Managing the Chaos and Complexities of Informal Organizations for the Effectiveness of Schools as Formal Organizations

Abstract

Informal organizations in education are those groups or unions that are spontaneously formed within the educational institutions by the members of staff, students and tradesmen for the realization of their identified goals. Those groups, in spite of their advantages, are chaotic and complex in nature as they are bound to bringing about frustration to the top or line mangers of the schools, encourage negativism, generate inter-personal and group rivalries, resist changes, cause harassment to certain employees, promote rumor mongering and promote dissatisfaction among employees. All of these deter the smooth operation and management of schools which if care is not properly taken may result to institutional entropy. The chapter puts forward some future trends for managing complexity of informal organizations by contending that, educational managers should employ approaches of cooptation, divide and rule, control of information, control of reward, displacement and control of meeting for the management of those groups.