Course content
Organisations are everywhere in different forms, size, internal structure, tasks, and goals. This course will expose students to important theories and conceptual models for analysing and understanding organisations with the aim of designing effective structures and cultures that allow them to create value, survive, develop and thrive. The course will articulate that employees do not always act in a rational and consistent manner. Our ability - whether as a new employee, a middle manager, or a top level executive - to understand, explain, and predict human behaviour in organisations is a valuable skill. We will study a wide range of organisational situations and examples, and connect them to organisational theories and effective management methods. We will bridge theory and practice through organisational analysis by exploring a series of successful and unsuccessful examples. Students will learn to apply different theoretical perspectives in our attempt to provide situational analysis and plausible solutions. No single model of an effective organisation will be advocated - no "right answer" that can be applied universally; rather, we will explore the factors and conditions within and outside an organisation that can be controlled to provide the best fit with the dynamic environment and thereby create the greatest opportunity for success. The imperative for organisational learning, continuous adaptation, and change based on new developments will be emphasized.
Class 1: Organisational theories, Organisational behaviour
Class 2: Managing individual and cultural diversity in organisations
Class 3: Workplace attitudes, Job satisfaction
Class 4: Work motivation
Class 5: Group processes: Conflict management
Class 6: Organisational processes: Leading with and without authority
Class 7: Decision making; Organised anarchy
Feedback activity: Organisational analysis
Class 8: Organisational Culture, Structure and Design; Knowledge management, Learning organisation
Class 9: The organisation and its environment: Resource dependency, Organisational ecologies
Class 10: Organisational analysis presentation (live or online upload, depending on class size)
Class 11: Comprehensive summary, exam preparation
See course description in course catalogue