service ideals (Ross,
1994a), learning environments (Gjelsvik, 2002), turnover
problems (Fossum et al., 2004), intrinsic/extrinsic motivation
(Zacarelli, 1985) and management styles (Worsfold, 1989).
How serious this issue is compared to business life in general
is not known since no such comparison exists.
6.1. Theoretical and research implications
Dichotomies such as organic/mechanistic organizational
modes and their ‘‘sister’’ leadership dichotomy, transfor-
mational- and transactional leadership styles, with their
intrinsic normative messages, sound reasonable and are
often easy to exemplify, and therefore have a high level of
surface validity among professionals and scholars. Previous
research as well as the present seem to indicate that these
dichotomies might be too simplistic for a good under-
standing of hospitality industry settings. More specifically,
the results of this study clearly show the realm experienced
by hospitality managers: on one hand, they experience their
organization to be significantly more organic than their
employees do, and, on the other, they clearly perceive the
need for mechanistic structures. One might speculate that
this could be one reason why management in the
hospitality industry is traditional and bureaucratic, that
is, simply because management does not see any need to
change the way things are.
In sum, if, as in this study, peoples’ preferences indicate
‘‘Yes, we want it all’’, it might be more fruitful to study sets
of organizational functions, that is, what is needed in order
to establish collective and individual identities among
employees (Erez, 1997; Tylor, 1997), or what is needed in
order to create and maintain a learning environment that
promotes innovations and development.
6.2. Managerial implications
This study indicates the importance of both organic and
mechanistic organizational structures. Organic structures
are considered important when it comes to employees’ and
organizations’ learning, innovations and development.
However, this study strongly indicates the importance of
mechanistic organizational forms for the individuals. In
addition, both this study and previous research indicate
that the hospitality industry might have a general problem
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T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671 669

with their managers, who are characterized by traditional
leadership styles that fail to make the most of the
employee’s resources. As pointed out above, this study
indicates that the dichotomy of transactional and trans-
formational leadership styles may be an oversimplification
of the challenges hospitality managers face, strategically as
well when running the daily operations. All together, this
implies that the hospitality industry has big challenges
when it comes to developing their styles of management,
but the answer is obviously not to be found in, for example,
the principles of transformational leadership theory alone.
6.3. Future research
Perhaps the most surprising finding in our study is the
importance of mechanistic organizational forms for the
relationship between organic forms and the employees’
perceptions of performance. Future studies should investi-
gate this relationship more closely, and try to establish in
more detail which aspects of mechanistic forms are needed
for the employees to put the freedom and support offered by
organic forms to good use. What kinds of rules, regulations,
goals, feedback, etc. are beneficial? And, as evidenced in
other industries, too much mechanistic organization will
result in excessive rules and stifling bureaucracy that will
hamper effectiveness, and there is no reason to believe that
the positive relationship between the mechanistic forms and
employees’ perceived performance we observed here will be
valid for any amount of mechanistic forms. A very important
question for future research is thus to establish what will be
enough mechanistic forms in hotel management.
In addition, we would like to draw more attention
towards the industry’s human resources. Instead of study-
ing which leadership styles give the highest results, or, as in
this study, which organizational mode is associated with
the ‘‘best’’ outcome, more attention should be given to
employee intentions, standards and service values. We need
more knowledge about substance; we need more knowl-
edge about how to let such private purposes affect the
industry’s future development.
Research in organizational structure modes and leader-
ship can be done in many ways. However, results from this
study indicate that more research and understanding of
managers’ roles and functions in the hospitality industry
seems necessary and needed. The knowledge about
managers in the industry is very scarce and limited, and
more evidence of how things are—and why—is needed.
The fact that this study may indicate that normative
recommendations like organic organization and transfor-
mational leadership styles do not seem to be sufficient and
optimal solutions for the hospitality industry.
Appendix A
Items and scale properties of measurements used in the
study (see Table A1).
Appendix B
A closer evaluation of convergent and discriminant
validity of the mechanistic and organic organizational forms.

Table A1

Variable No. of items a Items used in measurement

Organizing principle
Organic 11 .88 Sample items:
It is important to discover improvements in the ways we do things.
It is important to test new ideas in our work.
I have full discretion in choosing the means for getting the job done.
I am authorized to correct things that are wrong even if they are outside my responsibility.
In this hotel, there is a strong team spirit.
Mechanistic 14 .82 Sample items:
Our organization puts a lot of emphasis on measuring the results of our work.
In my work, I am very concerned with efficiency.
In our organization, there is a heavy emphasis on profitability.
There are rules and procedures for my work.
My tasks are clearly defined.
Job outcomes
Job satisfaction 2 .75 Everything considered, I am very satisfied with my present job.
I would recommend a friend to apply for a job here.
Intentions to stay with the hotel 1 I do not consider leaving this job within the next year.
Job performance 2 .85 Compared to other employees in the hotel industry, I do a good job.
Compared to other employees in this hotel, I do an excellent job.
Commitment 9 .90 Sample items:
I am willing to put in an effort beyond normal for this hotel.
I am proud to be part of this organization.
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670 T. Øgaard et al. / Tourism Management 29 (2008) 661–671

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