Organizational Redesign Research Articles

Information technology infrastructure, organizational process redesign, and business value: An empirical analysis

We extend current research examining synergies between information technology, process redesign, and firm performance in three ways: analyze a firm's entire IT and BPR portfolio, examine production and market value performance implications, and conduct analysis using a unique dataset of 228 firms between 1996 and 1999. We find a contingent association between IT, process redesign, and performance. The interaction of IT and BPR portfolios is positively associated with firm productivity and market value. However, we find mixed evidence of a difference in these impacts across different types of BPR. Insights for business investment in IT and process redesign are discussed.

Emerging human resource practices at Aditya Birla Group

AbstractThis article describes in detail through a longitudinal case study the emerging nature of human resources (HR) practices at Aditya Birla Group and, more importantly, links it to the strategic redesign that the whole organization underwent from 1995 to 2006. The longitudinal case study provides a snapshot of the dynamic and turbulent nature of the new liberalized Indian economic environment and how an organization such as Aditya Birla Group needed to brace itself from competition through innovative HR practices. The article argues that in challenging liberalizing business environments like India, the nature of HR itself demands that organizations develop new capabilities and that HR's role is to reevaluate its competencies and develop new ones to help in the overall strategic redesign of organizations. The article elaborates on two critical issues: (1) the peculiarities and defining characteristics of HR models unique to India and (2) the main factors that shape people management policies and practices in the liberalized Indian environment. © 2010 Wiley Periodicals, Inc.

Designing reasonable accommodation of the workplace: a new methodology based on risk assessment

If working tasks are carried out in inadequate conditions, workers with functional limitations may, over time, risk developing further disabilities. While several validated risk assessment methods exist for able-bodied workers, few studies have been carried out for workers with disabilities. This article, which reports the findings of a Study funded by the Italian Ministry of Labour, proposes a general methodology for the technical and organisational re-design of a worksite, based on risk assessment and irrespective of any worker disability. To this end, a sample of 16 disabled workers, composed of people with either mild or severe motor disabilities, was recruited. Their jobs include business administration (5), computer programmer (1), housewife (1), mechanical worker (2), textile worker (1), bus driver (1), nurse (2), electrical worker (1), teacher (1), warehouseman (1). By using a mix of risk assessment methods and the International Classification of Functioning (ICF) taxonomy, their worksites were re-designed in view of a reasonable accommodation, and prospective evaluation was carried out to check whether the new design would eliminate the risks. In one case – a man with congenital malformations who works as a help-desk operator for technical assistance in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) department of a big organisation – the accommodation was actually carried out within the time span of the study, thus making it possible to confirm the hypotheses raised in the prospective assessment.

Design for form postponement: do not overlook organization design

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to develop a theory of the organizational changes related to the production‐planning process that facilitate application of form postponement (FP), an increasingly popular operations‐design principle meant to alleviate the negative impact of product variety and customization on operational performance.Design/methodology/approachTo achieve the theory‐building objective, a multiple‐case study involving four cases in the machinery industry was designed. In the inductive theory‐building process, the authors borrowed from the information‐processing theory to further corroborate the internal validity and generalizability of the findings.FindingsThe theory proposed by the author indicates that greater utilization of lateral relations in the production‐planning process, higher production‐planning frequency, greater degree of self‐containment of the production‐planning task, and simplification of the production planning‐related environment favor application of FP.Research limitations/implicationsThe level of analysis of the theory is the production‐planning process of a product family within a company. Future research could extend inquiry of the organizational antecedents of FP at both higher and lower levels of analysis, such as the organization as a whole or the individuals participating in the production‐planning process.Practical implicationsThe theory supports managerial decision making by suggesting how to redesign the organization part involved in the production‐planning process of a product family in order to apply FP. The difficulty and cost of this organizational redesign effort should be taken into account when companies consider FP implementation.Originality/valuePast research has focused on changes to product design and to the manufacturing and supply chain process that enable FP. This paper augments the understanding of FP enablers by developing the first model of organizational antecedents of FP. It also responds to calls for more research integrating insights from organization theory and operations/supply chain management.

