Deck 11: Organizational Design

Question 1

According to the "Chapter 11 Preview," Home Depot must continue to open new stores in order to maintain their financial performance.

Answer 1

False

Question 2

Home Depot has been unable to find a new formula that will enable them to continue the large-scale growth that they experienced in the 1990s.

Answer 2

True

Question 3

An organizational chart, in general, provides ten major pieces of information about an organization's structure.

Answer 3

False

Question 4

Many organizations, like Wells Fargo Bank, are flattening their structures by increasing the number of management layers between the CEO and front-line employees.

Question 5

Centralization is an approach that requires managers to decide what to delegate, to select workers carefully, and to formulate adequate controls.

Question 6

Conflicts over product priorities are a potential pitfall of the functional design.

Question 7

Coordination is usually difficult across product lines because employees tend to focus on goals for their particular product, rather than on broader company goals.

Question 8

An emphasis on geographical design makes it possible to benefit from facilities and equipment for production being located in multiple locations, which maximizes flexibility.

Question 9

In a mechanistic system, decision making tends to be decentralized.

Question 10

An organization's technology has a significant impact on its organization design because different types of technologies generate various types of technological interdependence.

Question 11

There are three types of technological interdependence: pooled, sequential, and reciprocal.

Question 12

How did Home Depot originally organize itself for growth?

A) copying the business model of Sears and Wal-Mart
B) centralizing its management and purchasing
C) appealing to do-it-yourself home owners
D) commitment to international markets

Question 13

Each time Home Depot acquired a competitor or created a new store __________.

A) management lost another degree of control over the organization
B) its organizational design came under pressure to evolve
C) its profitability went up
D) its revenues per store went down

Question 14

At Home Depot, combining the Southeastern and Mid-Atlantic regions to form a new region is an example of __________.

A) integration
B) differentiation
C) vertical design
D) geographic design

Question 15

Antwan Payne is a manager of the marketing department of Paradise Time Share Condominiums. Payne's subordinate, Chadwick Wolff, is having trouble locating information on the demographics of timeshare buyers. Payne asks Wolff to do the report for him because he doesn't know how to do it. Payne tells Wolff to check some trade magazines. Wolff is following the __________ principle for improving delegation of authority.

A) establish adequate controls
B) expecting completed work
C) involve subordinates
D) timely feedback

Question 16

Lynette Ivey and Everett Frank are employees of Catalina Classics, a publishing firm. Both have experience in editing romance fiction. Both require editorial assistance and computer typesetting. If the two are grouped together based on these facts, the company is using __________.

A) network design
B) product design
C) virtual design
D) functional design

Question 17

All of the following are advantages of functional design except __________.

A) it results in a simple structure
B) it focuses on interdepartmental goals
C) creation of one department for each primary task
D) it keeps administrative expenses low

Question 18

All of the following are disadvantages of functional design except _______.

A) making quick decisions becomes difficult
B) managers must spend time resolving problems among departments
C) it promotes skills specialization
D) pinpointing the accountability of employees becomes difficult

Question 19

Starbucks' organizational design __________.

A) is horizontally integrated
B) has the executive level organized by location
C) applies rules extensively to all locations
D) all of the above

Question 20

Trinidad Wolff is a computer programmer with a large data processing company. Wolff spends much of his day working as a team with Meghan Kincaid, who is a computer engineer who specializes in computer hardware design. Wolff and Kincaid have authority to make system-wide design decisions and their work as a team facilitates problem solving. Wolff and Kincaid work in a(n) ___________ organization.

A) organic
B) mechanistic
C) network
D) virtual

Question 21

The medical services industry is constantly offering new technologies and equipment to assist with the diagnosis and treatment of patients. In addition, recent debates regarding public policy changes suggest that the governmental regulation of medicine is likely to be reformed to some significant degree. Furthermore, providing medical care might be described as a nonroutine service. Considering all of this, medical care providers should use a(n) __________ type of organization design.

A) mechanistic
B) network
C) geographic design
D) organic

Question 22

What are the two fundamentals of organizing? Describe them.

Question 23

What are the advantages and disadvantages of functional design?

Question 24

Describe how Starbucks uses its strategic action competency to develop its organizational design.

Question 25

Explain two of the three types of technical interdependence. Give an organizational example of each.