ASSIGNMENT 1 Report Presentation TITLE:

Concept of Bureaucracy and "Loose Coupling in Education

Name Student Id Class Lecturer

: Nurul Qistina Abu Bakar : Pgd 130009 : Pxgm 6102 Educational Administration & Organization : Dr. Zuraidah Binti Abdullah

Introduction

Bureaucracy is discussed as the sociological construct established by Max Weber (1947) of an ideal type of organizational structure that is made up of rules and policies, authority and hierarchy structures, document management, expert training, working capacity, and workplace management (Gerth&Mills,1948). Concepts bureaucracy is commonly referred broadly Weberian bureaucracy as a rational organization formed to facilitate the activities of government. Weberian bureaucracy emphasizes how should the bureaucratic machine is run professionally and rationally. In Malaysia, organizations implementing the bureaucracy in the organization structure in order to make sure the organisation be structure and organized. Eventhough the bureaucracy been implementing in the organisations but still the members of research questioning the notion the connection of the school with the structure of the organization in order to achieve its objectives. Coupling usually defined as the relationship between the elements or variables, whereby, loose coupling refers to the general characteristics of form of relationship in which the relations are more flexible of that tight. Coupling is defined as the relationship between "A" and " B ", and vary in strength along the continuum from the free-to-tight. Loose coupling combines the multidomain approach and multidimensional organizational processes. Members of the organization are linked together by bonds of bureaucracy and culture, the functional and resource interdependence with vertical and horizontal relationships. Multidimensional nature of the coupling also implies that the members can be aggregated or combined either loose or tight at the same time. For example, the principal and the deputy of the principal are linked closely (tightly coupled) because they share the same mission and vision of the school, but they also can be describe as loosely (loosely coupled) because they are not living in the same place and they are doing other responsibilities. According to Karl E. Weick (1976) & Howard E. Aidrich (1979), the nexus between the elements of the subsystems within the organization is loose. Therefore, educational institutions is a form of organization 'loose coupling'. John Meyer & Scott (1983) state that loose coupling in schools as they assert that bureaucratic structure and instruction are disconnected while Bidwell (1965) depicts the school as a distinctive combination of bureaucracy and structural looseness. All the statment state by the authors can well be define the loose coupling. The words coupling is synonymous with words like connection or link. The concept of loose coupling is well describe by Weick"(1976: 6), as loose coupling need not be used normatively while (Glassman, 1973; March and Olsen, 1975) said that it is important to highlight the connotation that is captured by this phrase and by no other.

Characteristics of Loose Coupling

There are six characteristic in loose coupling that I would like to discussed. The first characteristic are goal is ambiguous or unclear. Until now, the school is still considered to be an organization that have a unclear goal. This means that, most of the organization have the goal that they want to archive but the goal that they create is not been explain clearly towards the employees and each of the employees different taught and understanding. The second characteristics are lack of the technology application. The technology is important in the organisation especially educational organisation. This is because, in order to be a great country in term of the educational system, the country need to apply systems and make the system implementation is one of the most important things. In Malaysia, when the ministry of education introduce the Positive Behaviour Support (PBS) system for school staff and make it compulsary to school in Malaysia to apply the system, most of the school teachers complaint and they cant accept the system with by giving many excuses rather than try to accept and implementing the system. The third characteristics are lack of technological applications. In Malaysia, most of the school still lacking in technology applications. Most of the school teacher is unclear in using technology. Most of them refused to use technology in the school adn often give excused in using it. With out the technology knowledge it is difficult for the school to grow and loose coupling will extend bewteen the teachers and principals in the school. The fourth chateristics for loose coupling is fluid in participation among the teachers in the activities in the school. This means when the participation among teachers is weak, this will make the relation between the teachers with other teachers, students and the management become more loose. The fifth is loose control of the performance of duties. This means that, in organization, there is hierarchies of authority and it is not effective mechanism in intergration. For examples, in any organization, the person is a normal lecturer and the person is given responsiblities to be the Head of Department, that person will get the allowance for the title. When this happen, the person sometimes take advantage on the allowance that they get by not fulfill the responsibility given and no one monitor the person. This show that the school is still weak interm of monitoring. The six characteristics are there is no coordination in activities that they organize. In school, most of the activities that they plan to do always fails after few months its start. There is no monitoring on the activities that tahy organized. For examples, there is lost of activities been introduce in school such as Scout, Girls Guides, Kadet Pertahanan Awam, Kedet Remaja Sekolah, Kadet Polis Trafik Sekolah and manymore. But not all of the club is going on. Some of it failed halfway. This is because there are no tight rules of monitoring the activite in the school.