Pronalaženje najboljeg modela organizacionog dizajna u Domu zdravlja Trstenik

Introduction: The subject of research in this paper is the role of design organization of health organizations. The aim of work: The analysis of the current situation in Dom zdravlja Trstenik and comparison with relevant professional literature said the necessity of creating an adequate model of design that organization. The goal is to design a flexible organizational structure and redesign existing ones. Method: Research and processing defined topic be based on the use of domestic and foreign scientific and technical literature. The survey will be administered general scientific methods, theoretical and methodological principles that are common in the area of organization and management. Thereby the use of general research methods: dialectics, synthetics and verification, as well as special research methods: induction, deduction, analysis and synthesis of comparison. Deductive method to be used in testing hypotheses. The method of benchmarking is unavoidable, since in this way collected the best experience of others, which is undoubtedly used for our health care organization. Results: The existing, bureaucratic model of organization was successful only in terms of stable and simple environment. Contemporaries are periods of substantial transformation of our country in economic, political, social and all other spheres of social life and work, and in this regard can not speak about the adequacy of existing models related to its survival. Considering the ongoing socio-political turbulence, we can not talk about stability in an environment that allows the development of bureaucratic ways of organizing the House Health Trstenik. Due to the high standardization and formalization, it is difficult to change and adapting to change. Therefore, it can be successful in areas where there is not much change, and has one of the key reasons his overcoming and transforming the entire system of the organization in a professional model. Conclusion: Based on the organization must do teams of health workers gathered in the offices, departments and sections, with support centers which will consist of specialist services, diagnostic center, medical transport, Center for polyvalent patronage and development counseling.

Data Management Activities of Canada's National Science Library - 2010 Update and Prospective

NRC-CISTI serves Canada as its National Science Library (as mandated by Canada's Parliament in 1924) and also provides direct support to researchers of the National Research Council of Canada (NRC). By reason of its mandate, vision, and strategic positioning, NRC-CISTI has been rapidly and effectively mobilizing Canadian stakeholders and resources to become a lead player on both the Canadian national and international scenes in matters relating to the organization and management of scientific research data. In a previous communication (CODATA International Conference, 2008), the orientation of NRC-CISTI towards this objective and its short- and medium-term plans and strategies were presented. Since then, significant milestones have been achieved. This paper presents NRC-CISTI's most recent activities in these areas, which are progressing well alongside a strategic organizational redesign process that is realigning NRC-CISTI's structure, mission, and mandate to better serve its clients. Throughout this transformational phase, activities relating to data management remain vibrant.

A Structured Approach to Organizational Redesign

“Where are you going and where have you been?” This was the essential patient assessment question for my infectious disease professor. I have found this same question applicable in the daily work of medical and laboratory administration. When applied to administration, I ask, “What is our goal?” and “What have we accomplished so far?” These questions create structural tension1 and may be thought, in part, as the more familiar term—gap analysis. Structural tension is the common awareness of an organization’s current status versus the organization’s stated goals, and the resulting stress this difference creates. Essentially the stress is embedded in the work assignments that effectuate the transition from the current status to the stated organizational goals. Structure tension, as used by Robert Fritz,1 introduces 2 concepts to effectively move an organization toward its goal. First is the diagrammatic approach (structural tension diagrams) of presenting the difference between current status and goals. These diagrams sandwich work assignments between the goals and current environment ( Figure 1 ). Second is recognizing and addressing structure conflict within an organization as an essential element in attaining goals. Structural tension diagrams are a visual communication tool. On a single page, the essence of where we are, where we are going, and what we need to do to get there are presented. In the middle section, the diagram contains the work assignments. Each of these work items generates its own secondary structural tension diagram, with goals, current status, and work items ( Figure 2 ). In turn, it is easy to envision that secondary diagrams will spawn tertiary diagrams and even quaternary levels. Yet, each of these diagrams and work assignments graphically flows back up to the top goals of the organization. Compared to the mission statement, the graphic approach of connecting work to goals is quickly grasped …

