Designing Effective Organizations : Traditional and Transformational Views

This book on organization theory adopts a distinctive stance. In contrast to the traditional rational approach, it develops a transformational perspective which focuses on the organizational world as a projection of each organizational member's consciousness. While covering all the basic topics of organization theory, the author's approach reflects today's changing management paradigms.

"Takes a holistic approach that is often lost in more narrow-minded texts. Great for graduate students."
--Robert Kramer, Department of Management Science, George Washington University

"With its distinctive voice, this is a basic text for all courses on organizational theory."
--BUSINESS HORIZONS

"This book presents an avant garde approach to an important topic about which, to my way of thinking, no one else has written even a contemporary book. . . . The authors′ perspective readily allows the reader to comprehend and appreciate what is always present--often hidden and almost always controversial--the subjective side of organizational life. . . . The book you are about to read provides the rationalist and the veteran exactly what they each crave the most. It provides synthesis and order within a structure that acknowledges the interaction between an individual′s motivations and needs and the apparent order that individual perceives. . . . The use of cartoons and other ′right-brain′ highlighters allow readers to look down, as opposed to looking up, to understand and critique a phenomenon that a theory purports to explain, and to self-reflect on the importance a theory holds for the field. . . . Certainly, this is a book for the 1990s."
--from the Foreword by Samuel A. Culbert, John E. Anderson Graduate School of Management, University of California, Los Angeles

"What the authors are attempting is very difficult. David K. Banner and T. Elaine Gagné are declaring the presence of a new paradigm of the organization before it has actually crystallized and become part of the mainstream of organization theory. As such, the book is an act of leadership."
--Peter B. Vaill, Professor of Human Systems, School of Business and Public Management, The George Washington University

"A valuable resource to the students and instructors of organizational design and theory courses. The comprehensive coverage of traditional organization theory topics coupled with the authors′ contemporary orientation and transformational perspective ensure this. "The organizational design and theory text by Banner and Gagné addresses an important fact of organizational life that is usually ignored or given superficial treatment at best in existing organization theory texts; namely, that our implicit assumptions, worldviews, metaphors, paradigms, and organizational culture are important determinants of why we organize the way we do."
--Douglas Austrom, President and Cofounder, Turning Point Associates, Indianapolis, Indiana

"A valuable basic text for business related undergraduate or postgraduate programmes on organization theory (and practice!); particularly from a transformational perspectives."
--LONG RANGE PLANNING

Providing a distinctive voice, Designing Effective Organizations is the new basic text for the undergraduate or MBA-level course on organization theory. Although it contains the same comprehensive topical coverage as the leading traditional organization theory texts, Designing Effective Organizations is definitely not a clone of the others in the field. David K.Banner and T. Elaine Gagné develop a transformational perspective--which sees the world of the organization as a projection of each organizational member′s consciousness--as opposed to the traditional rational perspective. They thoroughly cover all the basics, but in a manner that reflects today′s changing management paradigms.

Designing Effective Organizations is the perfect text for scholars, researchers, professionals, and graduate and undergraduate students in organization studies, management, sociology, public administration, and education.