1. Groups and Organizations
Sociology, 13h Edition by John Macionis
Copyright © 2010 Pearson Education, Inc.  All rights reserved.

2. Two or more people who identify and interact with one another.
Social Group
Two or more people who identify and interact with one another.
Not every collection of individuals forms a group.
Many people with a status in common–women, homeowners, soldiers, millionaires, college graduates, and Roman Catholics–are not groups, but categories, because of limited interactions.

3. Not Quite a Social Group
Crowd
Temporary cluster of people created by an event
A group can have temporal status
A crowd can become a group, then a crowd again.
A large gathering of people at a football game
A crowd that begins to riot might be considered a group because of their purposeful interaction.

4. Primary Groups Traits Primary relationships Assistance of all kinds
Small social groups whose members share personal, lasting relationships.
Traits
Small: friends, family
Personal orientation
Enduring
Primary relationships
First group experienced in life
Irreplaceable
Assistance of all kinds
Emotional to financial

5. Secondary Groups Traits Secondary relationships Examples
A large, impersonal social group whose members pursue a specific goal or activity.
Traits
Large membership
Goal or activity orientation
Formal and polite
Secondary relationships
Weak emotional ties
Short term, goal directed
Examples
Co-workers and political organizations

6. Summing Up Primary Groups and Secondary Groups

7. Group Leadership Two roles
Instrumental: Task-oriented
Expressive: People-oriented
instrumental and expressive are also used to define gender; Ch.13
Three leadership styles
Authoritarian: Leader makes decisions; Compliance from members
Democratic: Member involvement
Laissez-faire: Mainly let group function on its own

8. Group Conformity Studies
Asch’s research page 164
Willingness to compromise our own judgments
Line experiment
Milgram’s research page 165
Role authority plays
Following orders
Janis’s research page 165
Negative side of groupthink
“the tendency of group members to conform, resulting in a narrow view” consequences?

9. Figure Cards Used in Asch’s Experiment in Group Conformity In Asch’s experiment, subjects were asked to match the line on Card 1 to one of the lines on Card 2. Many subjects agreed with the wrong answers given by others in their group. Source: Asch (1952).

10. Reference Group Stouffer’s research page 166 In-groups and out-groups
A social group that serves as a point of reference in making evaluations and decisions about where resources go, and who gets rewarded and punished
Stouffer’s research page 166
We compare ourselves in relation to specific reference groups upward
In-groups and out-groups
Loyalty to in-group downward
Opposition to out-groups
in-groups out-groups

11. Group Size The dyad The triad A two-member group
Very intimate, but unstable given its size
The triad
A three-member group
More stable than a dyad and more types of interaction are possible

12. Figure Group Size and Relationships As the number of people in a group increases, the number of relationships that link them increases much faster. By the time six or seven people share a conversation, the group usually divides into two. Why are relationships in smaller groups typically more intense? Source: Created by the author.

13. Social Diversity: Race, Class, and Gender
Large and homogenous groups turn inward.
Members have relationships between themselves.
Heterogeneous groups turn outward.
Diverse membership promotes interaction with outsiders.
Physical boundaries create social boundaries.
If segregation of groups takes place, the chances for contact are limited.
Networks
“Web of weak social ties”; people we know of or who know of us

14. Global Map 7.1 Internet Users in Global Perspective

15. Formal Organizations Utilitarian Normative Coercive
Large secondary groups organized to achieve goals efficiently; date back thousands of years.
Utilitarian
Material rewards for members (functional-conflict)
Normative
Voluntary organizations
Ties to personal morality
(functional-conflict)
Coercive
Punishment or treatment
Total institutions (functional-conflict)

16. Summing Up Small Groups and Formal Organizations

17. Bureaucracy
An organizational model rationally designed to perform tasks efficiently
Max Weber’s six elements to promote organizational efficiency:
Specialization of duties
Hierarchy of offices
Rules and regulations
Technical competence
Impersonality
Formal, written communications

18. Organizational Environment
Factors outside an organization that affect its operation:
Economic and political trends
Current events
Populations patterns
Other organizations
Informal side of bureaucracy
In part, informality comes from the personalities of organizational leaders.

19. Problems of Bureaucracies
Bureaucratic alienation
Potential to dehumanize individuals
Bureaucratic inefficiency and ritualism (irony)
Preoccupation with rules, interferes with meeting goals
Bureaucratic inertia
Perpetuation of the organization becomes more important than the goals and the purpose for it’s existence
Oligarchy: The rule of the many by the few
Helps distance officials from the public.
Michels: Concentrates power and threatens democracy page 174 .

20. The Evolution of Formal Organizations Scientific Management
Application of scientific principles to the operation of a business or large organization
Identify tasks and time needed for tasks
Analyze to perform tasks more efficiently
Provide incentives for worker efficiency
Whose interests are being served???

21. New Challenges to Formal Organizations
Race and gender
Pattern of exclusion
“Female advantage”
Japanese organizations
Value cooperation
Organizational loyalty
Changing nature of work
Information-based organizations
Creative autonomy, competitive work teams, flatter organization, and greater flexibility

22. Figure 7.3 U.S. Managers in Private Industry by Race, Sex, and Ethnicity, 2005

23. Figure 7.4 Two Organizational Models The conventional model of bureaucratic organizations has a pyramid shape, with a clear chain of command. Orders flow from the top down, and reports of performance flow from the bottom up. Such organizations have extensive rules and regulations, and their workers have highly specialized jobs. More open and flexible organizations have a flatter shape, more like a football. With fewer levels in the hierarchy, responsibility for generating ideas and making decisions is shared throughout the organization. Many workers do their jobs in teams and have a broad knowledge of the entire organization’s operation. Source: Created by the author.

24. McDonaldization of Society
Efficiency: Do it quickly
Predictability: Use set formulas
Uniformity: Leave nothing to chance
Control: Humans are most unreliable factor
Each principle limits human creativity, choice, and freedom.
Weber: Rational systems are efficient but dehumanizing.

25. Future of Organizations: Opposing Trends
Movement toward more creative freedom for highly skilled information workers
Movement toward increased supervision and discipline for less skilled service workers

26. Class Activity
Group 1: Explain behaviors on an elevator; group or crowd?
Group 2: How can we make this classroom more efficient? Is that a good thing, or just more drifting toward McDonaldization?
Group 3: After considering the differences between the American and Japanese models of automobile manufacturing (pages 176-7) , which is best and why?