APT 1 Complete summary of literature
Improve processes in a health service delivery organization
HIM0001
,Learning community meeting 1:
Understanding Organizations… Finally!: Structuring in
Sevens.
Henry Mintzberg (2023),
Chapter 1: “Our World of Organizations”
Overview
Mintzberg opens the book by showing that we live entirely surrounded by organizations —
from hospitals and schools to companies, governments, and NGOs. He asks:
“We are educated, employed, entertained, and exasperated by organizations — yet what do
we really understand about them?”
Chapter 1 introduces the central motivation of the book: to provide a way of truly
understanding how organizations function, differ, and can be structured effectively.
1. The Omnipresence of Organizations
Mintzberg illustrates that in a single day, we interact with numerous organizations — tech
companies, food producers, schools, transport, banks, gyms, and media outlets.
From birth to death, people live within an “ecosystem of organizations.”
Despite this, there’s a gap in understanding between personal self-awareness (self-help
literature) and macroeconomics — the “middle ground” of how organizations actually work.
Hence the book’s goal: to make sense of organizations, finally.
2. What Is an Organization?
Mintzberg poses a childlike question: “What is a Google anyway? And how can an
organization be an Apple?”
He points out how abstract the concept of an organization really is — we can’t “see” an
organization as we can see a building or product.
He offers two definitions:
Organization: Collective action structured for the pursuit of a common mission.
→ In simple terms: people working together in a formal arrangement to achieve
something.
Structure: The pattern of relationships designed to enable that collective action.
He then introduces Figure 1.1, which maps organizations by sector:
Public sector: governments, departments, ministries, agencies
, Private sector: companies, corporations, family businesses
Plural (community) sector: NGOs, charities, cooperatives, associations
These sectors represent three pillars of society: the economic, the political, and the
social/community spheres.
3. The “One Best Way” Fallacy
Mintzberg critiques Frederick Taylor’s 1911 Scientific Management — the “one best way”
approach.
Taylor’s idea that every organization could be managed the same way (using measurement
and control) is, according to Mintzberg, the “one worst way” to manage organizations.
“Believing there is one best way to structure organizations is the worst way to manage
them.”
He humorously illustrates this through “The Efficient Orchestra” story — a business student
recommends cutting violinists, updating centuries-old instruments, and rounding musical
notes to increase “efficiency.”
The absurdity underscores that different organizations (like orchestras and factories) have
fundamentally different purposes and dynamics.
4. Diversity and Complexity of Organizations
Mintzberg celebrates the variety of organizations:
Biggest: e.g., the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) — vast but overly bureaucratic.
Smallest: a two-manager tag-label company that still manages to create its own
bureaucracy.
Strangest: odd associations like the Flying Funeral Directors of America.
Most common: restaurants — which range from fast food to haute cuisine.
The point: no single model can fit all.
Even similar types (e.g., restaurants) require very different structures.
5. “Organization No-Speak”
Mintzberg compares our limited organizational vocabulary to two biologists who only know
the word mammal — one studies bears, the other beavers, and they argue because they lack
words for specific species.
Similarly, most people talk about organizations in general terms, without distinguishing
between their types.
This ignorance causes confusion — we mistake orchestras for factories or think governments
should run like businesses.
, “Ignorance is our predator: it devours our organizations by ignoring their differences.”
His goal: to give readers a richer vocabulary and typology to understand organizational
species.
6. From Fives to Sevens
Mintzberg revisits his earlier works:
The Structuring of Organizations (1979)
Structure in Fives (1983)
These identified five forms of organization, but now, after decades of research, he extends
this to seven forms and seven forces — hence Structuring in Sevens.
Why Seven?
He humorously references psychology and symbolism:
The number seven symbolizes completeness (seven days of the week, seven wonders
of the world).
People can cognitively process about seven “chunks” of information — enough to
remember, but not overwhelming.
Thus, seven is both manageable and comprehensive for understanding organizations.
7. Introducing the Book’s Structure
Mintzberg outlines the seven parts of the book and how they connect:
Content
Part Focus
Summary
I. Re-viewing the Understanding decision-making, strategy, and
Organization management as art, craft, and science.
II. Building Blocks The elements that make up organizational design.
III. Four Fundamental Personal, Programmed, Professional, and Project
Forms organizations.
Consolidation, Efficiency, Proficiency, and
IV. Four Basic Forces
Collaboration.
V. Three Additional
Divisional Form, Community Ship, Political Arena.
Forms
VI. Weaving Forces How the forces interact to shape and stabilize
Through Forms organizations.
