Post on 04-Dec-2015
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Organizational Life Cycles
Prof. Stephen Block
Organizational Life Cycles
Griener’s Five Stages of Growth
(From Harvard Business Review, July-August, 1972.)
Phase 1
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Creativity
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Leadership
Phase 1
Growth Through Creativity - This stage is dominated by the founders of the organization, and the emphasis is on creating both a market and product. These founders are usually technically or entrepreneurially oriented. Management activities are avoided. But as the organization grows, management problems cannot be handled through informal communication. This leads to:
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Leadership
Phase 1
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Leadership
The question of who is going to lead the organization out of its state of confusion and solve management problems? The solution is to find a strong manager. This crisis leads to the next evolutionary period:
Growth Through Direction
Phase 2
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Direction
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Autonomy
Phase 2 Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Direction
During this stage, the new manager and key staff take the responsibility for establishing direction, while lower level supervisors are treated as functional specialists than autonomous decision-makers.
The demands of lower-level managers for more autonomy eventually leads to the next revolutionary period:
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Autonomy
Phase 2 Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Autonomy
The solution to this crisis is usually greater delegation.
Phase 3
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Delegation
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Control
Phase 3
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Delegation
When an organization gets to the growth stage of delegation, it usually begins to develop a decentralized organizational structure, which heightens motivation at lower levels of the organization. Eventually top managers sense they are losing control over a diversified field operation. This leads to:
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Control
Phase 3
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Control
The crisis of control leads to a return to centralization. This creates resentment among those individuals who feel that their organizational freedoms are being constrained.
Searching for an alternative usually leads to: Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Coordination
Phase 4
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Coordination
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Red Tape
Phase 4
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Coordination
This period is characterized by the use of formal systems for achieving greater coordination with top management as the organizational watchdogs. Most coordination systems get carried away and it leads to:
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Red Tape
Phase 4
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of Red Tape
This crisis most often occurs when the organization has become too large and complex to be managed through formal programs and rigid systems. To overcome the Red Tape mentality, the organization moves to the next stage:
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Collaboration
Phase 5
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Collaboration
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of ?
Phase 5
Evolutionary Stage: Growth Through Collaboration
This stage emphasizes greater spontaneity in management action through teams and the skillful confrontation of interpersonal differences. Social control and self-discipline take over from formal control. The next “revolutionary stage” was not identified by Griener:
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of ?
Phase 5
Revolutionary Stage: Crisis of ?
Griener suggests that the next crisis will center on the psychological saturation of employees who have grown emotionally and physically exhausted by the intensity of teamwork and the heavy pressure for innovative solutions.
Organizational Life Cycles
Evolving Culture
Birth Stage
Size small Bureaucratic nonbureaucratic Division of Labor overlapping tasks Centralization one-person rule Formalization no written rules Administrative intensity no professional staff Internal Systems nonexistent Lateral teams, task forcesnone
for coordination
Youth Stage Size medium Bureaucratic prebureaucratic Division of Labor some departments Centralization two leaders rule Formalization few rules Administrative intensity increasing clerical &
maintenance Internal Systems crude budget &
information Lateral teams, task forcestop leaders only
for coordination
Midlife Stage
Size large Bureaucratic bureaucratic Division of Labor many departments Centralization two department heads Formalization policy & procedures Administrative intensity increasing professional &
staff support Internal Systems control systems in place,
budget, performance reports
Lateral teams, task forcessome use of integrators and for coordination task forces
Maturity Stage
Size very large Bureaucratic very bureaucratic Division of Labor extensive, with small jobs
and many descriptions Centralization top management heavy Formalization extensive Administrative intensity large-multiple departments Internal Systems extensive planning,
financial and personnel added
Lateral teams, task forcesfrequent at lower levels to
for coordination break down bureaucracy
Preventing Premature Organizational Death
Risk Factors
Board and staff stagnation
Reliance on a single funding source
Failure to pay attention to the external environment
Taking Action
Avoid the “we always did it this way” syndrome
Frequently ask: “Is there a better way to do this?”
Add new Board members
Taking Action
Pay attention to staff morale
Pay attention to financial trends revenues, expenses available fund raising dollars.
Have a strategic plan and monitor it daily.
Taking Action
Ask yourself whether you may be a problem for the organization. Are you challenged, are you having fun? Do you enjoy your co-workers?
Fight stress by exercising, taking vacations getting involved in non-work activities.