Deck 2: Organizational Structure, Design, and Bureaucracy

Question 1

Which of the following is not an example of bureaucratic functioning in organizations?

A) Paperwork and record-keeping
B) Hierarchical organizational structure
C) Advertising and marketing brochures
D) Policies, rules, and procedures

Answer 1

C
Explanation: Paperwork and record-keeping, hierarchical organizational structure, policies, rules, and procedures, are all bureaucratic techniques by which the behaviour of the workforce is controlled by indirect, impersonal means rather than face-to-face. Advertising and marketing brochures give information about the organization and its products to external parties, they are not used to control the workforce in the same way that bureaucratic techniques are.

Question 2

Henri Fayol's five functions of management help an organization to maintain control as it grows in size.

Answer 2

False
Explanation: The five functions of management simply state what tasks managers need to achieve in order to control an organization. Planning, organizing, coordinating, commanding, and controlling are functions that are needed no matter how large or small and organization is. Rather than a means of helping to manage as an organization grows in size, they are simply things that need to be maintained as an organization grows in size - it is bureaucracy that helps to perform these five functions on a larger scale.

Question 3

Can you match Fayol's functions to their description?
-Planning

A) Forecasting what is likely to happen in the future.
B) Gathering the right staff and resources to make the organization work.
C) Issuing orders to workers.
D) Monitoring and tracking the work that people do.

Answer 3

A

Question 4

Can you match Fayol's functions to their description?
-Organizing

A) Forecasting what is likely to happen in the future.
B) Gathering the right staff and resources to make the organization work.
C) Issuing orders to workers.
D) Monitoring and tracking the work that people do.

Question 5

Can you match Fayol's functions to their description?
-Commanding

A) Forecasting what is likely to happen in the future.
B) Gathering the right staff and resources to make the organization work.
C) Issuing orders to workers.
D) Monitoring and tracking the work that people do.

Question 6

Can you match Fayol's functions to their description?
-Controlling

A) Forecasting what is likely to happen in the future.
B) Gathering the right staff and resources to make the organization work.
C) Issuing orders to workers.
D) Monitoring and tracking the work that people do.

Question 7

Which of the following best describes the types of control that are exerted by bureaucracy? Please select all that apply.

A) Impersonal
B) Indirect
C) Face-to-face
D) At a distance

Question 8

The management of workers through levels of hierarchy and through the use of rules and procedures is known as direct control.

Question 9

Charles Clinton Spaulding developed his ideas about managing large-scale organizations from his experience in the mining industry.

Question 10

The Classical Management School provides a strong critique of bureaucracy.

Question 11

Which of the following explain how Spaulding's work differed from that of Fayol? Select all that apply.

A) The importance of lines of hierarchical authority
B) The importance of community and co-operation
C) The importance of cultural values
D) The importance of planning

Question 12

Look at the following aspects of bureaucracy and match them to the closest explanation of how they help to exert power and control over an organization.
-Collect data about people and tasks in a standardised form to allow the efficient operation of bureaucratic functions.

A) Records and paperwork
B) Structure and bureaucratic hierarchy
C) Timetables
D) Rules and procedures

Question 13

Look at the following aspects of bureaucracy and match them to the closest explanation of how they help to exert power and control over an organization.
-Allows control to be delegated through the levels of an organization, with face-to-face control at each level.

A) Records and paperwork
B) Structure and bureaucratic hierarchy
C) Timetables
D) Rules and procedures

Question 14

Look at the following aspects of bureaucracy and match them to the closest explanation of how they help to exert power and control over an organization.
-Orders people in space and time within an organization.

A) Records and paperwork
B) Structure and bureaucratic hierarchy
C) Timetables
D) Rules and procedures

Question 15

Look at the following aspects of bureaucracy and match them to the closest explanation of how they help to exert power and control over an organization.
-Standardizes behaviour across the organization through a set of prescribed approaches to different organizational tasks and functions.

A) Records and paperwork
B) Structure and bureaucratic hierarchy
C) Timetables
D) Rules and procedures

Question 16

The division of an organizational hierarchy into different functions is known as functional or _________ differentiation

Question 17

The number of workers that a manager supervises directly is known as the____ of control.

Question 18

Which of the following is a bureaucratic method of standardizing behaviour across an organization through a set of prescribed approaches to different organizational tasks and functions?

A) Paperwork and record-keeping
B) Hierarchical organizational structure
C) Advertising and marketing brochures
D) Policies, rules, and procedures

Question 19

An advantage attributed to bureaucracy is that its rules and procedures mean people are all treated in the same way. This is known as impersonal _______

Question 20

Which of the following features of bureaucracy allows for surveillance of worker performance to take place?

A) Paperwork and record-keeping
B) Hierarchical organizational structure
C) Advertising and marketing brochures
D) Policies, rules, and procedures

Question 21

Which of the following did Max Weber believe were characteristics of bureaucracy? Please select all that apply.

A) It should be used to manage all organizations
B) It was a technically efficient form of organization
C) It had negative effects on people by making life routine and predictable
D) It dominates so many parts of life that it is difficult to escape from

Question 22

Max Weber's assertion that what might be technically rational is not necessarily ethically desirable is an example of ____________ rationality.

