Structure, Culture and Organizational Change Culture – Change – Shape – Power

Abstract

The theory of organizations from the mechanistic paradigm has given special attention to issues of strategy and structure in addition to the contingent nature of these structures with respect to their environment; in this space it has become necessary to make an approach from the culture and organizational structure for the management of change in order to achieve efficiency in organizations.

The objective of this research is to explore in the organizations from bibliographical sources, the cultural levels identified through underlying assumptions, adaptive values and artifacts, as well as cultural dimensions that can be revealed as dominant. It is intended to make a brief revision of the theoretical foundations of the structure of the organizations with emphasis on the coordination mechanisms proposed by Mitzenberg; that characterize the typical structural configurations, identified as simple structure, mechanical and professional bureaucracy, divisional form and adhocracy.

Around this approach, the processes of change that seek competitive differentiation, recognize the change in structure and culture as factors that could influence the design of a particular configuration in organizations and achieve a satisfactory impact on their performance, in this manner, in a complementary way, the mechanistic structural designs and the dominant cultural are precisely the ones that could prove to be powerful impediments to change.