Top employer awards: A double-edged sword?

Organizations often use top employer awards to confirm their quality as employers via an independent third party. At first, the advantages of using awards seem apparent, such as giving the organization an edge in recruitment by increasing the organizational attractiveness for jobseekers. Possible disadvantages accompanying the use of awards have received little attention. We argue that awards can cause potential applicants to pay less attention to information provided in recruitment materials that allow them to assess their organizational fit. Therefore, we investigated the influence of awards on the relationship between person–organization fit and attraction to organization as well as application decision. We include the corporate brand awareness (unknown vs. well-known) as a boundary condition. The results of our experiment show that, while awards increase organizational attractiveness, they also reduce the effect of person–organization fit on organizational attractiveness in the case of well-known organizations. Moreover, we found that awards indirectly affect application decision in the same way. Hence, successful self-selection based on fit is disturbed in this situation. Consequently, the quality of the applicant pool is reduced, resulting in a disadvantage for the well-known recruiting organization. Contrary to expectations, unknown organizations do not appear to be affected by this downside and instead benefit from awards. Our study contributes to the literature in recruiting by focusing on how awards change the impact of other information, while also highlighting potential disadvantages of employer awards.     

组织学习对员工—组织匹配的影响——知识惯性调节作用的实证研究

本文实证研究组织学习对员工—组织匹配的影响及知识惯性的调节作用。研究发现学习承诺、分享愿景和开放心智对一致性匹配和互补性匹配具有显著正向影响;经验惯性和学习惯性在学习承诺、分享愿景和开放心智对一致性匹配的影响有负向调节作用。     

Provider satisfaction: an analysis based on expectation

Provider organizations will need to be in closer touch with their medical staffs in order to successfully anticipate and react to the many changes that lie ahead in the financing and delivery of health care services. This will mean understanding both physicians feelings and expectations. If you were asked today how satisfied your physicians are with your HMO, what would be your reply? How would you know? This staff-model HMO conducted a formal survey of its physicians to determine their expectations of the organization and their level of satisfaction with their work and environment. Such a tool is recommended for others interested in maintaining good relations with their physicians.     

Imitate Others? Not if We Have the Chance: Competitive Differentiation in Medical Malpractice Insurers' Pricing Decisions under Uncertainty

Several perspectives assert that organizations facing uncertainty tend to imitate other organizations' actions. While one might therefore expect to see great homogeneity across fields characterized by uncertainty, it is surprising that this homogeneity has not been observed more frequently in practice. Research investigating this puzzle has typically focused on the role played by organizational characteristics or the information organizations possess about their environments. Instead, this study turns attention to the information others possess about the organization. To that end, I disaggregate organizational uncertainty into the uncertainty facing decision makers and the uncertainty faced by others about what those decision makers might ultimately do, providing a more fine grained analysis of uncertainty and its impact on competitive action than typically offered in this literature. I suggest that uncertainty in competitors' evaluations of the organization provides an opportunity for the organization to differentiate itself rather than imitate others. I also suggest that this effect is stronger than the effects of the uncertainty facing the decision makers themselves. Related hypotheses are tested on a panel of medical malpractice insurance providers. The study's perspective generates unique predictions regarding imitation and differentiation in this industry and across other contexts featuring both uncertainty and competition.     

Resolving conflicts: principles and practice

Physicians and other medical professionals undergo extensive professional training for the privilege of obtaining their professional licenses. For most physicians, clinical training is conducted in extremely competitive circumstances. Many physicians endorse competition as an appropriate method for producing greater individual and collective competence within the profession. Competition, however, is a very limited way to resolve conflicts. And, in the current environment of greater resource restrictions and reform, the competitive model, at best, seems short-sighted. Many of the current relationships involving physicians and others are transitional, involving various partners in numerous practice and professional relationships. For example, medical practices are merging; hospitals are engaging physicians in numerous business structures, even employment. However, longer term relationships are enhanced by mutual respect and collaboration, rather than chronic competition to "win" one's rights over another. Thus, the need among physicians to enhance their conflict resolution skills is expanded in today's environment.     

Models for medical practice integration

Decreased physician income, increased administrative burdens, and interference with the compassionate delivery of high-quality medical care are threatening the independent practice of medicine in solo and small group practices. Many established physicians, and the hospitals with which they relate, are searching for organizational models that, by integrating some or all aspects of their practices, will preserve incomes and reduce regulatory and administrative burdens. This article will describe several "practice integration models," pointing out advantages and disadvantages to physicians in established practices. (Many of the same arguments could be made for physicians new to practice, with different emphasis). The continuum of integration models is shown in figure 1, page 19. The group practice without walls and its two submodels, the independent group practice without walls (IGWW) and the affiliated medical practice corporation (AMPC) are more recent and more effective models and will be covered in depth in the article.     

