Vertical Organizational Structure: This vertical organizational structure is reinforced by centrifugal forces that create decentralization and locate governance, responsibility, and resources peripherally, rather than centrally; funding models in many institutions base the allocation of resources on credit hours, which drives money into individual schools based on student enrollments in courses (Ehrenberg 2000). Schools within larger institutions compete with each other for scarce resources and almost inevitably, and often by necessity, promote their own interests rather than those of the university at large. Centralized components of the institution--such as most student affairs offices, programs, and services--may struggle for resources in this context. In these vertically organized institutions, there are important (and essential) horizontal forces; similarly, given the centrifugal, decentralized nature of decision making and resource allocation, there are nonetheless certain centripetal forces that pull some decision making, governance, and control to the center of the institution (Bourg Ault and Lapeer 2000; Kuh 1996; Mint berg 1979). Notable horizontal forces include, of course, central administration (which may or may not have significant power; the extent to which power is centralized is directly related to how resources are allocated and managed), institutional accreditation, overall financial management, and certain levels of policy. But development, alumni relations, communications and marketing, enrollment management, and other core institutional functions are often performed to a greater or lesser extent by individual schools as well as by the institution as a whole. Similarly, central funding and policy development are centripetal forces--but the strength of those forces varies by institutional type, history, culture, and perceptions of the need for public accountability. Horizontal Organizational Structure: Horizontal organization (also known as flat organization) refers to an organizational structure with few or no levels of intervening management between staff and managers. The idea is that well-trained workers will be more productive when they are more directly involved in the decision making process, rather than closely supervised by many layers of management. This structure is generally possible only in smaller organizations or individual units within larger organizations. When they reach a critical size, organizations can retain a streamlined structure but cannot keep a completely flat manager-to-staff relationship without impacting productivity. Certain financial responsibilities may also require a more conventional structure. Some theorize that flat organizations become more traditionally hierarchical when they begin to be geared towards productivity. The horizontal organization model promotes employee involvement through a decentralized decision making process. By elevating the level of responsibility of baseline employees, and by eliminating layers of middle management, comments and feedback reach all personnel involved in decisions more quickly. Expected response to customer feedback can thus become more rapid. Since the interaction between workers is more frequent, this organizational structure generally depends upon a much more personal relationship between workers and managers. Hence the structure can be more time-consuming to build than a traditional bureaucratic/hierarchical model. Organizational Interaction: A company's business must be organized. People are hired, some of which are contracted. Then there is a distinction between normal business and special projects. The latter brings additional resources management challenges. If the project is about implementing a large system that consists of component that has different suppliers, the project requires: system integration. System integration is a technical term for an organizational problem. The problem is about managing a solution that cannot be offered by only one party. This problem will occur more and more as companies are forced by the markets to focus on a single "trick." This is a world of specializations and that brings new challenges with it: integration of systems or integration of solutions offered by different stakeholders in one and the same project. The challenge is therefore to align the contributions of the various parties involved. This requires first of all scoping sessions: Scoping is about setting the boundaries of what everybody delivers: "I do this and only this." Scoping is not enough, because when parties limit their result, the overall result will never be covered. First there is the problem of interfacing - what component will connect with what - and then there is the problem of compatibility; some systems do not seem to be completely compatible with others. Standardization will solve this and this requires a central approach. This last point shows one of the main organizational challenges: some work requires a central approach; other activities can be performed locally. When more effort is put to a central steering the project may be unnecessarily delayed. If too much work is left to the local contributors, conflicts may arise. Typical centralized activities are: presentations and overviews of the big picture required standardization, a minimal set Overall project management alignment of scopes overall project communication Typical local or decentralized activities: individual project management and execution individual scoping signaling of issues Another issue is the design of the contract in subcontracts. Normally a large player will accept the whole project and will contract other parties. The risk of this approach is that the business sponsor (who is responsible for the overall result) is not completely informed. An independent advisor could support the sponsor in taking the right decisions. Another construction is possible where the project sponsor is responsible for the integration; in this way the company relies on internal project managers to manage the overall project. The main challenge in either configuration is the management of "what is missing." This is about making sure that the whole is more than the individual contributions.
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