Organization Concept
Resorting to the classical concept, we can define any organization as a group of two or more people who perform tasks, either in group, either individually but in a coordinated and controlled manner, performing on a certain context or environment, looking to achieve a pre determined goal through the effective affectation of several means and resources available headed or not by someone with the duty to plan, organize, lead and control.
From this definition of organization should withhold some fundamental concepts for its adequate comprehension, namely:
- Coordinated performance: to exist an organization, it’s not enough that a group of people perform looking to achieve a common goal; it’s also necessary that those people organize themselves, being, that develop their activities coordinately and controlled to achieve certain results. This coordination and control is usually performed by a leader but many times we find organizations in which these tasks are performed by all members together through for example, a collegial organ.
- Resources: represent all means made available to the organization and necessary for the fulfillment of its activities/tasks. In these resources are included human resources, materials, technological resources, financial resources, market image and credibility before the exterior.
- Effective affectation: organizational resources described on the previous point are, by definition, scarce, hence its allocation should be effectively performed in order that the probability of achieving the pre determined goals be the biggest possible. It’s from here that emerges the main justification for the organizations’ management needs.
- Goals: represent desired targets or organizational resources and obtain in the future or, by other words, the purpose that justifies all developed activity or even the organization’s own existence. Naturally, all organizations should determine not only their goals, but also define measures and ways of performance and allocation of resources that believe to be more adequate as a way to achieve them.
- Context: represents all the external surroundings that, directly or indirectly, influence its action and performance. On this external surrounding is included the economic context, technological, social-cultural, political-legal, and still a group of elements that perform closer and directly with the organization, such as clients, suppliers, competitors, union organizations, media, among others.
As we easily understand, the previously described concept for the organization, can be applied to any kind of organization whether is business or not. The only difference remains on the base goals to which each one proposes.
In the case of business organizations, the main goal or last end will be the maximization of its value for his owners achieved through the satisfaction of all its members and cooperators of production and/or distribution of goods and services in order to satisfy the specific needs of its consumers.
If we refer to non business organizations like hospitals, schools, sport clubs, union associations, or others, the main goals are slightly different, even though the last end always is the needs’ satisfaction or the interests’ defense of a particular group of people or the society in general. This way in case of hospitals, the main goal is the health of the population to which is destined while schools will be the learning of its students, sports clubs will be the obtainment of good sportive results and union associations will be the defense of the workers’ rights.
