Basic Overview of Organizational Life Cycles
Written by Carter McNamara, MBA, PhD, Authenticity Consulting, LLC. Copyright 1997-2007.Organizations go through different life-cycles just like people do. For example, people go through infancy, child-hood and early-teenage phases that are characterized by lots of rapid growth. People in these phases often do whatever it takes just to stay alive, for example, eating, seeking shelter and sleeping. Often, these people tend to make impulsive, highly reactive decisions based on whatever is going on around them at the moment. Start-up organizations are like this, too. Often, founders of the organization or program and its various members have to do whatever is necessary just to stay in business. Leaders make highly reactive, seat-of-the-pants decisions. They fear taking the time to slow down and do planning.
In our comparison of organizations and programs to people, we note that, as people continue to mature, they begin to understand more about the world and themselves. Over time, they develop a certain kind of wisdom that sees them through many of the challenges in life and work. They learn to plan and to use a certain amount of discipline to carry through on those plans. They learn to manage themselves. To survive well into the future, organizations and programs must be able to do this, as well. Experienced leaders have learned to recognize the particular life cycle that an organization or program is going through. These leaders understand the types of problems faced by the organization or program during the life cycle. That understanding gives them a sense of perspective and helps them to decide how to respond to decisions and problems in the workplace.
Organizational Life Cycles and Corresponding Typical Features
Organizations, as with most systems, go through life-cycles. Features of new organizations are usually markedly different from older (usually more larger) organizations. The following very useful table was summarized Richard L. Daft's work and book, Organizational Theory and Design (West Publishing, St. Paul, Minnesota, 1992), which, in turn, based information from Robert E. Quinn and Kim Cameron's Organizational Life Cycles and Some Shifting Criteria of Effectiveness, Management Science, 29, (1983), pp. 31-51. Also see Barbarians to Bureaucrats.|
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| Size | small | medium | large | very large |
| Bureaucratic | nonbureaucratic | prebureaucratic | bureaucratic | very bureaucratic |
| Division of labor | overlapping tasks | some departments | many departments | extensive, with small jobs and many descriptions |
| Centralization | one-person rule | two leaders rule | two department heads | top-management heavy |
| Formalization | no written rules | few rules | policy and procedures manuals | extensive |
| Administrative intensity | secretary, no professional staff | increasing clerical and maintenance | increasing professional and staff support | large-- multiple departments |
| Internal systems | nonexistent | crude budget and information system | control systems in place; budget, performance, reports, etc.. | extensive -- planning, financial, and personnel added |
| Lateral teams, tasks forces for coordination | none | top leaders only | some use of integrators and task forces | frequent at lower levels to break down bureaucracy |
Another Perspective
In the book, 5 Life Stages of Nonprofit Organizations (Wilder Foundation, 2001), the author, Judith Sharken Simon, provides another perspective on life cycles of nonprofit organizations. She identifies:1. Stage One: Imagine and Inspire ("Can the dream be realized?")
2. Stage Two: Found and Frame ("How are we going to pull this off?")
3. Stage Three: Ground and Grow ("How can we build this to be viable?")
4. Stage Four: Produce and Sustain ("How can the momentum be sustained?")
5. Stage Five: Review and Renew ("What do we need to redesign?")
Also see:
Barbarians to Bureaucrats.Characteristics of Developing Businesses
For the Category of Organizational Development:
Related Library Topics
Recommended Books
Managing Organizational Change
Managing Organizational Change
Field
Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development
- by Carter McNamara, published by Authenticity Consulting, LLC. Provides complete, step-by-step guidelines to identify complex issues in for-profit or government organizations and successfully resolve each of them. This book is also helpful to organizations that are doing fine now, but want to evolve to the next level of performance. This is one of the truly comprehensive, yet practical, books about this complex subject! Includes online forms that can be downloaded. Many materials in this Library's topic about guiding change are adapted from this comprehensive book.
Field
Guide to Consulting and Organizational Development With Nonprofits
- by Carter McNamara, published by Authenticity Consulting, LLC. Provides complete, step-by-step guidelines to identify complex issues in nonprofit organizations and successfully resolve each of them. This book is also helpful to organizations that are doing fine now, but want to evolve to the next level of performance. This is one of the truly comprehensive, yet practical, books about this complex subject! Includes online forms that can be downloaded. Many materials in this Library's topic about guiding change are adapted from this comprehensive book.
The following books are recommended because of their highly practical nature and often because they include a wide range of information about this Library topic. To get more information about each book, just hover your cursor over the image of the book. A "bubble" of information will be displayed. You can click on the title of the book in that bubble to get more information, too.
Growing Your Organization
The following books are recommended because of their highly practical nature and often because they include a wide range of information about this Library topic. To get more information about each book, just hover your cursor over the image of the book. A "bubble" of information will be displayed. You can click on the title of the book in that bubble to get more information, too.
Also See
Capacity Building (Nonprofit) -- Recommended Books
