# Organizational design

Organizational design is the discipline of (re)designing organizations and its organizational structure.
    CONTENT : A - F , G - L , M - R , S - Z , See also , External links

## Quotes

    Quotes are arranged alphabetically by author

### A - F

* Organizational design is the body of knowledge and techniques that seeks to offer useful advice to organizations about their structures (and other aspects) needed to attain their goals.
** Richard M. Burton, ‎Bo Eriksen, ‎Dorthe Døjbak Håkonsson (2008). Designing Organizations: 21st Century Approaches. p. 5
* In today's volatile world, organizational design is an everyday, ongoing activity and challenge for every executive, whether managing a global enterprise or a small work team. Globalization, worldwide competition, deregulation, and ever-new technologies drive the ongoing reassessment of the organization. The executive response has been many new forms of organizational design: virtual, learning, modular, cellular, network, alliance, or spaghetti – to name a few. New organizational forms challenge old ways of organizing for efficiency and effectiveness. Yet fundamental design principles underlie any well-functioning organization. Organizations still require a formal design.
** Richard M. Burton ‎Børge Obel, ‎Gerardine DeSanctis (2011). Organizational Design: A Step-by-Step Approach. p. 3
* Organizational design often focuses on structural alternatives such as matrix, decentralization, and divisionalization. However, control variables (e.g., reward structures, task characteristics, and information systems) offer a more flexible approach. The purpose of this paper is to explore these control variables for organizational design. This is accomplished by integration and testing of two perspectives, organization theory and economics, notably agency theory. The resulting hypotheses link task characteristics, information systems, and business uncertainty to behavior vs. outcome based control strategy. These hypothesized linkages are examined empirically in a field study of the compensation practices for retail salespeople in 54 stores. The findings are that task programmability is strongly related to the choice of compensation package. The amount of behavioral measurement, the cost of measuring outcomes, and the uncertainty of the business also affect compensation. The findings have management implications for the design of compensation and reward packages, performance evaluation systems, and control systems, in general. Such systems should explicitly consider the task, the information system in place to measure performance, and the riskiness of the business. More programmed tasks require behavior based controls while less programmed tasks require more elaborate information systems or outcome based controls.
** Kathleen M. Eisenhardt, "Control: Organizational and economic approaches." Management science 31.2 (1985): 134-149. p. 134; Article abstract

### G - L

* Organization design is conceived to be a decision process to bring about a coherence between the goals or purposes for which the organization exists, the patterns of division of labor and interunit coordination and the people who will do the work.
** Jay R. Galbraith (1977). Organization design. p. 5
* Hierarchical organizations are typically run by... little Napoleons and Napoleonettes; especially at mid-organization level... A hierarchical organizational design draws leadership focus and energy away from problem solving and progressive thinking by encouraging those climbing the organizational food chain to focus instead on protecting their positions, perks, and territory.
** John Hoover, Unleashing Leadership (2005)
* By far the most difficult skill I learned as a C.E.O. was the ability to manage my own psychology. Organizational design, process design, metrics, hiring and firing were all relatively straightforward skills to master compared with keeping my mind in check.
** Ben Horowitz "What’s The Most Difficult CEO Skill? Managing Your Own Psychology." at bhorowitz.com, March 31, 2011.

### M - R

* The organizational design is the responsibility of the CEO, and the designer's role is to act as midwife to aid in the rebirth of the organization.
** Kenneth D. Mackenzie (1986), Organizational design: the organizational audit and analysis technology. p. 154

### S - Z
## See also

* Organizational behavior
* Organizational theory