FREE ESSAY ON MODERN ORGANIZATIONAL THEORY VS. IMPROVISATION

MODERN ORGANIZATIONAL THEORY VS. IMPROVISATION

Modern Organizational Theory vs. Improvisation
"Organization theory deals with the formal structure, internal working, and external
environment of complex human behavior within organizations. As a field spanning several
disciplines, it prescribes how work and workers out to be organized and attempts to
explain the actual consequences of organizational behavior (including individual
behavior) on work done and on the organization itself."(Gordon and Milkavoich, 147) It
has been evolving for centuries on how should work be done in the public administration
and how the organization should be. "Research findings have emerged about what motivates
workers and how different incentives affect various tasks, employees, and situations; and
the environments in which they operate." (Gordon and Milakovich, 147) Even with all those
research statistics and different modes of thought toward organization there are still
situations in which the rational approach to public decisions does not help. For
instance, what if the environment is instable and has no guidelines or precedents to
follow? In the case of Israel, improvisation has changed the organization of public
administrations, uprooted the conventional models for policymaking, and strayed off from
the Weberian model of administration. This kind of improvisation is the product of
"cultural and personal predilections and environmental circumstances,"(Sharkansky and
Zalmanovitch, 1) 
The use of improvisation is dependent on the culture and the environment in which policy
decisions are made. For example, the use of improvisation is found more so in Spanish
managers. Why? "Spanish mangers express an explicit preference for spontaneous,
improvised managerial style over the methodical and formal planning favored by their
American, English, and Dutch counterparts." (Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 2) Another
proponent of improvisational technique is the Israelis. Improvisation is made inevitable
in a situation where problems must be dealt with expediently and on the spur of the
moment. Taking into consideration the conflict between the Arabs and the Israelis,
improvisation is essential to running administrations. The formal theory such of Max
Weber cannot apply since its framework of rules and procedures are to ensure stability,
predictability, and reliability of performance; yet, with no stability or predictability
in the environment these theories only fall short of their expectations. Rational panning
has already been pointed out a century ago by Herbert Simon (1976) to be "bounded" by
many factors such as: "skills, habits, and reflexes, values, etc, which makes it
impossible to achieve rational planning that is suited for the situation…Moreover,
rational planning does not have primary value in Israel's cultural heritage. Survival in
the Diaspora often depended on an ability to act quickly, with limited resources, under
harsh, changing, and uncertain conditions."(Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 2) 
With endless terrorism, continuous war, and a population growth that shifts from month to
month there is the perpetual challenge to respond to each situation expediently and
ingeniously. Even with the scientific management organizational theory, the formal
structure and rules, the highly centralized top management levels, and especially the
standardizing procedures would make policy-making decisions disastrous for Israel. This
mode of organization is to increase productivity, thus profits. Yet, Israel's leadership
has to consistently "accomplish a wide variety of expensive goals with limited means.
These goals included creating the infrastructure of a modem, industrial society in an
undeveloped setting; creating a welfare state which could house, educate, and provide
employment and healthcare for successive waves of immigrants and their children; and
provide its citizens with a decent standard of living." (Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 3)
With all of these pressures to be done on an economy of scarcity, the profit idea fits
nowhere. 
Improvisation began in Israel since 1967, the day the city was united under total Israeli
control. It involved deviating Israel's formal policy to keep the peace. With the Arabs
fighting for their land back and Israel's strong willed notion to maintain all of the
land under Israeli rule, it proved to be quite a task. Not only did the government had to
improvise to ease the tension between the Arabs and the Israelis, they also had to settle
the demands of the Religious and the Secular people. To maintain a harmonious environment
the public decision makers had to improvise a way to keep the religious and secular Jews
on the same level, whereby initiating one approach to appease on group and lowering the
standard to appease the other. This could only be done with an open system in which the
organization constantly interacts with their environment to give grounds to their
decisions. This systems theory- "which holds that organizations are like biological
organisms in which they behave according to the inputs from their environment is the
modern organization theory. The modern organization theory imbibes the notion of
improvisation since it is open to feedback and is not closed to the public and is
vulnerable to the forces in the external environment." (Class notes) 
Improvisation is integral to Israel's public administration. As stated before, with all
the pressures to fulfill expectations of its people and the lack of funding it has
provided the administrators creative ways of handling the situation. Instead of following
protocols and strict chains of command, leaders are encouraged to fend for themselves in
the creative war to obtain funds. "Some have persuaded commercial banks to lend money to
their municipalities against the formal regulations on the argument that the national
government would step in to pay up if the locality seemed on the verge of bankruptcy.
Local leaders have also used crises, like terrorists attacks or a spurt in unemployment,
to demand special grants."(Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 5) 
Another public administrative job in which improvisation proved more effective is that of
sudden immigration of Russian Jews after the collapse of the Soviet Union. If Israel had
used the older version of public administrative organization it would take months to set
up budgeting, land grants, building contractors, and begin construction to integrate the
Russian Jews. By following the chain of command and following the protocols there would
not have been any housing for any of the tens of thousands immigrants pouring in monthly.
Quick action and thinking was needed with strong leadership and control. "According to
one scholar, the Russian immigration constituted a "crisis," defined as a major,
unanticipated change which urgently requires solutions "with high risks," and for which
the existing resources, laws, and procedures are inadequate. The improvisations adopted
to deal with the crisis cut constructing time in half, increased by a magnitude of four
the rate of housing construction, and produced an adequate supply of housing for
immigrants." This is yet another success story by using improvisation as the method of
organization and decision-making process.
Improvisation maximizes the discretion of decision makers, it enables them to respond
directly to problems or situations at hand, and it "provides the opportunity for inspired
evasions of the limits imposed by formal organization and the rigors of rational policy
making."(Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 7) 
It can be used in vastly different ways and to different ends-to blur and delay insoluble
conflicts, or with force and determination when quick action seems appropriate. It can
merge pro force from the inability to implement policy, or itself be the policy, as in
the case of building housing quickly for immigrants. It can be guided by an overriding
vision." (Sharkansky and Zalmanovitch, 7) 
Improvisation has the ability to arrive to conclusions or actions in an expedient and
ingenious way when there are no other alternatives available. It is a means of avoiding
stagnation. It is useful when there is uncertainty, few precedents, reliable resources or
protocols, few facts and suitable routines; "when there is little way of evaluating the
relative efficacy of the various alternatives; and when there is pressure to act in a
short time or with resources that appear to be sufficient. Modern organizational theory
can only go so far to solve public administrative problems, but with creative thinking
such as improvising more can be done for the community.