Week 5 - Organisations and their context
Miles et al:
Author Miles et al. (1978)
Title Organisational Strategy, Structure, and Process
How organisational adaptation (adjusting to environmental change and
Main concept
uncertainty) really happens.
Adaptive cycle: organisational behaviour is only partially determined
by environmental conditions and the choices top managers make are the
determinants of organisational structure and process. These choices can
be broken down into 3 broad problems of organisational adaptation:
1. Entrepreneurial problem: mostly visible in new or rapidly growing
organisations. Necessity to clearly define the domain of specific
goods or services and the target market. Commit to a particular
product-market domain.
2. The engineering problem: operationalise what was determined
within the entrepreneurial problem. Select technologies for
production, distribution…
3. Administrative problem: develop structures to rationalise and
stabilise the activities determined in the previous two models.
Important Formulate and implement processes which enable the organisation
constructs to continue evolving.
What strategies do organisations use to solve the problems above?
Strategic typology -> different ways of solving problems based on the
differences in the organisations.
- Defenders: enacts and maintains an environment for which a stable
form of organisation is appropriate. Limited set of products, narrow
market; stable domain. Does not look at development and trends
outside their domains. Makes it hard for competitors to enter the
market. Optimises engineering. Mechanistic solution to admin. prob.
- risks: ineffectiveness due to not responding to major environ. shifts
- Prospectors: opposite of defender. Dynamic environments. Finds
and exploits new market opportunities. Fosters change in its industry.
Flexible in administration. - risks: not the most profitable,
exploration is costly. Inefficient in stable markets.
Miles et al:
Author Miles et al. (1978)
Title Organisational Strategy, Structure, and Process
How organisational adaptation (adjusting to environmental change and
Main concept
uncertainty) really happens.
Adaptive cycle: organisational behaviour is only partially determined
by environmental conditions and the choices top managers make are the
determinants of organisational structure and process. These choices can
be broken down into 3 broad problems of organisational adaptation:
1. Entrepreneurial problem: mostly visible in new or rapidly growing
organisations. Necessity to clearly define the domain of specific
goods or services and the target market. Commit to a particular
product-market domain.
2. The engineering problem: operationalise what was determined
within the entrepreneurial problem. Select technologies for
production, distribution…
3. Administrative problem: develop structures to rationalise and
stabilise the activities determined in the previous two models.
Important Formulate and implement processes which enable the organisation
constructs to continue evolving.
What strategies do organisations use to solve the problems above?
Strategic typology -> different ways of solving problems based on the
differences in the organisations.
- Defenders: enacts and maintains an environment for which a stable
form of organisation is appropriate. Limited set of products, narrow
market; stable domain. Does not look at development and trends
outside their domains. Makes it hard for competitors to enter the
market. Optimises engineering. Mechanistic solution to admin. prob.
- risks: ineffectiveness due to not responding to major environ. shifts
- Prospectors: opposite of defender. Dynamic environments. Finds
and exploits new market opportunities. Fosters change in its industry.
Flexible in administration. - risks: not the most profitable,
exploration is costly. Inefficient in stable markets.
