Comments on: What Do We Really Know About Organizations?

By: Rafe Champion

Rafe Champion — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 21:36:41 +0000

By the way, Koch wrote (p 17) “Progress, whether in business, an economy of science, comes through experimentation and failure”. Someone tell him to put Popper’s “Conjectures and Refutations” into the bibliography:) http://www.the-rathouse.com/CRContents.html

By: Rafe Champion

Rafe Champion — Wed, 28 Nov 2007 21:18:28 +0000

One of the questions to frame the answer is to establish whether you are talking about an orgnization that is operating in a more or less free market where it has to give satisfaction to customers or an organization that is operating in a situation where it can get by with political patronage almost regardless of the products.

That distinction gives rise to two very different kinds of entrepreneurs – the market entreprenuer and the political entrepreneur.

So compare and contrast to modus operandi of, say, Charles Koch and FDR. But then I am currently reading “The Science of Success” so I have to admit to bias!

By: Lessons from Organizational Studies « PurpleSlog

Lessons from Organizational Studies « PurpleSlog — Wed, 06 Sep 2006 14:14:26 +0000

[...] The Organizations And Markets Blog has an interesting post on “What Do We Really Know About Organizations? [...]

By: the major contribution of organizational theory? « orgtheory.net

the major contribution of organizational theory? « orgtheory.net — Sat, 26 Aug 2006 14:23:51 +0000

[...] What is the most significant contribution that organizational theory has made to our understanding of organizations? Peter Klein makes a list of what he sees as the major contributions, at least from an economics perspective. In comments, Fabio Rojas offers some of his own sociological insights. I agree with Peter and Fabio on much of their lists (hey, I think sociologists have a lot to offer too!). [...]

By: Fabio Rojas

Fabio Rojas — Thu, 24 Aug 2006 18:33:29 +0000

As a sociologist who studies orgs, I would add:

- work in organizations depends on informal networks within the firm, in other words: formal hierarchy only gets you so much, stuff gets done by appeal to social ties (see Burt or Knoke’s work)

- a lot of the structure of organizations emerges from copying or mimcking leading orgs (see the whole “new institutionalist” school, or the Haveman ASQ articles), more generally, an org’s political or social environment has a huge impact on what happens inside the org. life is more than managers sitting around and maximizing profits.

- there is a lot of interesting organizational change that is political, or is best desribed in political terms (see Gerald Davis’ work, or, ahem, my forthcmoing coming book on universities and black power politics), it’s not merely a matter of managers considering optimal/profit maximizing work arrangements

- an organization’s position in status hierarchies has a big effect on what manager’s think is a legitimate organizational practice (e.g., Phillips & Stewart’s AJS article on how elite firms feel more at liberty to pusue unorthodox strategy)

In a moment of self-promotion, I suggest that you look at my forthcmoing article in the Journal of Institutional Economics (Nov 2006) that takes a critical look at what sociologists have contributed to org studies and economic sociology more generally.