Rationality (Second half)

On Wednesday, February 2, our class discussed the second part of Rationality. We started class reviewing Monday’s lecture about the theories of Max Weber and Frederick Douglas. Then we were introduced to Henri Fayol’s Theory of Classical Management. A summary of this theory is, the employees should know where they fit, should receive individual rewards and should think about the company’s goals before their own. The problem with this theory is that it does not adequately explain how the organization works.

The second half of class we reviewed two different case studies to determine which theory each was using and the problems involved with their theory. The first case study is an example of Henri Fayol’s Theory of Classical Management. This case was about a small southern ice cream parlor called Creamy Creations Ice Cream Shoppe. A retiree owned it by the name of Bob Peterson. After a year and a half of owning Creamy Creations, Bob decided to sell the business to Burger Barn, a local fast-food chain that was striving to expand into other types of food services. After the turnover, Burger Barn wanted more efficiency within the parlor so they instituted more workstations behind the counter. Creating more workstations increased efficiency but took away from the personalization of Creamy Creations Ice Cream. While Bob owned the parlor, his main goal was personal interactions and friendliness between the employees and the customers. Not only were there less personal interactions but also less people were staying and eating their ice cream at the parlor. The problem that Creamy Creations Ice Cream was experiencing was that Burger Barn was not concerned about the personal aspects among the parlor but more concerned with the efficiency of the business and what would speed up the process allowing less people to wait in line. If I was called in as a communication consultant by Burger Barn executives, I would tell them they need to keep a quality product, encourage customers to come back and also personalize their interactions rather than the customers just getting their ice cream and leaving.

The second case study was an example of Max Weber’s Bureaucracy theory. The setting of this case study is in a mental hospital with many ill patients. One specific patient was Horris James Wilcox Jr. It was documented that Wilcox watches too much TV and has emotional outbreaks because of the different tragedies he sees on TV. Recently, he was complaining, “The sky was falling.” Wilcox watched an Air force Fighter plane explode in the sky on TV so the nurses thought of these statements as an emotional reaction to what he saw. It wasn’t until a few days later when the wall behind Wilcox collapsed onto him. Apparently, there has been a leak in the water pipe and the wall has been painted over 3 times in the last year. It turns out that there was miscommunication among all the employees at the hospital. The head of residential life was having her secretary sign all of her documents for her without reading them which led to the complaint of a water pipe leak being overlooked in Wilcox’s room. The hospital follows a bureaucracy system. The problem that the hospital ran into is that the miscommunication or lack there of it, lead to Wilcox’s death. The employees within the hospital only care about money and promotions, which led them to their current lawsuit.

Which theory is most commonly recognized within businesses in 2011?

By: Katie O’Laughlin