Explain why organizational disunity may occur between those individuals in the central offices of an agency and those individuals who operate in the field setting.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Organizational disunity can occur as a result of a change in president or a change in the makeup of Congress. Field staff hired under previous administrations may feel loyalty to the prior administration and the policies they espoused. As a result, they may be reluctant to adopt the new policies of the incoming administration(s). This can produce frustration for politicians in control of policymaking. Disunity can also occur as a result of field staff being “captured” by their clients. Field staffs are frequently close to their clients, and they may adopt their clients’ perspective in their own relationships with the remainder of the organization. This can happen when the clients are relatively disadvantaged and the organization is attempting either to assist them or to exercise some control over them. The identification of staff members with their clients is fostered by frequent contact, sympathy, empathy, and quite commonly genuine devotion to a perceived mission that is in contrast to the mission fostered by the central office. This sets up a pattern conflict that can lead to a failure in implementation. Another problem is that sometimes field staffs find that to be effective, they cannot follow all directives coming from the central office. To gain compliance from those they are monitoring, they may have to ignore the directives of the central office (e.g., FBI and bribery).