How Organizations Work: Taking a Holistic Approach to Enterprise Health, by Alan Brache. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, 2002. 225 pages. $29.95 (hardcover)
✍ Scribed by Paul B. Roberts; Kristen S. Dobbs; Otis C. Freeze
- Book ID
- 102255941
- Publisher
- John Wiley and Sons
- Year
- 2007
- Tongue
- English
- Weight
- 224 KB
- Volume
- 18
- Category
- Article
- ISSN
- 1044-8004
No coin nor oath required. For personal study only.
✦ Synopsis
In How Organizations Work: Taking a Holistic Approach to Enterprise Health, Brache introduces the new enterprise model (Figure 1) as a means of understanding complex organizations. Using this model, he defines the roles of variables within an organization and explains the importance of holistically viewing the system. The explanations provided assist the reader in understanding the interaction among the variables.
Overview of the Book
How Organizations Work focuses on using the enterprise model to improve organizational performance. The model is divided into external and internal variables. Internal or structural variables are business processes, goals, information and knowledge management, and organizational structure. Human variables consist of leadership, culture, and human capabilities. Two variables are equally human and structural: strategy and issue resolution.
In Chapter Two, Brache describes the external variables of the business environment. Influence is seldom exerted over external variables, which can include suppliers, government, competitors, society, resource providers, and shareholders. Brache also defines the concept of the value chain, which is the "number of links between the first and last commercial transactions in your industry … in each step, value is added and financial worth is increased" (p. 18).
In Chapter Three, Brache discusses the importance of leadership, which is identified as the most important variable because it is required in each of the other components in the enterprise model. He differentiates the roles of leaders and managers but reinforces the importance of each within the leadership variable. In explaining the roles of leaders and managers, he states, "Leaders provide vision; managers execute the vision" (p. 39).
Chapter Four focuses on strategy: "In the Enterprise Model, leadership and strategy are the drivers. Leadership and goals/measurement are part of both strategy and strategy implementation. All of the other variables-business processes, culture, human capabilities, information/knowledge management, organization structures/roles, and issue resolution-are aspects of strategy implementation" (p. 64).