Organizational performance comprises the actual
output or results of an organization as measured against its intended outputs
(or goals and objectives).
Specialists in many fields are concerned with organizational performance
including strategic planners, operations, finance, legal, and organizational
development.
In recent years, many organizations have attempted to manage organizational
performance using the balanced scorecard methodology where performance is
tracked and measured in multiple dimensions such as:
- financial performance (e.g. shareholder return) - customer service - social
responsibility (e.g. corporate citizenship, community outreach) - employee
stewardship
ERGONOMICS
Ergonomics (or human factors) is the application of scientific information
concerning humans to the design of objects, systems and environment for human
use. Ergonomics is commonly thought of as how companies design tasks and work
areas to maximize the efficiency and quality of their employees’ work. However,
ergonomics comes into everything which involves people. Work systems, sports and
leisure, health and safety should all embody ergonomics principles if well
designed.
It is the applied science of equipment design intended to maximize productivity
by reducing operator fatigue and discomfort. The field is also called
biotechnology, human engineering, and human factors engineering.
Ergonomic research is primarily performed by ergonomists who study human
capabilities in relationship to their work demands. Information derived from
ergonomists contributes to the design and evaluation of tasks, jobs, products,
environments and systems in order to make them compatible with the needs,
abilities and limitations of people.
CROSS-FUNCTIONAL TEAM
In business, a cross-functional team is a group of people with different
functional expertise working toward a common goal. It may include people from
finance, marketing, operations, and human resources departments. Typically, it
includes employees from all levels of an organization. Members may also come
from outside an organization (in particular, from suppliers, key customers, or
consultants).
Cross-functional teams often function as self-directed teams responding to
broad, but not specific directives. Decision-making within a team may depend on
consensus, but often is led by a manager/coach/team leader.
A non-business, yet good example of cross-functional teams are music bands,
where each element plays a different instrument (or has a different role). Songs
are the result of collaboration and participation, and the goals are decided by
consensus. Skills to play all the instruments involved are not required since
music provides a standard language that everybody in the team can understand. In
short, music bands are clear examples of how these teams work.
Organizational consequences of cross-functional teams
The growth of self-directed cross-functional teams has influenced
decision-making processes and organizational structures. Although management
theory likes to propound that every type of organizational structure needs to
make strategic, tactical, and operational decisions, new procedures have started
to emerge that work best with teams.
1) Less unidirectional - Up until recently, decision making flowed in one
direction. Overall corporate-level objectives drove strategic business unit (SBU)
objectives, and these in turn, drove functional level objectives. Today,
organizations have flatter structures, companies diversify less, and functional
departments have started to become less well-defined. The rise of self-directed
teams reflects these trends. Intra-team dynamics tend to become
multi-directional rather than hierarchical. Interactive processes encourage
consensus within teams. Also the directives given to the team tend to become
more general and less prescribed.
2) Greater scope of information - Cross-functional teams require a wide range of
information to reach their decisions. They need to draw on information from all
parts of an organization’s information base. This includes information from all
functional departments. System integration becomes important because it makes
all information accessible through a single interface.
3) Greater depth of information - Cross-functional teams require information
from all levels of management. The teams may have their origins in the perceived
need to make primarily strategic decisions, tactical decisions, or operational
decisions, but they will require all three types of information. Almost all
self-directed teams will need information traditionally used in strategic,
tactical, and operational decisions. For example, new product development
traditionally ranks as a tactical procedure. It gets strategic direction from
top management, and uses operational departments like engineering and marketing
to perform its task. But a new product development team would consist of people
from the operational departments and often someone from top management.
In many cases, the team would make unstructured strategic decisions -- such as
what markets to compete in, what new production technologies to invest in, and
what return on investment to require; tactical decisions like whether to build a
prototype, whether to concept-test, whether to test-market, and how much to
produce; and structured operational decisions like production scheduling,
inventory purchases, and media flightings. In other cases, the team would
confine itself to tactical and operational decisions. In either case it would
need information associated with all three levels.
4) Greater range of users - Cross-functional teams consist of people from many
parts of an organization. Information must take a form that all users
understand. Not only engineers use technical data and not only accountants use
financial data and not only human resources personnel use HR data. Modern
organizations lack middle managers to combine, sort, and prioritize the data.
Technical, financial, marketing, and all other types of information must come in
a form that all members of a cross-functional team can understand. This involves
reducing the amount of specialized jargon, sorting information based on
importance, hiding complex statistical procedures from the users, giving
interpretations of results, and providing clear explanations of difficult
concepts. Slicing and dicing techniques may prove useful in providing different
views of the information to different users. Data visualization systems can
present complex results in an intuitive manner.
5) Less teleological - Since the publication of Peter Drucker’s views on
"Management by Objectives", business decision-making has become more
goal-oriented. Managers have come to view decision-making generally, and
strategic thinking in particular, as a multi-stage process that starts with an
assessment of the current situation, determines objectives, then determines how
to reach these objectives. Management by objectives took this basic scheme and
applied it to virtually all significant decisions. Today many firms have started
to opt for a less structured, more interactive approach. One way of implementing
this involves using self-directed cross-functional teams. Proponents hope that
these teams will develop strategies that will re-define industries and create
new “best practices”. They feel that mere incremental improvements do not
suffice. Cross-functional teams, using unstructured techniques and searching for
revolutionary competitive advantages, allegedly require information systems
featuring increased interactivity, more flexibility, and the capability of
dealing with fuzzy logic. Artificial intelligence holds out the promise of one
day proving useful in this regard.
JARGON
Jargon is terminology that relates to a specific activity, profession or group.
Much like slang it develops as a kind of shorthand, to quickly express ideas
that are frequently discussed between members of a group. In many cases a
standard term may be given a more precise or specialized usage among
practicioners of a field.
Uses of Jargon
Jargon is used in several fields:
• Sports: One can find jargon just by watching a major league baseball
broadcast, where commentators compete for the greatest density of technical
sport terms and other sport-related metaphors.
• Medicine: Particularly in the operating room or under emergency conditions,
particular jargons have developed that allow medical professionals to
communicate quickly and effectively where common language would take much
longer. This kind of jargon is also known as technical terminology.
• Information Technology and the Internet: Computer and programming jargons used
by computer scientists, programmers, system architects, enthusiasts and hackers
to communicate. The proper usage of these words is a sometimes considered
prerequisite for inclusion in these groups (leetspeak).
• Nautical Terms, a good example of an ancient form of jargon.
• Jargon specific to the European Union, particularly its administration.
Pitfalls of Jargon
In some cases it is used to distinguish those belonging to a group from those
who are not. This is sometimes called "guild" or "insider" jargon. Those
unfamiliar with a subject can often be tagged by their incorrect use of jargon.
The use of jargon by outsiders is considered by insiders to be audacious, since
it constitutes a claim to membership of the insider group. Conversely, since
outsiders may not see the reference made via jargon, they are all the more
sensitive to its more visible elitist social framing. Jargon often comes across
as pedantic, nerdy, and divorced from meaning to outsiders