Role of information technology in organizational behaviour
Answers
Sociologists, and others, have discovered that technological developments are major sources of social, economic, and political change. Technology is the actions that an individual performs on an object, with or without the assistance of mechanical devices, in order to make some change in that object. The specific technology of the organization is, then, the collection of plant, machines, tools and recipes available at a given time for the execution of the production task and the rational underlying their utilization. It is argued that technology and its management has effects on the organizataional behaviour and the nature of work. Managers can use technology to manipulate workers and conditions of work. Therefore, organizations must employ new information and computing technology to remain competitive in world markets. Technology can be used to explain organizational behaviour. Technology can also be used to explain the nature of jobs, work groupings, hierarchy, skills, values and attitudes in organizations. The organizations of work around a given technology can be used to control labour costs, to control decision making, to control the relative status of different groups in an organization and to control promotion and career prospects. Managers may be able to manipulate employees in these ways by appealing to the technological determinist argument: "We have to do this because the technology demands it".