"THE CEO AS ORGANIZATIONAL ARCHITECT"AN ARTICLE CRITIQUE
This research critiques the article "The CEO As Organizational Architect: An Interview With Xerox's Paul Allaire," by Robert Howard.* The article describes and discusses an organizational redesign at the Xerox Corporation. This critique focuses on the aspects of the organizational redesign that emphasized (1) improving the corporation's ability to compete, (2) the use of total quality management (TQM), (3) the reduction of organizational hierarchy, (4) decentralization, and (5) the use of work groups.
Improving The Corporation's Ability To Compete.
Xerox CEO Paul Allaire identified as the major reason for a required organization change at the corporation the fact that "easy growth led Xerox to neglect the fundamentals of its core business, leaving the company vulnerable to low cost Japanese competition" (p. 107). Thus, the central focus of the Xerox strategy, was changed in the organizational redesign to identify the corporation as a "document company" whose corporate purpose intersected "the two worlds of paper based and electronic information" (p. 107). Thus, the new strategic focus at Xerox is "on 'the document'" (p. 108).
The goal of the organizational redesign at Xerox was to "make this . . . company more entrepreneurial, more innovative,
*Robert Howard, "The CEO As Organizational Architect: An Interview With Xerox's Paul Allaire," Harvard Business Review, September October 1992, 107 119.
and more responsive to the marketplace" (p. 111). The intent of the organizational redesign is "to create a company that combines the best of both worlds the speed flexibility, accountability, and creativity that come from being part of a small, highly focused organization, and the economies of scale, the access to resources, and the strategic vision that a large corporation can provide" (p. 111).
As a part of the organizational redesign, Xerox implemented a dec...