Implications of Rapid Growth on Organizational Effectiveness

Organizational effectiveness refers to an organization's ability to achieve its desired goals through efficient use of its resources. To maximize organizational effectiveness, a group must adopt business management practices, such as effective communication system or a robust strategic planning process, which are appropriate for its industry environment and suit the internal culture. If the industry environment or internal situation changes, an organization must evolve its business practices. A systematic process to evaluate organizational effectiveness can empower an organization to effectively respond to its evolving needs. Improvements to organizational effectiveness will enable an organization to proactively respond to market or technological changes, become more cost effective, and deliver its products more efficiently to the customer. The goal of this work is to develop and apply such a process for the Renagel product group at the Genzyme Corporation. The systematic process developed in this work is a combination of several existing academic frameworks, including the theory of the organizational lifecycle, change management practices and business excellence models. The Renagel case study is presented to demonstrate the application and outcome of the process. Other groups can apply a similar process to predict organizational challenges associated with its own period of growth. Thesis Supervisor: Charles L. Cooney Title: Professor, Department of Chemical Engineering Thesis Supervisor: Janice A. Klein Title: Senior Lecturer, Management Science