425 CH 3

Managing Change
7th edition
Chapter 3
Developments in organisation
theory
From certainty to contingency
Copyright © 2017, 2015, 2010 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved
The Human Relations school
(1930s onwards) (1 of 2)
Key figures
• Mary Parker Follett
─ From Scientific Management to Human Relations
• Elton Mayo
─ Hawthorne Experiments
• Chester Barnard
─ Cooperative Systems
• Abraham Maslow
─ Hierarchy of Needs
The Human Relations school
(1930s onwards) (2 of 2)
• Douglas McGregor
─ Theory X and Theory Y
• Warren Bennis
─ The Death of Bureaucracy.
The Human Relations school (1 of 7)
Central propositions
•Humans have emotional needs.

•Organisations are cooperative social systems.
•Organisations have informal structures and
rules.
Follett
From Scientific Management to Human
Relations
•Workers should accept managerial authority and
managers should act impartially.
•The group is more important than the individual.
•Conflict can have a positive effect by creating a common
purpose.
•Command and control management is ineffective – worker
participation is necessary.
•Individual and group self-development is more effective
than the increased use of experts. Copyright © 2017, 2015, 2010 Pearson Education, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Mayo – Hawthorne Experiments
• ‘Hawthorne Effect’.
• Informal groups can have a positive effect on
performance.
• Humans have a need for security, recognition
and belonging.
• Social factors are more important than economic
factors.
Barnard – cooperative systems
• Monetary incentives weaker than non-monetary
incentives
• Common purpose
• Authority from bottom-up
• Systematic and effective communication
• Effective leadership.
Maslow’s hierarchy of needs
McGregor’s Theory X and Theory Y
Bennis – the death of bureaucracy
• Rapid and unexpected change
• Growth in size of organisations
• Increasing diversity
• Change in managerial behaviour.
Job Design
Operationalising Human Relations
• Job design rejects the Tayloristic basis of job
design and work organisation.
• It is possible to design jobs that satisfy human
needs and organisational objectives.
• Increased job satisfaction and increased
organisational performance go hand-in-hand.
Ideas and perspectives 3.4
The three main variants of Job Design
• Job enlargement – concentrates on increasing
work variety.
• Job enrichment – focuses on increasing
workers’ control over what they do.
• Socio-technical Systems theory – technology
limits the scope for redesigning individual jobs.
Therefore, Job Design must go hand-in-hand with
technological change if it is to be successful.
Summary
It rejects the Classical school as mechanistic.

It stresses:
• Leadership
• Communication
• Intrinsic motivation
• Flexibility
• Involvement
• Change by consent.
Criticisms
• Intrinsic rewards are weak.

• Portrays people as irrational.
• Portrays people as emotionally immature.
• It is manipulative.
• Hawthorne Experiments are flawed.
• No empirical support for Maslow’s motivation
theory.
• It is a ‘one best way’ approach.
• It ignores the outside world.
Contingency Theory (1 of 2)
Key figures
• Tom Burns and George Macpherson Stalker
─ Environmental uncertainty and dependence
• Joan Woodward
─ Technology
• The Aston school
─ Size.
Focus
• The relationship between overall structure and
performance.
• Organisations as ‘open systems’.
(1960s–1980s)
• Performance depends on structure.

• Structure is ‘contingent’ on situational variables.
NOT ‘One Best Way’ for ALL

BUT ‘One Best Way’ for EACH.
Summary
• Organisations are open systems.

• Performance depends on structure.
• Structure must match situational variables.
• The main situational variables are:
─ Environmental uncertainty
─ Technology
─ Size.
• Change is a rational process of collecting and
evaluating information.
Criticisms
• No agreed definition of good performance.

• Conflicting and multiple contingencies.
• Organisations do not have clear-cut goals.
• Contingencies can be manipulated.
• No agreed definition of technology.
• No agreed definition of environment.
• Structure does not equal performance.
Criticisms
• It focuses exclusively on formal structures.

• It ignores managerial choice.
• It ignores organisational complexity.

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425 CH 3

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Managing Change

•Humans have emotional needs.

It rejects the Classical school as mechanistic.

• Intrinsic rewards are weak.

• Performance depends on structure.

NOT ‘One Best Way’ for ALL

• Organisations are open systems.

• No agreed definition of good performance.

• It focuses exclusively on formal structures.

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