Understanding Organizations...Finally!: Structuring in Sevens

by Henry Mintzberg

The iconic Henry Mintzberg provides a crystal-clear map to the forms and forces that shape all human organizations, synthesizing his fifty years of research.

We live in a world of organizations, from our birth in hospitals until our burial by funeral homes. In between, we are educated, employed, entertained, and exasperated by organizations. We had better understand how these strange beasts really work. But where can we go to find out?

Welcome to Understanding Organizations . . . Finally! For half a century, Mintzberg has been observing organizations, advising them, engaging them, and escaping them. Here he offers a masterful update and revision of his 1983 classic, Structure in Fives.

Believing there is one best way to structure organizations is the worst way to do so. A better place to start is by recognizing different species of organizations. Mintzberg identifies seven-personal enterprises, programmed machines, professional assemblies, project pioneers, and others. He explores these forms and the seven forces that drive them toward hybrids and across their life cycles.

You will find no better guide to the care and feeding of these extraordinarily varied and vital creatures than this book.

Genres: Business

256 pages, Kindle Edition

Published February 7, 2023

About the author

Professor Henry Mintzberg, OC , OQ , Ph.D. , D.h.c. , FRSC (born September 2, 1939) is an internationally renowned academic and author on business and management. He is currently the Cleghorn Professor of Management Studies at the Desautels Faculty of Management of McGill University in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, where he has been teaching since 1968, after earning his Master's degree in Management and Ph.D. from the MIT Sloan School of Management in 1965 and 1968 respectively.
Henry Mintzberg writes prolifically on the topics of management and business strategy, with more than 140 articles and thirteen books to his name. His seminal book, The Rise and Fall of Strategic Planning, criticizes some of the practices of strategic planning today and is considered required reading for anyone who seriously wants to consider taking on a strategy-making role within their organization.

He recently published a book entitled Managers Not MBAs Managers Not MBAswhich outlines what he believes to be wrong with management education today and, rather controversially, singles out prestigious graduate management schools like Harvard Business School and the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania as examples of how obsession with numbers and an over-zealous attempt at making management into a science actually can damage the discipline of management. He also suggests that a new masters program, targeted at practicing managers (as opposed to younger students with little real world experience), and emphasizing practical issues, may be more suitable.

Ironically, although Professor Mintzberg is quite critical about the strategy consulting business, he has twice won the McKinsey Award for publishing the best article in the Harvard Business Review.

In 1997 he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada. In 1998 he was made an Officer of the National Order of Quebec. He is now a member of the Strategic Management Society.

Reviews

[Andrew H · Rating 4 out of 5]

Well outside my comfort zone, but a fascinating example of a modern mind at work.

[Denis Romanovsky · Rating 5 out of 5]

Top book on analysis of organizations, their structures, forces and future. It really resonates with what I experience at work. This book is an update of the older one - Structure in Fives. It can be reasonable to read that one before this one. Anyway, this is the best work on organizations theory that I had access to.

[Jaakko · Rating 3 out of 5]

Same old Mintzberg. Not sure about the target audience - maybe some management students?

I guess this would’ve worked much better as a printed version.

[Alexander · Rating 5 out of 5]

“Hermits may not need to understand organizations, but the rest of us do, at least if we are to make constructive use of them. What are these beasts? How do they work? When don’t they work? How can we make them work better? The answers are important because, as soon as you put down this book, you will be facing the bears, beavers, and other beasts of our world of organizations. Help is on the way!” Henry Mintzberg humorously writes in his new book, Understanding Organizations…Finally! He also writes, “How many organizations are you connecting with today? Is ten an exaggeration? Let’s start in the morning. First thing, you check your email, courtesy of a phone maker and an internet provider. Breakfast has been brought to you by farmers, factories, and food stores as well as airlines and truckers. Off you go to work in a business, government, or nongovernmental organization (NGO), or maybe to study in a school, transported by your local bus company, unless you drive on a road patrolled by the police and maintained by the municipality. Lunch in a cafeteria might be followed by a visit to your bank, or a workout at the gym. Back home, you check out some fact on Wikipedia, via Google, and then watch the news on a TV network, before reading this book produced for you by a publisher (and written by an author, but I am not an organization). I count at least fifteen: how many did I miss?”

Similar to the perceptive acumen of a comedian or standup performer, Mintzberg is able to showcase his ability to concurrently communicate his ideology and philosophy clearly and concisely, while showing how it’s applicable viscerally. His ability to make the material fresh, funny, and well-paced is part of how he makes his argument come full-circle, solidifying the expertise laid out rather than being a narrative red herring to make it interesting. “We live in a world of organizations, from our birth in hospitals until our burial by funeral homes. In between, we are educated, employed, entertained, and exasperated by organizations. Yet what do we really understand about them?” Mintzberg writes, in aforementioned style. “If you want to learn about yourself—your personality, your anxieties, whatever—walk into any bookstore and choose from among dozens of books on self-help. If you are concerned about the economy, read any number of political blogs to get the latest word. But between our micro selves and our macro economies, where can we go to find out how these social things called organizations really work? Note that the main points of this book are highlighted in bold face type…Welcome to Understanding Organizations . . . Finally!... As I began this book, I had a chat with Jeremiah Lee, a consultant friend in Boston who knows this book, and much of my other work, well. He asked a question that took this book to another place. Since a number of my other books were written as syntheses (about strategy, managerial work, and balance in society), he asked how about a synthesis of these syntheses. Hence I decided (a) to rename the main title Understanding Organization . . . Finally; (b) to bring together an understanding of managing, decision-making, and strategy formation around the central issues of organizing; and (c) to do all this in a much more spirited tone, in an effort to reach everyone who needs to understand organizations. (How am I doing so far?)”

