provisionally approved 6/6/02

ORGANIZATIONAL DYNAMICS

Level II

RATIONALE:  We spend most of our lives interacting with and being part of organizations.  Our employment typically is within organizations, as is our schooling.  We get together with neighbors to set up a crime watch or clean-up campaign.  Almost any grouping that has specific goals and sets up rules to achieve those goals is an organization. There are many different types of organizations, ranging from bureaucracies and businesses to small groups that organize activities for children in a neighborhood.  Organizations can be large or small, complex or simple, stable or shaky—and anything in between.  Organizations evolve specific structures, depending on their goals, mission, values, membership, type of accountability, and the environments in which they operate.  Given particular goals, organizations develop processes and styles of leadership for achieving them.  With an understanding of organizational dynamics, one can more competently plan, organize, and act as an effective change agent to make organizations more responsive to the needs of workers, other stakeholders, and the communities in which they are located.

COMPETENCY:  Can demonstrate basic understanding of an organization, including its type, structures, decision-making processes, environment, and leadership style.

CRITERIA:

1.      Select an organization and describe its mission and main activities.

2.      Describe the organizational structure.

3.      Describe how work is organized.

4.      Describe the decision-making process and leadership style within the organization. 

5.      Describe the environment in which the organization is located.

6.      Discuss how size, structure, environment, decision-making, and leadership style may impact the organization for workers and other stakeholders.

PORTFOLIO LINKS:  You are expected to use the Writing Portfolio criteria and standards as guidelines for the written products required by this competency. Papers written for this competency may be considered for submission to the Writing Portfolio.

STANDARDS:

1.      For Criterion 1, a faculty evaluator must approve the organization.  It can be an organization that you work in, or one that you select for other reasons.  In describing the organization include:

a.       its mission

b.      whom it serves

c.       its demographics

d.      changes over time.

2.      For Criterion 2, refer to the literature on organizational dynamics to address the following concepts:

a.       size

b.      degree of formality

c.       degree of bureaucratization

d.      type of structure

e.       type of decision-making.

f.        leadership style

g.       types of accountability

h.       grievance process

i.         stakeholder and worker representation

3.      For criterion 3, address the tasks necessary to maintain and carry out the mission of this organization.  Identify who does what specific tasks, how workers are grouped, what teams are configured.  Describe relationships between and among the tasks, individuals, and groups.  Draw and explain a functional chart.

4.      For Criterion 4, apply concepts from the organizational dynamics literature to:

a.       classify and discuss the organization’s decision-making process

b.      identify and discuss the organization’s  leadership style/s, including how it is influenced by ideology.

5.      For criterion #5, describe the community in which the organization is located or the groups and people it affiliates with. Identify obstacles and supports in the environment.

6.      For criterion 6, give specific examples of the impact as it may be seen in programs, services, quality of work life, consumer satisfaction, or policies. What are the opportunities to influence or change negative impacts?

EXAMPLES OF DEMONSTRATION:

1.      Prior Learning:  A student with prior experience as an executive within a community-based organization draws upon this experience in addressing all criteria and standards.  She includes with her papers a formal copy of her job description and a letter from the agency identifying her role.

2.      Independent Learning:  A students accepts a clerical position with the Department of Social Services (DSS), the child protective agency in Massachusetts.  He hopes to become a social worker at DSS when he completes his undergraduate degree.  After conferring with a faculty evaluator, the student interviews two social workers and two supervisors about their roles in the agency in order to learn about the agency and to help figure out if this is the career path he wants to follow.  He then analyzes the interviews, places the findings within the organizational dynamics literature, and writes papers which address the competency criteria.

3.      Course:  A student takes a CPCS course and completes the work assigned by the instructor.

4.      Field Project:  A group of students work with a professor to learn more about a youth agency that is experiencing a high level of turnover.  The students spend the semester interviewing workers and management, reviewing organizational documents, observing meetings and agency activities, and they present their findings to the agency, highlighting aspects of the culture, leadership, decision-making, structure, and environmental factors that may be the sources of tension.