Preface
Summary
In writing this book, we had specific readers in mind. We dedicate this book to our executive students at The Fuqua School of Business and at the Aarhus School of Business, Denmark. Executive students are very special professionals who come from around the world and bring their varied experience. They have a goal to acquire new knowledge to act and take decisions that will make a difference in their world. In particular, they want to improve the performance of their firm, unit, or organization. From our first detailed outline to the final editing from Cary, Durham, and Aarhus – whether in person, video conference or elaborate email – they were ever with us.
Experience and science are two great teachers. Most of us spend most of our time in organizations at work, home, worship and leisure. Over time, we amass a wealth of experience through observation and action to apply in the design of organizations; simply, we use our experience to design. But this experience is limited and we can enhance it by blending it with the science of organization design. The science of organization design is an accumulation of knowledge by many individuals who, over many years, have conducted research on the performance of organizations under many conditions. It informs us about how to take action to design an organization. The scientific foundation of this book comes from almost a century of research we call the multi-contingency approach of Organizational Design.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Organizational DesignA Step-by-Step Approach, pp. xiii - xivPublisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2006