A Technique for Predicting Intraorganizational Action

This paper is addressed to the problem of forging a closer link between theoretical and empirical analysis of a given organization. An analytic research method and instrument capable of systematically transforming certain theoretical organizational concepts into operational form is presented. The technique and its instrumentation were designed to, when fitted with appropriate theoretical substantive variables, efficiently yet accurately describe, explain, and predict the consequences of changing specified organizational variables within an organization. To predict the results of organizational action requires analytic techniques that, when fitted to appropriate theory, can quickly and efficiently seek out and measure crucial variables that offer understandable and reliable explanations of intraorganizational action. Many theorists have proposed models to explain intraorganizational action, most of which do provide guidelines for predicting the consequences of such action. Prediction, however, requires empirical data and tools, which we generally do not have. There is the need to forge a closer link between the theoretical and empirical analysis of organizations. In this paper, I have attempted to describe an analytical technique that can, for a given organization, quickly, accurately, and efficiently transform abstract theoretical propositions into concrete empirical indices. The problem as stated calls for the development of an analytical technique and instrument that will systematically put basic theoretical concepts into an operational form. In order to do this, it was first necessary to determine what important or limiting factors are related to intraorganizational analysis. A search of the literature