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Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective

Organizational structure enables organizations to achieve their goals. The chosen organizational structure determines, to a large extent, the flow of information streams and the manner and extent to which roles, power, and responsibilities are delegated and coordinated to achieve the organization’s...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Winasti, Windi, Berden, Hubert, van Merode, Frits
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10047425/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36981309
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/e25030420
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author Winasti, Windi
Berden, Hubert
van Merode, Frits
author_facet Winasti, Windi
Berden, Hubert
van Merode, Frits
author_sort Winasti, Windi
collection PubMed
description Organizational structure enables organizations to achieve their goals. The chosen organizational structure determines, to a large extent, the flow of information streams and the manner and extent to which roles, power, and responsibilities are delegated and coordinated to achieve the organization’s goals. In this study, we applied information theory with entropy as the central concept to assess the effectiveness and costs of an organizational structure and its coordination processes. Entropy was used to measure the amount of uncertainty associated with probabilistic events. In the context of organizational design, entropy values can be assigned to specific organizational structures to gain insights into the factors that lead to delays in decision-making. We used Shannon’s entropy theory to quantify Galbraith’s organizational structure and coordination process as applied to the perinatology care system of Radboud University Medical Centre in the Netherlands. Our entropy analysis provided insights into how departments should be partitioned and which coordination mechanisms should be used to achieve organizational goals, such as minimizing delays in decision-making. Particularly, two types of entropy appear to be important: positional entropy and task allocation entropy. These are different dependent variables on the organizational design scenarios. Our analysis shows that entropy is one method to determine optimal organizational structures and coordination processes. Entropy can be used as a concrete way of assessing the effectiveness of organizational design given the level of uncertainty of the environment and the required speed of decision-making.
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spelling pubmed-100474252023-03-29 Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective Winasti, Windi Berden, Hubert van Merode, Frits Entropy (Basel) Article Organizational structure enables organizations to achieve their goals. The chosen organizational structure determines, to a large extent, the flow of information streams and the manner and extent to which roles, power, and responsibilities are delegated and coordinated to achieve the organization’s goals. In this study, we applied information theory with entropy as the central concept to assess the effectiveness and costs of an organizational structure and its coordination processes. Entropy was used to measure the amount of uncertainty associated with probabilistic events. In the context of organizational design, entropy values can be assigned to specific organizational structures to gain insights into the factors that lead to delays in decision-making. We used Shannon’s entropy theory to quantify Galbraith’s organizational structure and coordination process as applied to the perinatology care system of Radboud University Medical Centre in the Netherlands. Our entropy analysis provided insights into how departments should be partitioned and which coordination mechanisms should be used to achieve organizational goals, such as minimizing delays in decision-making. Particularly, two types of entropy appear to be important: positional entropy and task allocation entropy. These are different dependent variables on the organizational design scenarios. Our analysis shows that entropy is one method to determine optimal organizational structures and coordination processes. Entropy can be used as a concrete way of assessing the effectiveness of organizational design given the level of uncertainty of the environment and the required speed of decision-making. MDPI 2023-02-26 /pmc/articles/PMC10047425/ /pubmed/36981309 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/e25030420 Text en © 2023 by the authors. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Article
Winasti, Windi
Berden, Hubert
van Merode, Frits
Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title_full Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title_fullStr Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title_full_unstemmed Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title_short Hospital Organizational Structure and Information Processing: An Entropy Perspective
title_sort hospital organizational structure and information processing: an entropy perspective
topic Article
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10047425/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36981309
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/e25030420
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