Hierarchijos organizacijose : argumentai, alternatyvos, perspektyvos

LTTurbūt niekas negalėtų pasakyti gero žodžio apie hierarchijas. Bet hierarchijos ir toliau atkakliai gyvuoja. Šio straipsnio objektas - hierarchija kaip organizacinės valdymo struktūros pagrindas, o tikslas - apsvarstyti hierarchijų gyvavimo šiuolaikinėse organizacijose argumentus ir nubrėžti gaires hierarchijų perspektyvai. Straipsnyje nesiekiama ginti ar atakuoti hierarchijų. Siekiama atsakyti į klausimą, kodėl hierarchijos vis dar yra pagrindinė struktūra organizacijose, kodėl jos vyrauja ir klesti, išsiaiškinti, kokiais tikslais buvo kuriamos hierarchijos organizacijose anksčiau ir dabar. Hierarchiniai santykiai tarp žmonių dažnai atsiranda spontaniškai, savaime. Bandymai priversti paklusti kitus pastebimi jau tarp ikimokyklinio amžiaus vaikų, todėl tai gali būti susiję tiesiog su genetiniu polinkiu būti už kažką viršesniu. Reiškia, hierarchiškumas - tai tiesioginis biologinis paveldas organizacijų vadybai, susiformavęs dar ankstyvaisiais žmogaus formavimosi laikotarpiais. Tyrimas šiame straipsnyje parodė, kad nors hierarchija, kaip socialinė organizavimo forma turi privalumų, bet yra ir labai ydinga. Tai ar ji vis dėlto tinkama šiuolaikinėms organizacijoms? Berods, tokia forma, kaip ji buvo sugalvota vadybos klasikų tinka itin retai, tik ypatingose aplinkos sąlygose. Rinkos ekonomikoje aštrios konkurencijos sąlygomis klasikinę hierarchiją būtina modifikuoti, kitaip organizacija turi mažai galimybių išlikti; arba pasirinkti tinkamą hierarchinės organizavimo formos kurią nors esminę alternatyvą: rinkos ar klano; arba tam tikrą tinklinių santykių formą, galinčią apimti jau minėtas alternatyvas.Reikšminiai žodžiai: Hierarchija; Organizacinė valdymo struktūra; Bendroji sistemų teorija; Hierarchy; Organizational structure; General system theory.

ENScholars, consultants and managers constantly predict that hierarchies will be replaced with new egalitarian structures in organizations, but hierarchies still exist. The hierarchy theory is a dialect of general systems theory. It has emerged as part of a movement toward a general science of complexity. The hierarchy theory uses a relatively small set of principles to keep track of the complex structure and the behavior of systems with multiple levels. A hierarchy is a system of ranking and organizing things or people, where each element of the system (except for the top element) is a subordinate to a single other element. Many human organizations, such as governments, educational institutions, businesses, churches, armies and political movements are hierarchical organizations, at least officially; commonly seniors, called "bosses", have more power than their subordinates. The term ‘hierarchy’ immediately conjures up the idea of bureaucracy, which represents rationality in an attempt to define an order in organizations and to control social existence. In recent years the concept of hierarchy has come under increasing scholarly criticism. The hierarchical design inevitably leads to organizational dysfunctions and unanticipated outcomes, it is emphasized the impact of rigid hierarchy on the individual, suggesting that over-concern for an organizational structure and regulation leads to timidity, conservatism, and technicism. The rigid hierarchy stifles professional judgments, limits innovation, and creates dependency and subordination. Modern organizations equate the pay grade with hierarchical work levels and are blamed for having too many layers. With too many layers, accountability is unclear.Individuals in hierarchies become passive players and enter a heteronymous state in which autonomy, responsibility, and moral judgment are suspended. There are many alternatives to hierarchies and ways how to adapt them to modern organizational environment in management science. The triarchy theory refers to the three fundamental ways of getting things done in organizations: hierarchy, heterarchy and responsible autonomy. All organizations use a mixture of these three ways, but the proportions can differ widely. Heterarchy and responsible autonomy are often misunderstood or neglected. Any actual social analysis of coordination involves the employment of the market, hierarchy and network models in comparison and comparative framework, which tends to highlight different aspects of the coordinative activity and overlaps. Another way of thinking about the relationship between the models is that the idea of networks might be used to encompass both markets and hierarchy. Thus, networks could be used as the most general category of coordination. A comparison between the market and hierarchy shows that the idea of hierarchy splits into two types: bureaucracies, which are hierarchical-competitive systems, and clans, which are hierarchical-cooperative systems respectively. In addition, the market form is defined as an independent-competitive combination, while the network structure occupies the independent-cooperative position. Finally, the ways how to improve hierarchies with different innovations such as organizational design, informational systems, financial data, reward system, learning, vision, contacts in chain of virtue, and leadership have been proposed, because the use of hierarchies in a classical manner is simply impractical as well as disastrous in modern organizations. [From the publication]

• Vadyba / Management
• Ekonomika / Economics