You are not alone with this question. To identify and improve organizational performance, there have been many different researches, findings, approaches and developments over the years. At the same time, these are initially very different. However, in combination, they can be used effectively. Especially if you are aware of the limitations of each paradigm.
Early management approaches to increase productivity
One of the pioneering approaches was Taylorism, around the beginning of the 20th century. It is also referred to as Scientific Management. Frederic Winslow Taylor took the approach of optimizing organizations with purely scientific analysis in order to solve social problems and achieve “prosperity for all.” At its core, the approach aims to divide work into small, quickly repeated activities that are centrally managed and controlled. Likewise, there is an underlying assumption that there is a “one right way” to perform work. Through its specification, the maximum productivity can be achieved. Among other things, this allows easy comparability of performance in terms of units/time and has led to remuneration models such as piecework wages. This approach provided both increased efficiency and criticism, e.g., of the stress caused by monotonous activities. Counter-movements and further research followed.
Thus, the Hawthorne ex periments around 1930 brought new empirical insights. In the form of experiments, it has been shown that productivity can be increased beyond the approaches of Taylorism by positive work climate. This is how the human relations approach to increasing productivity was born. Later, further developments such as motivation-theoretical approaches emerged. Incidentally, the term “New Work” emerged later, in the 1980s, but as we can see, it was already recognized in the 1920s/30s that pure Scientific Management had its limitations. In essence, these approaches focus more on informal structures of the organization, while classical approaches are more concerned with the formal organizational and operational structure.
Classification of Lean Management
At this point, I would like to make a short insertion on the subject of lean. At this point, I would like to make a short insertion on the subject of lean. It was created a little later, something in the middle of the 20th century. However, there are differences compared to Scientific Management. Lean management is an evolution with a slightly different focus. In addition to pure efficiency, some human relations insights are taken into account. Because in lean management there is no longer a strict division between “those who direct it” and “those who implement it”. Rather, the focus is on self-reflection and the joint search for new ways to use resources (time and materials) more wisely while maximizing customer benefits and quality. n contrast to previous, centrally organized approaches, optimization is managed in a decentralized manner to meet the challenge of rapidly changing markets.
Question simplifications and positions
In summary, all of the above approaches, illuminate performance from a slightly different point of view. Similarly, all approaches pursue the goal of establishing rules and guidelines to address organizational complexity and increase productivity. There are both corroborating and critical studies for each of these approaches, and there is something to be gained from each of them – considering the underlying assumptions and limitations.
This is how simplifications are used in Scientific Management. These are often based on the assumption that there are clear (but not always trivial) relationships between causes and effects. There are certainly (sub-)systems in which this is true and performance can also be sustainably increased in this way. For example, when it comes to increasing efficiency through the use of faster machines or parallel production. However, the organizational environment has changed in many places. The acronym VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex, Ambiguous) describes this environment. In a complex environment, there are no clear cause-and-effect relationships. Therefore, simplifications that were legitimate in another context are no longer applicable.
Due to this fact, a purely person- and behavior-oriented approach that bases productivity exclusively on the people-related level and thereby ignores structures in the sense of structural and process organization would also be inadmissible. Sense-making, further training, personal development and coaching can all make a contribution to increasing performance – but are only effective if the underlying structures allow added value to be generated.
What does this mean for practical organizational development
The findings of all the above approaches can be considered as the foundations of modern organizational management. However, the entire complexity of an organization cannot be summarized in a single theory. Organizational theory approaches produce new partial insights that you can use as foundations for practical organizational development. When developing the principles that apply to your organization, it is then important that you are aware of simplifications and underlying assumptions. Critically question the context in which applicability makes sense.
In the complex environment, organizational development should take into account as much of the existing evidence as possible. This concerns the possibilities offered by technical progress, and findings in organizational theory as well as findings in work and personnel psychology. In addition to formal organizational structures, informal social structures must also be taken into account. In practice, you will experience interactions that cannot be clearly predicted.
Ultimately, for this reason, there is also no universally valid recommendation for action for the success of an organization. The interactions between companies, markets and customers are simply too complex. Organizational science approaches each consider only partial aspects of the organization. There is now a consensus in the view that success depends on many factors, which are “technical” and “logical” as well as “emotional” “psychological”. Therefore, be careful when confronted with extreme positions and supposed blueprints in practice. Here, advertising effectiveness often takes precedence over problem solving.
Organizations are always goal-oriented. So success also depends on what your organization’s defined goal is and what metrics you want to use to assess progress. The conscious handling of the underlying assumptions of selected methods as well as observation of changes in your organization play an important role. The great art, therefore, is to recognize whether the combination of measures, guidelines and rules will lead to the goal and to make adjustments if necessary. Hypothesis generation, scenario techniques, and the appropriate selection and presentation of outcome criteria are some of the tools that can help you do this.
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Viktoria Kurpas / stock.adobe.com