Management Work—Family Research and Work—Family Fit

In this article, 25 years of organization science research on work—family is summarized, and its implications for building the human, social, and economic elements of family capital in family business are developed. The impact of work—family conflict; sex and gender roles; role enrichment; work—family benefits, programs, and policies; and work, job, and organization redesign are emphasized. A social systems model of environment—environment fit—work—family fit—is developed. Implications for future research and for investing in family capital are discussed.

What are the most effective strategies for improving quality and safety of health care?

There is now a plethora of different quality improvement strategies (QIS) for optimizing health care, some clinician/patient driven, others manager/policy-maker driven. Which of these are most effective remains unclear despite expressed concerns about potential for QIS-related patient harm and wasting of resources. The objective of this study was to review published literature assessing the relative effectiveness of different QIS. Data sources comprising PubMed Clinical Queries, Cochrane Library and its Effective Practice and Organization of Care database, and HealthStar were searched for studies of QIS between January 1985 and February 2008 using search terms based on an a priori QIS classification suggested by experts. Systematic reviews of controlled trials were selected in determining effect sizes for specific QIS, which were compared as a narrative meta-review. Clinician/patient driven QIS were associated with stronger evidence of efficacy and larger effect sizes than manager/policy-maker driven QIS. The most effective strategies (>10% absolute increase in appropriate care or equivalent measure) included clinician-directed audit and feedback cycles, clinical decision support systems, specialty outreach programmes, chronic disease management programmes, continuing professional education based on interactive small-group case discussions, and patient-mediated clinician reminders. Pay-for-performance schemes directed to clinician groups and organizational process redesign were modestly effective. Other manager/policy-maker driven QIS including continuous quality improvement programmes, risk and safety management systems, public scorecards and performance reports, external accreditation, and clinical governance arrangements have not been adequately evaluated with regard to effectiveness. QIS are heterogeneous and methodological flaws in much of the evaluative literature limit validity and generalizability of results. Based on current best available evidence, clinician/patient driven QIS appear to be more effective than manager/policy-maker driven QIS although the latter have, in many instances, attracted insufficient robust evaluations to accurately determine their comparative effectiveness.

The implications of lean operations for sales strategy: from sales-force to marketing-force

Lean operating principles are based on the systems of Toyota Japan. Companies around the world, in all sectors of the economy, now embrace these approaches to improve quality, cost and productivity. Different purchasing and sourcing practices in lean organisations mean that winning sales from them requires major changes to sales strategy and practice. This process has not been fully explored. Serving lean customers, who demand complete transparency across the supplying organisation and focus on capability not cost, has proven problematic for traditional sales departments. Further, as supplying organisations themselves become lean (this transformation being a result and requirement of selling to a lean company), organisational redesign extends from operations into sales. This paper illustrates the shifts needed in sales approach and strategy in selling to, and subsequently, becoming a lean business. The role of this future-sales-force is considered in relation to its shift towards a marketing-orientated rather than sales-push strategy.

The Development of an Organisational Redesign Model

The objective of this study was twofold: Firstly, to explore and describe the perceived fairness of a disciplinary procedure in the workplace and, secondly, to develop guidelines that could be used by managers to provide a fairer experience of the disciplinary procedure. A qualitative research design was employed. In-depth interviews were conducted with participants who were purposely divided into two groups (an employee participant group and an expert participant group). Results indicated that employees experienced the disciplinary procedure as traumatic, unfair and not reliable. Guidelines were formulated to manage employee discipline more effectively.

