Ebook Structural Redesign in an Organized Anarchy

This paper presents data from a study of planned structural redesign to challenge several assumptions underlying theories of planned change (1). First, I describe and analyze the experience at Worldwide Action for Development (WW) to establish a divisional structure based on the location of the implementation and result in unanticipated outcomes. I then consider the implications for how planned change can be handled when circumstances undermine the validity of core assumptions about how or why organizations change.

A variety of theories have been developed and tested to understand and predict processes of planned organizational change. These models have evolves from different research traditions to emphasize diagnosis (Lawrence & Lorsch, 1969; Porras, 1987), intervention (Schein, 1969; Argyris, 1970), and change management (Nadler, 1981; Beckhard & Harris, 1987). We would expect the application of a particular theory of planned change to depend upon the type of organization, the design of the change intervention, and the circumstances that initiated it. Indeed most theorists are careful to include a situational or contingent component to their models recognizing that change is a fluid process which cannot be completely blueprinted and is not easily managed (2).

Yet these techniques presuppose a manager's desire and ability to articulate an organizational purpose or mission, or the end state of some change process.