MGT 3200 Lecture Notes - Lecture 1: High Fructose Corn Syrup, Clairol, Splenda
Document Summary
Understanding the relationship between the organization and its environment is the key to fully appreciating the challenge facing management, today. One way to understand this relationship is through the open-systems approach. There are many elements in the organization"s environment that affect its input- transformation-output process. A manager"s performance is often contingent upon his knowledge of how his organization influences and is influenced by its external environment. Open systems must interact with the environment to survive; it both consumes resources and exports resources to the environment. It must continuously change and adapt to its environment. In contrast, a closed system does not have to interact with its environment. To understand the whole organization it should be viewed as an open system. A system is a set of interrelated elements that acquire inputs from the environment, transforms them, and discharges them in the form of outputs to the external environment. The need for inputs and outputs reflect the dependency on the environment.
