OS ch. 1

26 flashcards · Other · by Daniel F.

1. Organization

   A tool people use to coordinate their actions to obtain something they desire or value.

2. Entrepreneurship

   The process by which people recognize opportunities to satisfy needs and then gather and use resources to meet those needs.

3. How does an organization create value?

   input, conversion, output

4. Why do organizations exists?

   1. To increase specialization and the division of labour 2. To use large-scale technology 3. To manage the organizational environment 4. To economize on transaction costs 5. To exert power and control

5. economies of scale

   Cost savings that result when goods and services are produced in large volume on automated production lines.

6. Economies of scope

   Cost savings that result when an organization is able to use underutilized resources more effectively because they can be shared across different products or tasks.

7. Transaction costs

   The costs associated with negotiating, monitoring and governing exchanges between people.

8. Organizational theory

   The study of how organizations function and how they affect and are affected by the environment in which they operate.

9. Organizational structure

   The formal system of task and authority relationships that control how people coordinate their actions and use resources to achieve organizational goals.

10. Organizational culture

    The set of shared values and norms that controls organizational members' interactions with each other and with suppliers, customers and other people outside the organization.

11. Organizational design

    The process by which managers select and manage aspects of structure and culture so that an organization can control the activities necessary to achieve its goals.

12. Organizational change

    The process by which organizations redesign their structures and cultures to move from present state to some desired future state to increase their effectiveness.

13. Core competences

    Managers' skills and abilities in value-creating activities. Core competences allow a company to develop a strategy to outperform competitors and produce better products, or produce the same products but at a lower cots.

14. Strategy

    The specific pattern of decisions and actions that managers take to use core competences to achieve a competitive advantage and outperform competitors.

15. How do managers measure organizational effectiveness?

    Control, Innovation, Efficiency

16. Organizational effectiveness - Control

    Having control over the external environment and having the ability to attract resources and customers.

17. organizational effectiveness - Innovation

    Developing an organization's skills and capabilities so the organization can discover new products and processes. It also means designing and creating new organizational structures and cultures that enhance a company's ability to change, adapt and improve the way it functions.

18. organizational effectiveness - Efficiency

    Developing modern production facilities using new information technologies that can produce and distribute a company's products in a timely and cost-effective manner. It also means introducing techniques like internet-based information systems, total quality management and just-in-time inventory systems to improve productivity.

19. External resource approach

    External resource approach: A method managers use to evaluate how effectively an organization manages and controls its external environment.

20. Internal systems approach

    A method that allows managers to evaluate how effectively an organization functions and resources operate.

21. Technical approach

    a method managers use to evaluate how efficiently an organization can convert some fixed amount of organizational resources into finished goods and services

22. Official goals

    Guiding principles that the organization formally states in its annual report and in other public documents

23. Mission

    Goals that explain why the organization exists and what it should be doing.

24. Operative goals

    Specific long-term and short-term goals that guide managers and employees as they perform the work of the organization.

25. Competitive advantage

    The ability of one company to outperform another because its managers are able to create more value from the resources at their disposal.

26. Contingency

    An event that might occur and must be planned for.