Question 23

Which of the following best sums up Weber's approach to bureaucracy?

A) He recommended a set of design principles through which bureaucracy could best be used to control organizations.
B) He noted a set of dysfunctions that prevented bureaucracy from working to its optimum efficiency.
C) Whilst he noted the technical efficiency of bureaucracy, he expressed concerns about the negative effects that it was having on people and society.
D) He noted how its power was massively increased by computer technology.

Question 24

Match the following scenarios to their associated dysfunctions of bureaucracy.
-A schoolteacher is unable to speak to a child in distress because she has an attendance report to complete for an impending deadline.

A) Red tape
B) Bureaucratic personality
C) Mock bureaucracy
D) Discretion

Question 25

Match the following scenarios to their associated dysfunctions of bureaucracy.
-A bouncer refuses to allow a person into a nightclub because there is a spelling mistake on the guest list which means their name is one letter different to that on their identification.

A) Red tape
B) Bureaucratic personality
C) Mock bureaucracy
D) Discretion

Question 26

Match the following scenarios to their associated dysfunctions of bureaucracy.
-A company has an equal opportunities policy but does little in practice to implement it.

A) Red tape
B) Bureaucratic personality
C) Mock bureaucracy
D) Discretion

Question 27

Match the following scenarios to their associated dysfunctions of bureaucracy.
-A supermarket cashier is faced with a queue because an item has been presented without a barcode. Rather than wait for an assistant to find a similar item, they remember the price and ring it through the till under a general product code.

A) Red tape
B) Bureaucratic personality
C) Mock bureaucracy
D) Discretion

Question 28

A police officer walks past a bar and hears a fight taking place. Rather than going straight into the bar, the officer walks around the block for 15 minutes. Upon returning, the fight has ended, everything is calm and there is nothing more for the police officer to do. This is an example of the police officer using discretion.

Question 29

When Sara Ahmed (2012) describes diversity policies which exist on paper but which are not put into effect in practice, which dysfunction of bureaucracy is she describing?

A) Mock bureaucracy
B) Red tape
C) Discretion
D) Bureaucratic personality

Question 30

The inability of workers to take on new tasks and ideas beyond the narrow confines of their role is called trained _______

Question 31

'The world has become too fast-moving and dynamic for traditional organizational structures.' Which of the following perspectives best describes this statement?

A) Pre-Fordism
B) Post-Fordism
C) Pre-bureaucracy
D) Post-bureaucracy

Question 32

An organization which has a traditional bureaucratic hierarchy, but also places workers into cross-departmental project teams which have their own separate line managers, is said to have a_____structure.

Question 33

Which of the following best describes a matrix structure?

A) A top-down hierarchical structure
B) A flat structure with no levels of hierarchy
C) A traditional organizational structure designed to take account of environmental factors such as size and technology
D) An organizational structure with cross-departmental project teams, and with horizontal and vertical lines of command

Question 34

Bureaucracy works best where there is an uncertain environment facing an organization, and where they may need to be flexible and respond to changes quickly.

Question 35

The ____ sector of an organization's environment is where the influence of consumer tastes, fashions, and opinions lies.

Question 36

Match the following sectors of an organization's environment to their description.
-Political

A) Policies and laws made by various levels of government
B) Factors such as consumer demand and exchange rates
C) Consumer tastes, fashions, and opinions
D) The latest innovations and machinery

Question 37

Match the following sectors of an organization's environment to their description.
-Economic

A) Policies and laws made by various levels of government
B) Factors such as consumer demand and exchange rates
C) Consumer tastes, fashions, and opinions
D) The latest innovations and machinery

Question 38

Match the following sectors of an organization's environment to their description.
-Social

A) Policies and laws made by various levels of government
B) Factors such as consumer demand and exchange rates
C) Consumer tastes, fashions, and opinions
D) The latest innovations and machinery

Question 39

Match the following sectors of an organization's environment to their description.
-Technological

A) Policies and laws made by various levels of government
B) Factors such as consumer demand and exchange rates
C) Consumer tastes, fashions, and opinions
D) The latest innovations and machinery

Question 40

The contemporary environment is much more stable and predictable than in the days of the industrial revolution when rational organization was founded.

Question 41

The turbulent, changeable, and dynamic nature of the contemporary world is described by Bauman (2000) as ______ modernity.

Question 42

Which of the following might be features of post-bureaucratic organizations, such as Google and Oticon? Please select all that apply.

A) Fixed job roles and descriptions
B) Removal of walls and fixed desks
C) Hierarchy with many levels
D) Minimal rules and procedures

Question 43

The ____ is a concept that helps describe the random connections made by organizations as they operate through global computer networks.

Question 44

Which of the following describe organizations which use data to process increasing amounts of their activity? Please select all that apply.

A) Weber's (1958) iron cage of rationality
B) Zuboff's (1988) informated organization
C) Blackler's (1995) implosion and explosion of organizations
D) Bauman's (2000) liquid modernity

Question 45

Workers such as cycle couriers who are self-employed but perform tasks which are controlled by the data and algorithm of one organization are said to work in the ___ economy