The Loose-Coupling Metaphor

According to Weick (1976), the loose coupling metaphor has two limitations but frequently ignored by those adopting the perspective. First, not every connection in school systems is a loose coupling. The degree of coupling cannot be characterized simply as either tight or loose, for the responsiveness of units to one another varies from one context to another. By assigning teachers and students to classrooms, for example, administrators tightly control who teaches whom. Yet they exert less influence over what happens once the classroom door is shut (Weick, 1976; Meyer and Rowan, 1978). Thus there is good reason to explore the variety of con-nections between organizational subunits in school systems. Second, the loose coupling view does not identify the mechanisms that hold school systems together. With few rules and orders, and little supervision, how can school systems bring about the sequential curricular progress and eventual graduation of students? How do teaching and learning occur similarly across classrooms? What forces permit work to be accomplished in the near absence of bureaucratic authority? These questions is to prompt us to explore the nature of organizational linkages.

Elements of Loose Coupling

Technical Core Of The Organization In the case of technical couplings, each element is some kind of technology, task, subtask, role, territory and person, and the couplings are task-induced.

The Authority Of Office In the case of authority as the coupling mechanism, the elements include positions, offices, responsibilities, opportunities, rewards, and sanctions and it is the couplings among these elements that presumably hold the organization together.

Components for Coupling

Independent component of coupling refers to the degree of dependence that exists between the components to function properly.

Highly Coupled

: Is the strong dependence between the compenents.

Loosely Coupled : There is a dependency between the components but the relationship is weak.

Uncoupled

: There is no dependency at all between the compenents. It is free.

Advantages of Loose Coupling

Loose coupling lowers the probability that the organization will have to or be able to respond to each little change in the environment that occurs. May provide a sensitive sensing mechanism. This possibility is suggested by Fritz Heider's perceptual theory of things and medium. Loosely coupled system may be a good system for localized adaptation. These local adaptations can be swift, relatively economical, and substantial. In loosely coupled systems where the identity, uniqueness, and separateness of elements is preserved, the system potentially can retain a greater number of mutations and novel solutions than would be the case with a tightly coupled system. A loosely coupled system could preserve more "cultural insurance" to be drawn upon in times of radical change than in the case for more tightly coupled systems.

Examples Of Loose Coupling

Slack times-times when there is an excessive amount of resources relative to demands. Occasions when any one of several means will produce the same end. Richly connected networks in which influence is slow to spread and/or is weak while spreading. A relative lack of coordination, slow coordination or coordination that is slow as it moves through a system. A relative absence of regulations. Planned unresponsiveness. Actual causal inde-pendence. Poor observational capabilities on the part of a viewer Infrequent inspection of activities within the system Decentralization

References

Weick, Karl E. (1976). "Educational organizations as loosely coupled systems . Administrative Science Quarterly 21: pp. 1-19. Glassman, R. B. (1973). "Persistence and loose coup-ling in living systems." Be-havioral Science, Vol 18. pp. 83-98. Andrew Volk. (nd). Teachers Experiences with Bureaucracy in Loosely and Tightly Coupled Systems: Impacts on Professional Practice. University of Manitoba. Bidwell, Charles. (1965). The School As Formal Organization. In Handbook of Organization, ed. J. G. March. New York: Rand McNally. Pp. 972-1019. Mayer, John W., and W. Richars Scott. (1983). Organizational Environments: Ritual and Rationality. Beverly Hills: Sage. Frank W. Lutz. (1982). Tightening up Loose Coupling in Organizations of Higher Education. Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 27, No. 4 (Dec., 1982), pp. 653-669. J. Douglas Orton and Karl E. Weick. (1990). Loosely Coupled Systems: A Reconceptualization. The Academy of Management Review, Vol. 15, No. 2 (Apr., 1990), pp. 203-223. Glassman, R. B. (1973) Persistence and loose coupling in living systems. Behavioral Science, 18, 83-98. March, J. G., and J. P. Olsen 1975 Choice Situations in Loosely Coupled Worlds. Unpublished Manuscript, Stanford University. Weber, M. (1947) The Theory of Social and Economic Organisation, Hodge. Adam Gamoran and Robert Dreeben. (1986). Coupling and Control in Educational Organizations. Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 31, No. 4, (Dec., 1986), pp. 612-632. Howard E. Aldrich. 1979. Organizations and Environments. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall. Reprinted in paperback , 2006, by BookSurge LLC, Charleston, SC. Gerth, H. H. and Wright Mills, C. (Eds.) (1948). From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology. London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.