Improve processes in a health service delivery organization
HIM0001
,Learning community meeting 1:
Understanding Organizations… Finally!: Structuring in
Sevens.
Henry Mintzberg (2023),
Chapter 1: “Our World of Organizations”
Overview
Mintzberg opens the book by showing that we live entirely surrounded by organizations —
from hospitals and schools to companies, governments, and NGOs. He asks:
“We are educated, employed, entertained, and exasperated by organizations — yet what do
we really understand about them?”
Chapter 1 introduces the central motivation of the book: to provide a way of truly
understanding how organizations function, differ, and can be structured effectively.
1. The Omnipresence of Organizations
Mintzberg illustrates that in a single day, we interact with numerous organizations — tech
companies, food producers, schools, transport, banks, gyms, and media outlets.
From birth to death, people live within an “ecosystem of organizations.”
Despite this, there’s a gap in understanding between personal self-awareness (self-help
literature) and macroeconomics — the “middle ground” of how organizations actually work.
Hence the book’s goal: to make sense of organizations, finally.
2. What Is an Organization?
Mintzberg poses a childlike question: “What is a Google anyway? And how can an
organization be an Apple?”
He points out how abstract the concept of an organization really is — we can’t “see” an
organization as we can see a building or product.
He offers two definitions:
Organization: Collective action structured for the pursuit of a common mission.
→ In simple terms: people working together in a formal arrangement to achieve
something.
Structure: The pattern of relationships designed to enable that collective action.
He then introduces Figure 1.1, which maps organizations by sector:
Public sector: governments, departments, ministries, agencies
, Private sector: companies, corporations, family businesses
Plural (community) sector: NGOs, charities, cooperatives, associations
These sectors represent three pillars of society: the economic, the political, and the
social/community spheres.
3. The “One Best Way” Fallacy
Mintzberg critiques Frederick Taylor’s 1911 Scientific Management — the “one best way”
approach.
Taylor’s idea that every organization could be managed the same way (using measurement
and control) is, according to Mintzberg, the “one worst way” to manage organizations.
“Believing there is one best way to structure organizations is the worst way to manage
them.”
He humorously illustrates this through “The Efficient Orchestra” story — a business student
recommends cutting violinists, updating centuries-old instruments, and rounding musical
notes to increase “efficiency.”
The absurdity underscores that different organizations (like orchestras and factories) have
fundamentally different purposes and dynamics.
4. Diversity and Complexity of Organizations
Mintzberg celebrates the variety of organizations:
Biggest: e.g., the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) — vast but overly bureaucratic.
Smallest: a two-manager tag-label company that still manages to create its own
bureaucracy.
Strangest: odd associations like the Flying Funeral Directors of America.
Most common: restaurants — which range from fast food to haute cuisine.
The point: no single model can fit all.
Even similar types (e.g., restaurants) require very different structures.
5. “Organization No-Speak”
Mintzberg compares our limited organizational vocabulary to two biologists who only know
the word mammal — one studies bears, the other beavers, and they argue because they lack
words for specific species.
Similarly, most people talk about organizations in general terms, without distinguishing
between their types.
This ignorance causes confusion — we mistake orchestras for factories or think governments
should run like businesses.
, “Ignorance is our predator: it devours our organizations by ignoring their differences.”
His goal: to give readers a richer vocabulary and typology to understand organizational
species.
6. From Fives to Sevens
Mintzberg revisits his earlier works:
The Structuring of Organizations (1979)
Structure in Fives (1983)
These identified five forms of organization, but now, after decades of research, he extends
this to seven forms and seven forces — hence Structuring in Sevens.
Why Seven?
He humorously references psychology and symbolism:
The number seven symbolizes completeness (seven days of the week, seven wonders
of the world).
People can cognitively process about seven “chunks” of information — enough to
remember, but not overwhelming.
Thus, seven is both manageable and comprehensive for understanding organizations.
7. Introducing the Book’s Structure
Mintzberg outlines the seven parts of the book and how they connect:
Content
Part Focus
Summary
I. Re-viewing the Understanding decision-making, strategy, and
Organization management as art, craft, and science.
II. Building Blocks The elements that make up organizational design.
III. Four Fundamental Personal, Programmed, Professional, and Project
Forms organizations.
Consolidation, Efficiency, Proficiency, and
IV. Four Basic Forces
Collaboration.
V. Three Additional
Divisional Form, Community Ship, Political Arena.
Forms
VI. Weaving Forces How the forces interact to shape and stabilize
Through Forms organizations.
