Alternatives to Bureaucracy to Motivate Workers

A detailed Summary of Alternatives to Bureaucracy to Motivate Workers

There are many alternatives that are used to motivate workers beyond the conventional bureaucratic ways that was once thought of as the only way to control workers. Since the 1960's we have learned a great deal of information leading to the discovery of alternatives to bureaucratic organizations. Today, bureaucratic ideas are still widely used among organizations, however a shift in thinking occurred and the question was asked, What are the alternatives if bureaucracy it not working in an organization?

According to Max Weber, bureaucracy is the most efficient and most rational known means of exercising authority over human beings (Weber, p223). Further it is reliable, precise and stable, these are all terms that are desired for large complex organizations that need to control vast amounts of employees. Bureaucracy is based on legitimate authority, those that are being controlled by others; accept oppression as part of the work along. There are several characteristics that mold a particular organization into following the bureaucracy model, such as, rules, hierarchy, salaried careers, written documents and appointment. These characteristics serve as a guideline, or an owner's manual of sorts that has a pre

To externalize labor means to outsource labor, which is done by on a contractual basis either by a large company specializing in a vast array of products or by an independent person. These outside agents are responsible for selling products for a company but are not part of the company's integration structure. They are not salaried but are employees working on a commission only basis. In fact, these representatives may sell several different products from many companies at the same time; they are focused on the buyers of these goods. The advantages to outsourcing the sales force include customer loyalty, low and stable costs and performance is evaluated by actual sales. These independent agents have a large customer base since they are peddling more than one company's products; they rely on these strong networks for present and future business deals. Again, when a company externalizes the labor costs remain low and are on a piecework type rate; one is only paid for what they sell. The downside of externalized labor is that the contactor focuses only on the commission, and does not offer guarantees to the products that they sell. Further, they can refuse to do any extra nonselling assignments, like conventions or extra paperwork. Some examples of independent contractors are Warner Lambert Co, Mary Kay cosmetics, Amway and Real Estate Agents. In which a commission is earned on product

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Approximate Word count = 937
Approximate Pages = 4 (250 words per page double spaced)

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