Clinical Inquiry and Reflective Design in a Secrecy-Based Organization

Edgar Schein has consistently maintained that clinical inquiry differs from action research because the setting is created by someone who wants help rather than by the researcher deciding what to study. The authors review emerging literature on clinical inquiry research, participatory action research, collaborative management research, and reflective organization design where change programs have often been initiated by the clients. These perspectives are explored in light of Schein's visual model of the researcher—client relationship, which focuses on different research interventions and different levels of involvement by researchers and clients. All four perspectives are used to analyze an in-depth and contemporary case of organization redesign within a high-technology, secrecy-based company in the defense industry. Implications for theory and research practice are explored.

University Management Improvement Based On The Viable System Model. Case Study: Libre University

This paper presents a methodology proposal based on the Viable System Model (MSV) which aims to study, design and offer specific mechanisms of viability, efficiency and improvement of university management. As an application of this model, a study case for the Libre University in Bogota is described. To develop this study a pilot plan has been developed for the improvement and organizational redesign, intended to focus on the administration of the university in order to make this institution an effective and viable organization. This Viable System Model is supported by a organization analysis theory known as systematic approach.

Designing Student Affairs Organizational Structures: Perceptions of Senior Student Affairs Officers

Student affairs organizations have become complex entities and serve as a critical link to student success and the quality of the overall educational experience in collegiate institutions. Over time, new programs and services have been added to the array of existing programs and services with little attention focused on how these organizations might be designed to effectively meet the institution’s mission or address student needs. This research study was designed, in part, to investigate student affairs organizational structures within colleges and universities across the United States. The focus of this study was on the design and structure of student affairs organizations, but it also investigated where in the institution the senior student affairs officer reported. It explored questions related to what changes were made in student affairs organizations and why. The findings indicated that some change has occurred in student affairs organizations, but these changes have been modest. While student affairs organizations have retained their functional structures they also appeared to be generally organized by institutional type, and as a result somewhat reflective of institutional mission. The influences of revenue source and availability of resources appeared to remain the dominant influences in the current functional structures of student affairs organizations. While some of the desired reasons for organizational redesign appeared to be strategic and environmentally oriented, the actual changes and redesigns that were reported were not directly focused on these issues. These findings have implications for student affairs organizational effectiveness in the future.

Identifying Organizational Patterns: Normative and Empirical Criteria for Organizational Redesign

Public service organizations (PSOs) function in patterns that endure over time. Derived from the study of complex systems, the observation of patterns is important for public policy and organizational change. Although the notion of organizations having cultures is now well accepted, organizational patterns involve more than culture—they are the product of the interaction of dynamic multidimensional factors at work in organizations. These dynamics are explored through the three factors of individual motivation, organizational culture, and the challenge of implementing a change. When these three factors interact, they form eight organizational patterns. Based on a case study of each pattern, the character of each pattern is explored. Advantages and disadvantages of each organizational pattern and the context in which each pattern functions best are identified, the implications of an understanding of patterns are explored, their impact on new entrants to the workplace is identified, and suggestions for teaching the patterns are offered.

School Reform and Restructuring: Does Performance Technology Have a Role?

There is now widespread agreement that America's schools are in serious trouble. However, there is little consensus regarding what should be done about it. The school reforms currently being suggested are the most radical since the elimination of the one room school. School reforms of the 1980s—personnel selection, job redesign, evaluation/ feedback, incentives, instructional technology, and organization rede-sign—are reviewed from a performance technology perspectivee Reasons for their lack of success are discussed, in particular the schools' lack of interest in instructional design and technology. The most likely future reforms, those that involve the organizational redesign of schools, are discussed along with the impact such changes would have on the potential for applying performance technology in the schools. The paper concludes with actions that performance technologists in both business and academic environments can take to encourage the application of their technologies in the schools.

Organizational Redesign, Information Technologies and Workplace Productivity

Using a large longitudinal, nationally representative workplace-level dataset, we explore the productivity gains associated with computer use and organizational redesign. The empirical strategy involves the estimation of a production function, augmented to account for technology use and organizational design, correcting for unobserved heterogeneity. We find large returns associated with computer use. We also find that computer use and organizational redesign may be complements or substitutes in production, and that the productivity gains associated with organizational redesign are industry-specific.

