I'm a masters student at ucd here in ireland. My thesis has come to a halt
at the moment as i am having trouble operationalising my research
question: According to Henry Mintzberg in times of change a machine
bureaucracy may require a radical shift in direction, which can be occur
in two ways. Either a visionary leader emerges to both formulate and
implement the new direction or a bottom-up process, where the implementors
of the previous strategy are allowed to formulate the new direction,
occurs. Thus those with the pertinent information are allowed set the new
direction for the company, using the knowledge embedded at the lower
levels of an organisation. Mintzberg calls this learning as the dichotomy
between formulation and implenemtation is collapsed. However this is far
removed from the concepts of learning espoused by Senge, Argyris, Schon,
Slocum,Lei among others. They have an all-encompassing view of learning as
it relates to the higher order needs of mankind. Is it possible to
reconcile these together or are their outlooks totally different?
Ideally i wish to examine a bureaucracy where radical change has occured
and see whether people at the bottom had an impact on the new direction.
Bureaucracies are constructed to work from the top down, is it possible to
work from the bottom up?
Any comment or suggestions would be most welcome, as i have reached an
stalemate situation.
James Gerard Coughlan. B.Comm
MBS,(SMP)
E-Mail: ftmbs-15@carraig.ucd.ie
--gerard coughlan <ftmbs-15@carraig.ucd.ie>
Learning-org -- An Internet Dialog on Learning Organizations For info: <rkarash@karash.com> -or- <http://world.std.com/~lo/>