Boundaryless Organizations
In deciding issues such a distribution of authority, reporting relationships, p of control and centralization/decentralization, the structure of the organization will result. It is worth noting that the current tendency is to move to flatter organization having fewer hierarchical levels and more flexible reporting arrangements. This is what a boundaryless organization is about. As a different view of organizational structure, it is not defined by, or limited to, the boundaries imposed by a predefined structure. Boundaries in this context can be external and internal in nature.
Internal boundaries are horizontal boundaries imposed by work specialization and departmentalization and vertical boundaries that separate employees into organizational levels and hierarchies. The external boundaries are those that separate the organization from its customers, suppliers, and other stakeholders. The boundaryless organization breaks down the artificial boundaries created by a design such as departmentalization and hierarchies, and the external boundaries separating the organization from its suppliers, customers and other stakeholders.
General Electric’s former chairman, Jack Welch, coined the term boundaryless organization to describe is idea of what he wanted GE to become (Ashkenas, Ulrich, Jick and Kerr (1995). It has been called by different names since: the 21st century network organization, modular corporation, the new corporate model, the new corporate architecture or virtual corporation, to name a few. And because it relies heavily on information technology, some have turned to calling this structure the T-form (or technology-based) organization.
Industries and Organizations Suitable for a Boundaryless Organizational Structure From its foundation, more than one hundred years ago, the learning of organizations has rested on a single conjecture: that there is and/or should be a sole ‘right’ structure of organization. This ‘one-size-fits-all’ thought still keeps on until today. What is offered as the ‘one right’ business structure has altered on more than one occasion, but the exploration for the one-size-fitting-all organizations continues these days.
Probably the most suitable organization for a boundaryless organizational structure is manufacturing companies which operate on a global scale. However, it may be noted that no one structure meets all the business requirements under all conditions. It is always important to periodically evaluate the organization structure to determine whether it is still appropriate to the changing needs. The decision maker should list the strengths and weaknesses of each structural alternative and also develop business priorities for attributes such as cycle-time reduction or scale/scope of manufacturing, etc.
Then the choice of structure can be made to meet the top priorities. Advantages In recent years, many organizations have attempted to become more boundaryless by maintaining flatter structures and allowing a more free flow of communication and influence with customers and suppliers. As an example, a boundaryless organization might encourage the contracting of services across functional or product-line boundaries. With such contracting comes closer contact and natural development of customer-supplier relationships between previously separated groups.
One specific example increasingly common in recent years involves the contracting of human resource services between an HR department and other units of an organization. The boundaryless organization aims to do away with pecking order, have unlimited p of control, and substitute units with empowered teams. The breaking down of boundaries between an organization and its external customers has also caused those customers to take a more active role toward the organization and its management.
For example, in service settings that have adopted boundaryless orientations, external customers increasingly become more involved in the design and delivery of the company’s HRM practices. By taking away vertical boundaries, the management evens out the chain of command. Status and rank are minimized and becomes flexible and responsive. Another advantage is that it dissolves temporal, geographical, hierarchical, legal and economic boundaries.
The extent to which an organization has attempted to reshape its boundaries structurally toward boundarylessness coincides with the appropriateness of 360° degree feedback. For example, a flatter structure would increase the need for upward appraisals and feedback, as managers attempt to gauge the effectiveness of their leadership behaviors. Disadvantages Any discussion of the benefits or transcendence of the boundaryless organization should, however, consider the limitations and disadvantages of this new structure.
These may include lack of control due to the increase in its p, communication difficulties due to personality and cultural differences, stifling of innovation, ambiguities in the nature of relationships, asymmetric commitment, conflict in control, loss of autonomy and security, time lags, managing complexity, structural constraints, narrow managerial perspectives, manipulation and ulterior motives, mismatched or incomplete knowledge and competence, increased dependencies and so on. Also, the fact that people are motivated by different things and in different ways is something that managers are constantly conscious of.
Thus, there are times when delayering and the flattening of hierarchies can create insecurity and lower staff morale (Peters, 1992). During the process, employees usually feel that they are being stripped off their responsibilities, interpreting it as lack of trust on the part of the management. Creating a Boundaryless Organization Picot, Reichwald and Wigand (2008) observed that there have been copious cases of businesses delayering their organizational structures in recent years. According to advocates of the structure, one of the most effective ways of building responsiveness into organizations is to eliminate layers of management.
The benefits gained from delayering could be fully realized only through a number of significant accompanying organizational changes. Looking more into internal training to meet the firms’ needs, citing cost pressures to cut back on spending for occupational training and outsourcing, which pushes the costs of training lower down the supply chain, often onto small and medium size enterprises which are in no position to finance such training are a number of ways to overcoming any problems that the delayering process creates.
The managers’ and leaders’ role into this process, since they are the management people coming in closest contact with the employees, is to communicate, consult and plan on the measures that need to be taken in order for the delayering process to become beneficial to the organization as a whole.
Cross-hierarchical teams (which includes top executives, middle managers, supervisors and operative employees), participative decision-making practices, and the use of 360-degrees performance appraisals (in which peers and others above and below the employee evaluate his or her performance) are examples of what a boundaryless organization should be doing to break down vertical boundaries. Conclusion Many factors have contributed to the rise of the boundaryless organization. One is the need to respond to rapidly changing, highly competitive global markets.
Another factor is new technology, such as computers and telecommunications that permits organizations to work more effectively. Employees then have a vast amount of information at their fingertips through an intranet. This idea may sound odd, yet many of today’s most successful organizations are finding that they can operate more effectively in today’s environment by remaining flexible and unstructured: that the ideal structure for them is not having a rigid, predefined structure.
WORKS CITED Ashkenas, R. , Ulrich, D. , Jick, T. & Kerr, S. (1995). The Boundaryless Organization: Breaking the Chains of Organizational Structure. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass. Peters, T. (1992). Liberation Management: Necessary Disorganization for the Nanosecond Nineties. London: Macmillan Picot, A. , Reichwald, R. & Wigand, R. (2008). Information, Organization and Management. Berlin: Springer-Verlag.
