Critically Discuss the Key Ideas of Both the Systems Rationalism Era and the Organisational Culture Era. Examine How These Ideas Were Shaped by Earlier Strands of Management and Reflect on Their Enduring Impact on Contemporary Management Ideas.

Essay Title:

Critically discuss the key ideas of both the Systems Rationalism Era and the Organisational Culture Era. Examine how these ideas were shaped by earlier strands of management and reflect on their enduring impact on Contemporary Management ideas.

Essay Plan/Outline

* Introduction – Basic outline of emergence of Systems Rationalism and Organisational Culture Eras. Outline of years covered by particular eras.

* Outline the key ideas of the Systems Rationalism Era.

* Link the key ideas of the Systems Rationalism Era back to influences from earlier strands of management thought such as the Scientific Era and the Human Relations.

* Comment on enduring impacts on contemporary management stemming from Systems Rationalism Era.

* Outline the key idea of the Organisational Culture Era.

* Link the key ideas of the Organisational Culture Era back to influences from earlier strands of management thought such as the Industrial Relations Era and the Scientific Management Era.

* Comment on the enduring impacts on contemporary management stemming from the Organisational Culture Era.

* Conclusion – Sum up the essay briefly. Include personal feelings and thoughts.

Both the Systems Rationalism Era and the Organisational Culture Era brought about their own new ideas and perspectives on the practice of management. The Systems Rationalism Era ranged from about 1955 up to 1980. It was followed by the Organisational Culture Era which ranges from about 1980 up to present day. The movement from The Human Relations Era into the Systems Rationalism Era came about for a number of reasons. There was a growing criticism of the human relations rhetoric and practices. There was a feeling that the human relations strategies in relation to observation of workers were too costly and results were poor. This is what led to the new interest and emphasis on science and maths that is clearly seen in the

Bibliography: * Curtis, A. (2011). All Watched Over By Machines of Loving Grace. BBC Productions, London. * Grey, C. (2009). A Very Short, Fairly Interesting and Reasonably Cheap Book About Studying Organisations (2nd Ed.). London, Sage. * Witzel, M. (2012). A History of Management Thought. London, Routledge. Reflections on Essay 2 Feedback * One major problem with my previous essay was my referencing. My technique was completely incorrect. My in text references were much longer than was required. Instead of simply stating the authors name and the year of publication, I was also including the book name, publisher and page number. On top of this, my bibliography referencing was incorrect. I failed to align resources in alphabetical order of author second names. I also failed to include year of publication, the publishing company and place of publication in bibliography references. My feedback form Essay 2 has shown me the correct method of referencing and has enormously aided my learning experience. * Another large problem with my previous essay was my focus on the essay title. The title asked us to firstly focus on the central ideas of the Scientific Management Era and the human Relations Era and secondly to focus on their impact on management practice (positive/negative). I didn’t pay enough attention to the two parts of the question. I paid very little head to the positive/negative impacts while focussing the majority of my essay on describing the central ideas. The consequence of this mistake was too much summarising in my essay. I didn’t include enough personal feelings on the eras and my essay grade suffered as a result. I have tried not to make the same mistakes in writing my third essay. I have tried to focus on all aspects of the question (key ideas, past influences and enduring impacts) I achieved this by constantly reading over the essay title to ensure I was answering the question correctly. * My grammar and formatting was poor in my previous essay also. I have made an attempt to improve my grammar by editing over my work in more depth. I have tried to use a wider vocabulary. I have also made sure that my line spacing and font size are correct.