Introducing entrepreneurship teaching at select german universities

In the recent past, universities in the western world have been expected to play a greater role in the national economic welfare of their countries in addition to their traditional role of education and research. In 1997, following the examples of national governments in Australia, Canada and the United Kingdom, the German government launched an entrepreneurship initiative at universities. Two of its goals were entrepreneurial teaching and culture. I decided to explore how universities participated in, implemented and evaluated the public initiative to introduce entrepreneurship into German universities. During interviews with senior academic administrators at 22 tertiary institutions, I collected data on leadership, organisational re-design and development, recipients of change, and academic and administrative cultures. Similar to Clark (1998, 2004) and Gjerding et al. (2006), introducing entrepreneurship into university culture requires support both from the top and the bottom, especially the faculty. Academic decision makers behave entrepreneurially to external opportunities for financial and/or branding reasons but they respect their colleagues’ decisions whether to join. The traditional inter/intra faculty model needs to include external stakeholders for entrepreneurial teaching initiatives. German universities have been successfully using this model for external research programmes without changing their core purpose: teaching and research.

Performance analysis of a focused hospital unit: The case of an integrated trauma center

The concept of focus [Skinner, W., 1974. The focused factory. Harvard Business Review 52 (3), 113–121], notably operationalized in manufacturing entities like cells and focused factories, has also been adopted by the health care industry. Examples include patient-focused care systems and product/service lines. Despite its longevity, there is a paucity of studies analyzing the focus concept and its link to performance, especially in health care. This research is aimed at enhancing our understanding of how a focus-based approach to organization redesign in health care affects processes and practices, and what operational, clinical, and financial outcomes result from such a change. The research setting is a single case site within a large medical center for which costs for trauma care used to exceed income. Using a structured framework, we document the design and operation of this physically and organizationally integrated Level I trauma care center and compare it to its preceding operation. Its pre- and post-conversion performance is analyzed using symmetric event windows covering three-year periods before and after the focused hospital unit (FHU) was established. Under a sizable increase in workload, we find no change in mortality, moderate improvement in length of stay, and a large improvement in net operating margins. Surprisingly, the latter stem not from reductions in cost but in sharply increased hospital reimbursements. Previous studies of hospital restructuring involving focused patient populations have not conclusively supported a positive link between focus and outcomes. However, this investigation of a specific FHU suggests, conceptually as well as quantitatively, that focus can be an attractive element in health care system design.

Providers' experience with an organizational redesign initiative to promote patient-centered access: a qualitative study.

Patient-centered access is a philosophy and a method that supports efforts to redesign health-care delivery systems to deliver higher quality care and to better meet the needs and preferences of patients. Since mid-2000, Group Health Cooperative has pursued an ensemble of strategic initiatives aimed at promoting patient-centered access, referred to as the Access Initiative. In support of this strategy, Group Health has also engaged in enterprise implementation of an electronic medical record and clinical information system that is integrated with their patient Web site, MyGroupHealth. To elicit, describe, and characterize providers' perceptions of the effects of the Access Initiative, an information technology-enabled organizational redesign initiative intended to promote patient-centered access. Thematic analysis of semi-structured in-depth interviews. Twenty-two care providers representing 14 primary care, medical, and surgical specialties at Group Health Cooperative, an integrated health-care system based in Seattle, Washington. Analyses of the interview transcripts revealed nine emergent themes, five of which have particular relevance for health-care organizations pursuing patient-centered access: the Access Initiative improved patient satisfaction, improved the quality of encounter-based care, compromised providers' focus on population health, created additional work for providers, and decreased job satisfaction for primary care providers and some medical specialists. Providers like that the Access Initiative is mostly good for their patients, but dislike the negative effects on their own quality of life - especially in primary care. These reforms may not be sustainable under current models of organization and financing.