Deck 8: Structuring Organizations for Todays Challenges

Question 1

The purpose of a division of labor and specialization is to improve an employee's job performance.

Answer 1

True

Question 2

The process of setting up individual departments to do specialized tasks is called job specialization.

Answer 2

False

Question 3

The driving force behind the change in business organizations is the change in consumer expectations.

Answer 3

True

Question 4

Alicia dreams of opening her own restaurant and knows that she will need to organize her business. Organizing begins with determining the work to be done.

Question 5

Managing a growing business often requires managers to create departments to accomplish various tasks.

Question 6

Henri Fayol and Max Weber are best known for their contributions to accounting theory.

Question 7

Correctly structuring a business organization allows managers to avoid delegating responsibility and authority to employees.

Question 8

Organizing the structure of the company means deciding how many jobs need to be done and who is responsible for doing them.

Question 9

In its effort to reorganize its floor space, Backstreet Books decided to eliminate seating space in its stores in order to make room for bookshelves to accommodate the growing interest in books about how to go green. This company's effort is an example of how a firm may reduce its emphasis in one product line in order to serve customer preferences and trends.

Question 10

The process of creating individual departments to do specialized tasks is called departmentalization.

Question 11

Departments are functional units within the business such as sales, accounting, finance, and marketing.

Question 12

To better organize his landscaping business, Frank divides each job into several parts. One part is excavation and removal of old landscaping, the next part is design, followed by purchasing, and the last part is installation of new plants. If he assigns a different employee to each part, this action would be an example of departmentalization.

Question 13

As indicated in the Making Ethical Decisions box, "Would You Sacrifice Safety for Profit?" organizational decisions that affect profits in a negative way should be avoided at all cost.

Question 14

One key to organizational success is to go back to basic principles and build the business on a sound foundation.

Question 15

Division of labor is difficult to achieve in small businesses.

Question 16

In a capitalist economy, organizations seldom reorganize due to changing markets.

Question 17

The success of the firm often depends on assigning the right tasks to the right person.

Question 18

Division of labor refers to deciding how many jobs must be accomplished and then dividing them up amongst the labor force.

Question 19

When Eric Schmidt joined Google he tackled the organization function head-on. In speaking at a large conference with its founders, Sergey Brin and Larry Page, he commented that Google was running pretty well but "it just needed a little structure." Schmidt was referring to basic organization principles such as division of labor, specialization, and getting the departments running smoothly.

Question 20

Small business organizations lack the size required to reap the benefits of labor specialization.

Question 21

Job descriptions are an important part of Max Weber's organizational theory.

Question 22

Fayol's principle of esprit de corps says that employees should be divided into small groups that can be directed efficiently by a single manager.

Question 23

The design of a bureaucratic organization assumes a well-educated workforce.

Question 24

Weber believed that employees should be empowered to make their own decisions.

Question 25

Max Weber's organizational theories require an educated workforce to operate efficiently.

Question 26

Clear communication among workers and keeping order in materials and people are included in Fayol's principles.

Question 27

Weber believed that large organizations required everyone to follow the established rules and guidelines precisely.

Question 28

Fayol's principles suggest that the goals of the firm are less important than the goals of individual workers.

Question 29

Max Weber's principles of organization were similar to those of Henri Fayol.

Question 30

Weber promoted the idea of the pyramid-shaped organization structure for large businesses.

Question 31

Some business organizations still follow the 1940s organizational theory of Max Weber.

Question 32

Weber was a strong proponent of bureaucracy.

Question 33

One of Fayol's principles suggests that managers should have the right to give orders and expect others to follow.

Question 34

Fayol believed that the amount of decision-making power vested in top management should be the same in all situations.

Question 35

Fayol's principle of the division of labor says that functions should be divided into areas of specialization such as production, marketing, and finance.

Question 36

According to Fayol's principle of authority, if you have authority you also have responsibility.

Question 37

Weber was critical of bureaucrats because he felt they undermined the efficiency of the organization.

Question 38

Fayol believed that managers should treat employees and peers with respect and justice.

Question 39

Weber had a great deal of faith in managers. He was confident that a firm would do well if employees simply did as they were told.

Question 40

Max Weber believed that promotion should be based solely on seniority.

Question 41

An organizational hierarchy establishes one person at the top of an organization.

Question 42

The purpose of Weber's and Fayol's principles was for the benefit of management, as opposed to pleasing customers.

Question 43

Bureaucratic organizations are not very responsive to customers.