[Evelyne Gauthier · Rating 4 out of 5]

Un ouvrage fort bien documenté (quoiqu'un peu long), où l'on sent toute l'expérience de l'auteur. Bien que les informations ne soient pas toutes pertinentes pour tous les lecteurs (il faut en prendre, en laisser et se concentrer sur ce qui nous concerne), le livre est fort intéressant pour quiconque s'intéresse à la gestion et au management. Le langage est bien vulgarisé et accessible et les exemples aident grandement à saisir certains concepts théoriques qui, autrement, ne seraient pas compréhensibles pour le commun des mortels.

[Manouane Beauchamp · Rating 5 out of 5]

Magnifique synthèse des travaux de ce spécialiste des organisations. Mintberg a toujours eu le réflexe dans ses précédents ouvrages à en écrire beaucoup plus que requis, ce qui venait alourdir le texte inutilement et, au bout de quelques pages, forçait une lecture rapide avec pour résultat de passer à côté d'informations importantes.
Dans ce livre, il a fait un effort magnifique de synthèse et chaque page, chaque paragraphe est rempli d'infomrations pertinentes. Il s'agit probablement du seul livre de Mintzberg dont vous avez besoin. Parfait outil pour les consultants et les gestionnaires.

[Robert Bogue]

When Henry Mintzberg says that he finally understands organizations and structure, he does so with decades of experience and accolades. In Understanding Organizations… Finally!: Structuring in Sevens, he builds on his research on how organizations have been organized, should be organized, and naturally organize themselves. In the book, he explains the structures that he’s been trying his whole career to understand.

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[Rod Willis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Understanding Organizations over time - just brilliant.

The book is a lovely synthesis of core ideas shared in earlier books by H Mintzberg. It is easier to engage with as a practitioner as there is far less theoretical content. Having said that, theory still very much underpins what is shared.

If you want to develop your understanding of what organisations are and how you might characterise them in a helpful, accessible manner, then this is the book for you.

[James G. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mintzberg’s Strategy Safari remains one of the best books I’ve ever read. This also has lots of gems. But I didn’t find it as all-around useful, just a solid compendium of his thinking on forms & systems.

[zoagli · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not a bad book, by any means. Just not helpful for me. Too theoretical, perhaps. And the illustrations, while interesting, don’t help.

[Bülent Duagi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Excellent synthesis book about the life of organizations.
Will definitely re-read 👍

[Alexandra Armer · Rating 4 out of 5]

Extremely dense and complicated, which is representative of its topic.

[Amir Rafiey · Rating 4 out of 5]

(علاوه بر توضیح کتبی که این جا نوشتم، توی کانالم، یه توضیح شفاهی کامل‌تر از کتاب رو گذاشتم:
https://t.me/table_number3/139)


همون طور که از اسم کتاب مشخصه، کتاب در مورد فهمیدن یکی از مهم‌ترین پدیده‌های قرن‌های اخیر، یعنی سازمانِ. تقریبا تمامی آدمای این دوره‌ زمونه (به جز البته اون‌ها که توی غار زندگی می‌کنن) یه جوری با سازمان در تعامل اند

کتاب جمع‌بندی کارهای دانشگاهی مینزبرگ است. اگر با آقای مینزبرگ آشنا نیستید. ایشون، یکی از مهم‌ترین نظریه‌پردازهای حوزه‌ی مطالعات سازمانی است (و مدیریت). هدف اصلی این کتاب توضیح پدیده‌ها مربوط به سازمان و بخش‌های مختلف آن و دسته‌بندی‌شون است. مثلا توی فصل‌های اول ایشون به تقسیم‌بندی نقش‌ها، کارهای مختلف یه مدیر و انواع سبک‌های مدیریتی پرداخته

مهم‌ترین بخش کتاب،‌ دسته‌بندی انواع سازمان است. کتاب برای تقسیم سازمان‌ها، ۷ شکل عمومی پیشنهاد میده. بعد از دسته‌‌بندی انواع سازمان‌ها، کتاب در مورد این صحبت می‌کنه چجوری می‌تونیم از این دسته‌بندی برای تحلیل یه سازمان استفاده کنیم. به نظرم اگر برای طراحی یا بازطراحی یه سازمان درگیرید، کتاب می‌تونه براتون کمک کننده باشه

اگر دانشجوی مدیریت هستید، احتمالا با نظریه‌هایی که توی این کتاب مطرح شده قبلا برخورد داشتید، اما باز هم پیشنهاد می‌کنم که کتاب رو بخونید چون خوندن سریع نظریه برای امتحان اصلا درک مناسبی از اون نظریه برای آدم ایجاد نمی‌کنه. من خودم چندین بار با نظریه‌های مینزرگ برخورد داشتم اما این دفعه که کتابش رو خوندم، تازه تونستم یه درک خوبی از حرف‌هاش به‌دست بیارم

از نظر من، یه انتقادی به کتاب هست و اون هم این که همه‌ چیز دنیا رو از دید سازمان می‌بینه، یعنی این که هر جوری که آدم‌ها خودشون رو سازمان‌دهی می‌کنن رو یه شکل خاصی از سازمان در نظر گرفته. دیدگاهی که فکر می‌کنم چندان درست نباشه.اگر اشتباه یادم نمونده باشه، توی رشته‌ی جامعه‌شناسی مشاغل، به شکل‌های دیگه‌ای که میشه برای سازمان‌دهی در جوامع از اون‌ها استفاده کرده،‌ پرداخته شده. به نظر می‌رسه که آقای مینزبرگ چندان با اون نظریه‌ها آشنایی نداشته

[Ryan McCormack · Rating 5 out of 5]

Best book on organizational design I’ve ever read.