ILRHR 6620 - Organization and Work Design

Fall or spring. 4 credits. Letter grades only.

Prerequisite: ILRHR 5600. Enrollment limited to: graduate students or senor undergraduates with permission of the instructor.

L. Dyer.

HR managers and consultants are frequently called upon to engage in organization and work design and yet often are unaware of the many options available and the key factors to consider when choosing one option over another. This course attempts to rectify the situation by examining the various models of organization design that have emerged over the years: mechanistic, organic, adhocratic, and agile, along with various hybrid forms. In all cases, attention is given to the key elements of the models and to the business imperatives and institutional forces (technology, demographics, etc.) that led to their development. In addition, consideration is given to the relative strengths and weaknesses of the models in terms of facilitating work designs that produce desired outcomes not only for organizations and their employees, but also for society more broadly. Given this background material, the course concludes by focusing on likely developments that will affect the emergence of more radical forms of organization and work designs in the years ahead. By the end of the course students should have no trouble crafting designs that are both suitable for incipient circumstances and effective in producing desired results.