Success and Failure of MRP II Implementation

This paper assesses the reasons for the success or failure of manufacturing resource planning (MRPII) implementation projects. It begins by discussing the literature and research on success and failure of these systems and presents evidence from cases prepared by the authors. The paper is not concerned to prescribe ‘best practice’ for MRP implementation. The first section reviews the relevant literature and concludes that there is a divergence of opinion as to what constitutes success, raising questions on the usefulness of current methods of establishing whether implementation is successful. The latter section of the paper uses results from longitudinal (process) research carried out by the authors. This starts with a discussion of what counts for success. The discussion highlights the importance of understanding the full potential of MRPII in effecting change of organizational structures, cultures and practice. Several factors that contribute towards MRPII failure are next considered. Finally,‘big bang’style implementations, such as those recommended by the Ollie Wight organization, are most likely to be successful if the organization follows a strategic approach to planning. There also needs to be a high degree of fit between organizational structure, culture and the demands of the MRPII system.     

A comparison of quality and utilization problems in large and small group practices

Physicians practicing in large, multispecialty medical groups share an organizational culture that differs from that of physicians in small or independent practices. Since 1980, there has been a sharp increase in the size of multispecialty group practice organizations, in part because of increased efficiencies of large group practices. The greater number of physicians and support personnel in a large group practice also requires a relatively more sophisticated management structure. The efficiencies, conveniences, and management structure of a large group practice provide an optimal environment to practice medicine. However, a search of the literature found no data linking a large group practice environment to practice outcomes. The purpose of the study reported in this article was to determine if physicians in large practices have fewer quality and utilization problems than physicians in small or independent practices.     

The physician exodus from hospitals

Physicians are spending increasingly less of their work week in the hospital. This is true of surgeons because they are performing more ambulatory surgery, often off the hospital premises, and for primary care physicians because they are delegating hospital care of their patients to others. What are the effects of this physician exodus on hospitals, patients, physicians, and medical education? Some of these consequences are explored, from disruptions in the continuity of care, to increase in practice productivity, to preparing undergraduates for the realities of medical practice.     

Compensation for elected hospital medical staff leadership

As physicians' practices become more complex and their practice incomes more difficult to maintain, hospitals concurrently require more physician input into organizational, utilization, and strategic planning matters. Physicians and hospitals across the country are discussing the question of financial compensation to physicians for the time they spend performing these hospital administrative tasks. It is already common practice for hospitals to pay a salary for medical direction of hospital departments such as intensive care units or pulmonary laboratories. The question has become whether this practice should be extended to elected medical staff leadership.     

Organizational disidentification and change-oriented citizenship behavior

This study proposes that the extent to which employees have disidentified with their organization might reduce the likelihood that they undertake change-oriented citizenship behavior, though this negative link might be buffered by employees’ access to two personal resources (self-enhancement motive and benevolence) and two contextual resources (citizenship climate and job involvement). To test these theoretical predictions, the study gathers survey data from employees in the telecommunications sector in Canada. The results show that prior organizational disidentification curtails voluntary efforts to improve current organizational practices, but this effect is weaker when employees (1) find it important to make a good impression on others, (2) are benevolent toward others, (3) perceive that their organization encourages voluntary efforts, and (4) are highly involved with their jobs. These four factors accordingly diminish the risk that the extent to which employees have cognitively separated from their employer escalates into a reluctance to add to organizational effectiveness on a voluntary basis.     

The new breed

Structural changes within the health system--particularly in the organization and financing of services--have made new and different opportunities available to physicians interested in management. What types of physicians are currently going into management? How do they compare to others who have been in management for a longer period of time and to the "traditional" portrait of the physician executive? The author profiles the emerging, contemporary physician executive and explores the implications for the viability of the field of medical management as a whole.     

Medical practice in large-scale organizations.

The traditional role of the physician as the principle resource allocator in the health care system is rapidly giving way to a shared decision-making. As more and more physicians practice in large organizational settings, an adversarial relationship is developing that affects both the quality of care and the efficiency of medical practice.     

The Use of Anthropomorphizing as a Tool for Generating Organizational Theories

Abstract

Despite admonishments that anthropomorphizing represents a serious error in scientific thinking, this review shows that anthropomorphizing has been a critically important tool for developing influential theories in organization studies. Analyzing the literatures related to organizational identity and organizational knowledge reveals how organization theorists build on their rich and highly accessible understanding of humans (i.e. the self and others) to (1) make guesses and sense of organizational anomalies, (2) articulate theoretical mechanisms to build stronger theories, and (3) create plausible stories that facilitate sensegiving. Our review shows how some theorists by using particular approaches were able to use anthropomorphizing to generate new organizational theories, yet anthropomorphizing does not always lead to such salutary outcomes. Anthropomorphizing is less likely to enhance theorizing in organization studies when the theorist does not sufficiently doubt their guesses about organizational phenomena, fails to develop stronger explanations of the “how” and “why” of the theory thereby only partially exploring the social mechanisms underlying the proposed relationships, and fails in their attempts to tell the theory's “story”. We conclude with a discussion of the conditions under which anthropomorphizing is more or less effective.     

