MediaSpace Wiki

Organizational Spr2006 Sess25

Passed out new class schedule thorugh the end of the semester.

Dialectics of Control

• Let's consider a purchasing dept.
  • Director
  • Secretary
  • Typists
  • Head of operations
  • Agents
  • Technicians
  • A set of media
    • Forms (Requisitions, Purchase orders, and others
    • Files
    • Telephone
    • Formal bid requests
    • Advertisements
    • Direct Interaction
    • And more
  • And an office layout:

• The department executes a formal process
  • Requisitions from client departments
    • Standardized forms
  • Bids from suppliers
  • Bid analysis and supplier selection
  • Finalized transactions with supplier (purchase orders)
• Process varies by price
  • < $200 by department (petty cash)
  • < $5000 by phone bid
  • < $200,000 by written bid
  • > $200,000 by published requisition
  • < $10,000 approved by operations manager
  • < $50,000 approved by director
  • > $50,000 approved by V.P.
• As a formalized system, it was known to be very inefficient
• There are several relationships here
  • Not just boss to employee
  • A status hierarchy of head complement relationships
    • Director -> head of operations -> agents -> technicians > typists
    • Director -> secretary -> all
    • Client departments -> purchasing -> suppliers
• All of this structure is about control
  • Minimizing unnecessary expenditures
  • Getting the best prices
  • Asserting status
  • Asserting control
• We have, in effect, a dialectic of control
  • The customer controls purchasing
  • Purchasing controls the customer
• How does this work?
  • Forms via internal mail
  • Routing within office
  • Signatures
  • Bid requests and responses
  • Files
  • Final resolutions
• How could it work?
  • Without computerization?
    • Direct purchasing?
  • With computers
    • Managed workflow
    • Outsourcing
• Computerizing this
  • Issue 1: Looking outside the box
    • An external set of eyes isn't trapped by existing process
    • But resentments are inevitable
  • Issue 2: What are you trying to solve
    • Improving performance versus cutting bodies
    • Dis-economies
  • Issue 3: Implementation and training
    • System complexity
    • People create shortcuts and they need ways to make them
  • Issue 4: Integrating the existing process
    • Supplier reference materials, for instance
    • Hard copy was supposed to go away in a "paperless office". It didn't
    • Rebuilding the supplier database.
      • Existing job descriptions
      • Invoking the union
  • Issue 5: Measuring success
    • Treating service organizations as profit centers
    • How do you measure productivity?
    • And what was the real problem, anyway?