Question 44

A bureaucratic style of organization is slow when responding to change.

Question 45

In today's fast-paced business environment, Weber's bureaucratic ideas work well. These principles permit business to respond quickly to customer changes.

Question 46

The basic idea behind the organization design of Fayol and Weber was that management wanted to control workers.

Question 47

As organizations grew, the use of Fayol's principles led to rigid organizations that didn't always respond quickly to consumer requests.

Question 48

Weber put great trust in the creativity, skills, and pride of employees and believed that managers should act more as coaches than as bosses.

Question 49

When we experience economies of scale, this means that as production levels rise (we make more of something), the cost of supplies and the cost of labor that go into the production go down.

Question 50

Bureaucratic organizations establish rules and regulations that everyone is expected to follow.

Question 51

Looking at a traditional organization chart, you will view who reports to whom; you will have a sense of each person's authority and responsibility, and the type of work that they perform for the organization.

Question 52

Bureaucratic organizations are structured to empower employees and please customers.

Question 53

According to Weber, a bureaucrat is a middle manager whose job is to implement top management's orders.

Question 54

Empowerment works only when employees are given the proper training and resources to respond.

Question 55

An organization chart shows who is accountable for the completion of specific work and who reports to whom.

Question 56

A bureaucracy is an organization with many layers of managers who set rules and regulations and oversee all decisions.

Question 57

A bureaucracy empowers employees to quickly respond to customers' wants and desires.

Question 58

A bureaucracy is designed to be customer focused.

Question 59

A chain of command is a line of authority that moves from the lowest level of the hierarchy to the top.

Question 60

A hierarchy requires many top managers, but only a few middle managers.

Question 61

The optimum number of subordinates a manager should supervise is referred to as the span of control.

Question 62

Kate holds a middle-management position with a large corporation. She prefers to involve her subordinates in decision making. She also favors allowing workers a fair amount of flexibility in how they do their jobs. Kate's approach to management exemplifies the principles first popularized by Max Weber.

Question 63

Sam supervised a group of people in a very large organization. The refrigerator in their lunchroom stopped functioning. He started the paperwork on the day it died, and the refrigerator request went out for bid; two middle managers needed to approve acceptance of the bid and document their decision, and the purchasing director had final approval. The refrigerator arrived six months later. Max Weber would have approved of the decision process and documentation of it at Sam's company to back up such a refrigerator purchase.

Question 64

In today's business environment, the trend is to decrease the span of control.

Question 65

Span of control refers to the number of different markets a business can serve efficiently.

Question 66

The degree to which an organization allows lower-level managers to make decisions reflects the degree of decentralization.

Question 67

As a result of rapidly changing markets and global differences in consumer tastes, more firms are considering centralized authority.

Question 68

In firms with centralized authority, each business unit is treated as if it is a completely separate and independent organization.

Question 69

At Dilly-Dally Sportswear Store a manager needs to be called to the front of the store and sign off on every return that a cashier performs. The CEO continues this policy because he wants every manager to "look those customers right in the eye" and "stake their job on taking those items back." Clearly, Dilly-Dally empowers its employees to make decisions at their jobs.

Question 70

Centralized authority provides for the delegation of authority to employees who are then better able to respond to customers' needs.

Question 71

As a new employee in a bureaucratic organization, Nelle can expect a great deal of independence and authority.

Question 72

An advantage of decentralized authority is that those individuals closest to the customers and more familiar with local conditions make decisions.

Question 73

Blake is a manager at a car seat manufacturing company. He believes that it is very important and less confusing if each worker has only one boss. Blake's view is consistent with Fayol's unity of command principle.

Question 74

Most businesses adopt a bureaucratic organization in order to speed up their decision-making process.

Question 75

The more standardized the work, the wider the span of control.

Question 76

Soprano Industries follows a chain of command with authority moving from the top of the hierarchy down to lower-level managers. The company is organized by department with established rules and regulations that everyone is expected to follow. These characteristics suggest that Soprano Industries is an example of a bureaucratic organization.

Question 77

Paige believes all workers should receive the same wage rate regardless of their position within a company. Paige's views on wages illustrate Fayol's principle of equity.

Question 78

A weakened corporate image is one of the disadvantages of a decentralized business organization.

Question 79

Antonio works in the accounting department of a large firm. This is an example of Fayol's division of labor concept.

Question 80

Rob is a middle manager who spends much of his time devising ways to implement the ideas of top management. Max Weber would have considered Rob a bureaucrat.