3078.1.1 : Designing Effective Organizations
The graduate explains how the structure of an organization impacts its effectiveness in the context of critical circumstances.
Today’s business environment requires leaders to have competency in designing organizations to effectively achieve strategic goals. In this task, you will choose an organizational structure that will positively affect a consulting firm’s ability to effectively achieve goals and explain your choice in relation to the four factors that affect organizational design. You will also be asked to evaluate the impact of an organizational structure on one of the consulting firm’s goals.
You have decided to create a consulting business to address increasing market needs for sustainability and innovation in the community. You want to emphasize how businesses can make incremental changes in the workplace to achieve sustainable results that increase profitability and brand reputation. The mission of the company is to “facilitate sustainable social, economic, and environmental development opportunities for the good of businesses in the community.” Your goals for this company include the following:
• Be a mission-driven, for-profit organization that will create partnerships that result in sustainable changes for the community.
• Achieve a level of success so your consulting firm can raise your city’s ranking in the “Most Sustainable and Innovative Communities” list from the top 20% of all U.S. communities to the top 10%.
• Assess the sustainability and innovation needs of 30 businesses in the local community in the first year. You will then share the results of those assessments with all business stakeholders to generate feedback that will be used to develop and implement proposals for consulting.
• Hire three university students as part-time interns to help you develop an organizational structure.
Before you design a business venture plan that includes its organizational design, you will identify how the business will generate revenue. You are interested in seeking investors in the business community who want to take a leadership role in the business and its decision-making.
You are excited about this opportunity and begin considering the organizational structure for your consulting business.
Note: Additional employees may be hired in the future.
Your submission must be your original work. No more than a combined total of 30% of the submission and no more than a 10% match to any one individual source can be directly quoted or closely paraphrased from sources, even if cited correctly. The similarity report that is provided when you submit your task can be used as a guide.
You must use the rubric to direct the creation of your submission because it provides detailed criteria that will be used to evaluate your work. Each requirement below may be evaluated by more than one rubric aspect. The rubric aspect titles may contain hyperlinks to relevant portions of the course.
Tasks may not be submitted as cloud links, such as links to Google Docs, Google Slides, OneDrive, etc., unless specified in the task requirements. All other submissions must be file types that are uploaded and submitted as attachments (e.g., .docx, .pdf, .ppt).
A. Describe the organizational structure you would choose for the consulting business in the scenario by doing the following:
1. Describe the main features of one of the following organizational structures and how this structure applies to the scenario:
• functional
• divisional
• matrix
• teams
2. Using the chosen organizational structure described in part A1, explain how each of the following four factors works within the chosen organizational structure for the consulting business in the scenario:
• functions or departments
• chain of command
• centralized or decentralized structure
• level of formality
B. Describe one of the following organizational theories, including how it can be used to support the organizational structure described in part A1:
• scientific management
• bureaucratic
• administrative
• neoclassical
• modern
• contingency/situational
C. Explain how organizational structure can impact business effectiveness by doing the following:
1. Identify one of the goals from the scenario for the consulting business.
2. Explain how the chosen organizational structure from part A1 can impact the consulting business’s ability to meet the goal identified in part C1.
D. Acknowledge sources, using in-text citations and references, for content that is quoted, paraphrased, or summarized.
E. Demonstrate professional communication in the content and presentation of your submission.
File size limit: 200 MB
File types allowed: doc, docx, rtf, xls, xlsx, ppt, pptx, odt, pdf, csv, txt, qt, mov, mpg, avi, mp3, wav, mp4, wma, flv, asf, mpeg, wmv, m4v, svg, tif, tiff, jpeg, jpg, gif, png, zip, rar, tar, 7z
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not describe the main features of a functional, divisional, matrix, or teams organizational structure. Or the submission does not explain how the selected organizational structure applies to the scenario. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission describes the main features of a functional, divisional, matrix, or teams organizational structure, but the description is inaccurate. Or the submission does not accurately describe how the selected organizational structure applies to the scenario. |
COMPETENT The submission accurately describes the main features of a functional, divisional, matrix, or teams organizational structure and accurately describes how the selected structure applies to the scenario. |
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not use the organizational structure described in part A1 to explain how the 4 given factors (i.e., functions or departments, chain of command, centralized or decentralized structure, level of formality) work within the chosen organizational structure for the consulting business in the scenario. Or 1 or more of the given factors are missing. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission uses the organizational structure described in part A1 to explain how the 4 given factors (i.e., functions or departments, chain of command, centralized or decentralized structure, level of formality) work within the chosen organizational structure for the consulting business in the scenario, but the explanation of 1 or more of the given factors is not logical. Or the explanation does not accurately explain how 1 or more of the given factors work within the selected organizational structure for the consulting business in the scenario. |
COMPETENT The submission uses the organizational structure described in part A1 to logically and accurately explain how each of the 4 given factors (i.e., functions or departments, chain of command, centralized or decentralized structure, level of formality) works within the chosen organizational structure for the consulting business in the scenario. |
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not describe 1 of the given organizational theories (i.e., scientific management, bureaucratic, administrative, neoclassical, modern, contingency/situational) or does not include how the theory can be used to support the organizational structure described in part A1. Or the submission does neither of these. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission describes 1 of the given organizational theories (i.e., scientific management, bureaucratic, administrative, neoclassical, modern, contingency/situational), including how the theory can be used to support the organizational structure described in part A1, but the description of the organizational theory is inaccurate, or it is unclear how this theory can be used to support the organizational structure described in part A1. |
COMPETENT The submission accurately describes 1 of the given organizational theories (i.e., scientific management, bureaucratic, administrative, neoclassical, modern, contingency/situational), including a clear description of how this theory can be used to support the organizational structure described in part A1. |
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not identify 1 goal for the consulting business. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission identifies 1 goal for the consulting business, but the goal is not from the scenario. |
COMPETENT The submission identifies 1 of the goals from the scenario for the consulting business. |
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not explain how the organizational structure described in part A1 can impact the consulting business’s ability to meet the goal in part C1. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission explains how the organizational structure described in part A1 can impact the consulting business’s ability to meet the goal in part C1, but the explanation is not clear, contains inaccuracies, or omits required information. |
COMPETENT The submission clearly and accurately explains how the organizational structure described in part A1 can impact the consulting business’s ability to meet the goal identified in part C1. |
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NOT EVIDENT The submission does not include both in-text citations and a reference list for sources that are quoted, paraphrased, or summarized. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE The submission includes in-text citations for sources that are quoted, paraphrased, or summarized and a reference list; however, the citations or reference list is incomplete or inaccurate. |
COMPETENT The submission includes in-text citations for sources that are properly quoted, paraphrased, or summarized and a reference list that accurately identifies the author, date, title, and source location as available. |
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NOT EVIDENT Content is unstructured, is disjointed, or contains pervasive errors in mechanics, usage, or grammar. Vocabulary or tone is unprofessional or distracts from the topic. |
APPROACHING COMPETENCE Content is poorly organized, is difficult to follow, or contains errors in mechanics, usage, or grammar that cause confusion. Terminology is misused or ineffective. |
COMPETENT Content reflects attention to detail, is organized, and focuses on the main ideas as prescribed in the task or chosen by the candidate. Terminology is pertinent, is used correctly, and effectively conveys the intended meaning. Mechanics, usage, and grammar promote accurate interpretation and understanding. |