Presenteeism, Power and Organizational Change: Long Hours as a Career Barrier and the Impact on the Working Lives of Women Managers

This paper discusses the results from a survey on the gendered impact of organizational change and the implications for workloads and working hours. These results suggest that restructuring leads to increased workloads and that the pressure of long working hours is associated with male-dominated organizations. Restructuring is also associated with 'presenteeism' (the tendency to stay at work beyond the time needed for effective performance of the job) as fear of redundancy and uncertainty over promotion opportunities lead to a need to demonstrate visible commitment. Such presenteeism was found to be gendered: it is associated with a competitive masculine culture, it is seen by women as a form of 'male resistance' to their presence as managers and it imposes heavy costs on women as they attempt to meet the conflicting demands of work and home. This paper suggests that organizational restructuring can produce dysfunctional outcomes such as 'competitive presenteeism' (whereby managers compete over who stays longest in the office) and that such outcomes have important gender implications. It concludes that gender mix is a defining feature in how well women fit into the organization and how easily they accommodate to changes in organizational structures and managerial work.     

Work Alienation and Organizational Leadership

This study examines the extent to which a leader's behaviour (i.e. transactional and transformational styles) and aspects of an organization's structure (i.e. centralization, formalization dimensions) directly and/or indirectly relate to elements of work alienation (i.e. powerlessness, meaninglessness, self estrangement). The study utilized structural equation modeling techniques to estimate the goodness of fit of a leadership–organizational structure–work alienation model based on the responses of personnel in a major US eastern seaboard fire department (a bureaucratic, quasi–military type organization) ( n = 326). Goodness of fit statistics indicate good fit to the observed data. Results show that transformational leadership was associated with lower work alienation, whereas transactional leadership was associated with higher work alienation. Organizational structure was not significantly predictive of work alienation, but was negatively associated with transformational leadership and positively associated with transactional leadership. The significant indirect effects between organizational structure and work alienation, and between organizational structure and transformational leadership, provide further evidence that the leadership style of the organization has a more significant impact on feelings of work alienation than antecedent conditions such as organization rigidity. The study argues that managers as well as leaders need to question bureaucratic orientations to work and manager Ðemployee relations by rethinking their value orientations and adapting new models that encourage individual fulfilment, learning and personal development.     

A personal formula for motivation.

Have you ever wondered why some colleagues or subordinates are outstanding in their work while others are less so? Training and experience are extremely important factors but, by themselves, they will not ensure outstanding performance. The pivotal factor that activates all others is motivation. And underlying motivation is the fact that we all have needs that we desire to have fulfilled and that we make choices regarding the course of action or strategy to fulfill these needs. As managers, we do not typically create the "products" of the organization but rather must rely on subordinates. It is incumbent upon us to obtain from our employees desired behavior that will fulfill organizational goals. Indeed, it has been asserted that "one of the most basic responsibilities of the health service organization manager [is] motivating constructive participation of other organization members."     

Serf or citizen: physician status and organizational structure

For more than a decade, dynamic changes in the health care industry have created new organizations for physicians. The major change for physicians has not been the organization itself, but the principles by which it is governed. This fundamental shift is studied with its impact on physicians, by analogy, becoming more like serfs or more like citizens. A review of the general organizational direction and results of non-physician health care organizations is made followed by the statistical trends of physician groups. Historical comparisons of non-health care industries are made with current organizational choices of physicians and physician groups. Observations of physician decisions are made identifying the direction they send physician status along the continuum from serf to citizen. Physicians are unknowingly making decisions regarding the principles by which they will be governed in new organizations. The choices they are making give them less autonomy and less opportunity to make future choices. The seductive invitation to spend less time in administrative matters and more time practicing medicine is a siren's call that will diminish the status of physicians and the autonomy by which medicine is practiced.     

The Management of Violence in a Conflict Organization: The Case of the Abu Sayyaf

The Abu Sayyaf is an organization which has left a trail of mayhem and murder in the southern Philippines for more than a decade. It has gained international notoriety through several high profile mass kidnappings. This article looks at how the Abu Sayyaf has managed to survive and at times prosper despite the state's efforts to eradicate it. By using organizational analysis the paper demonstrates how the Abu Sayyaf has developed structures and processes which make it such a deadly force. The organization has succeeded in gaining considerable fit with the environment in which it operates.