Gerald R. Salancik: Organizing

“The effects of subunit power on organizational decision making and the bases of subunit power are examined in a large midwestern state university. It is hypothesized that subunits acquire power to the extent that they provide resources critical to the organization and that power affects resource allocations within organizations in so far as the resource is critical to the subunits and scarce within the organization. Departmental power is found to be most highly correlated with the department's ability to obtain outside grants and contracts, with national prestige and the relative size of the graduate program following closely in importance. Power is used most in the allocation of graduate university fellowships, the most critical and scarce resource, and is unrelated to the allocation of summer faculty fellowships, the least critical and scarce resource.”

Gerald R. Salancik

Gerald R. Salancik, and Jeffrey Pfeffer. "The bases and use of power in organizational decision making: The case of a university." Administrative Science Quarterly (1974): 453-473; p. 454; Abstract.

Decision , Universe , Summer

“This article outlines a social information processing approach to explain job attitudes. In comparison with need-satisfaction and expectancy models of job attitudes and motivation, the social information processing perspective emphasizes the effects of context and the consequences of past choices, rather than individual predispositions and rational decision-making processes. When an individual develops statements about attitudes or needs, he or she uses social information - information about past behavior and about what others think. The process of attributing attitudes or needs from behavior is itself affected by commitment processes, by the saliency and relevance of information, and by the need to develop socially acceptable and legitimate rationalizations for actions. Both attitudes and need statements, as well as characterizations of jobs, are affected by informational social influence. The implications of the social information processing perspective for organization development efforts and programs of job redesign are discussed.”

Gerald R. Salancik

Source: A social information processing approach to job attitudes and task design. 1978, p. 224; Abstract

Behavior , Motivation , Thinking , Decision

“The theme of this book, and the underlying premise of the external perspective on organizations, is that organizational activities and outcomes are accounted for by the context in which the organization is embedded.”

Gerald R. Salancik

2003; 39
The External Control of Organizations, 1978

Books

“The criticality of a resource can be measured as the ability of an organization to function in the absence of the resource or in the absence of the market for the output.”

Gerald R. Salancik

Source: The External Control of Organizations, 1978, p. 46

“The most frequently encountered view of commitment in organizations is one having to do with an individual's psychological bond to the organization.”

Gerald R. Salancik

Barry M. Staw & ‎Gerald R. Salancik (1977). New directions in organizational behavior. p. 2

“People as adaptive organisms adjust their behavior and beliefs to the social context and to the reality of their own past and present behavior and situation.”

Gerald R. Salancik

Source: A social information processing approach to job attitudes and task design. 1978, p. 226

People , Behavior , Reality , Past