Comprehensive exam

MPA Comprehensive Examination – Spring 2020

Student Name: Eric Neal

Important Message - Plagiarism

The strength of Sam Houston State University depends on academic and personal integrity. In this comprehensive examination, you must be honest and truthful. To this end, your written work is expected to be devoid of plagiarism. Plagiarism is the use of someone else’s work, words, or ideas as if they were your own. Here are three reasons why you must not plagiarize:

1. By far the deepest consequence to plagiarizing is the detriment to your intellectual and moral development: you will not learn anything and your ethics will be corrupted.

2. You must give credit where it is due, but adding your own evaluation and reflection will get you higher grades. Using and citing standard dictionaries and encyclopedia’s, such as Wikipedia, for graduate level concepts is highly discouraged.

3. Sam Houston State University punishes academic dishonesty. The most common penalty is suspension from the university, but students caught plagiarizing are also subject to lowered or failing grades as well as the possibility of expulsion.

Please be sure to review the Sam Houston State University Code of Student Conduct and Discipline, which is available in the Student Guidelines. A more in-depth discussion about using sources and avoiding plagiarism is available on the Purdue Online Writing Law website. If you have any questions about plagiarism, be sure to ask your professors.

Instructions:

· Provide your answer to each exam question in separate Word documents, one file per question, with the file title: lastname firstinitial Subject (e.g. Houston S Ethics in Government).

· In the word document, type your name and subject title in the Header (e.g. Sam Houston Area I – Public Service Perspective: PADM 5388 Ethics in Government).

· Format: typed, double-spaced, 1” margins, Times Roman or similar font, 12 pt.; parenthetical method of documentation with a Works Cited section per APA Style Manual or similar style manual.

· Length: minimum 7 pages for each question (except POLS 5377 Scope and Methods of Political Science). You do not need to re-state the exam questions in your answer.

· Due Date: responses must be submitted to Dr. Wen-Jiun Wang ([email protected]) and Administrative Associate Belinda Myers ([email protected]) by email no later than Monday, April 6th, 2020 by 9 AM CST.

See next page

Area II. Public Management: PADM 5384 Organizational Theory & Behavior

Classical Organization and Management theorists sought the “one best way” to organize and manage an organization. That is, they sought to identify universal principles of organization and management that can be applied to any organization.

For example, Luther Gulick asked, “What is the work of the chief executive? What does he do?”” He replied, “The answer is POSDCORB” (2011. “Notes on the Theory of Organization,” in Classics of Organization Theory, seventh edition, edited by Jay M Shafritz, J. Steven Ott, and Yong Suk Jang. Wadsworth Cengage Learning, p. 90. Also, see Tompkins, ch. 6, p. 106-112).

Question: To what degree did subsequent organization and management theories support or counter Gulick’s answer?

In answering the above question, first define and explain PASDCORB from Gulick’s work (approximately 1 page). Then, make an argument and provide evidence for your argument from each of the following schools and associated theorists (approximately 1 page each):

· Pre-Human Relations School - Mary Parker Follett;

· Human Relations School - Elton Mayo & Fritz Roethlisberger;

· Natural Systems Perspective - Chester I Barnard;

· Structural-Functional Theory - Robert Merton, Philip Selznick, Peter Blau and W Richard Scott; and,

· Open Systems Perspective Daniel Katz and Robert L Kahn, James D Thompson, Tom Burns and G M Stalker.

This question requires you to make a comparison between Gulick’s approach to public management and organization and each of these subsequent organizational theories.

Be sure to cite the textbooks we used in class and any other sources you use in supporting your argument.

CRITERIA

I am attempting to see how each student thinks a Classical Organizational/Management theorists is compatible with subsequent schools of thought in organizational theory and behavior. In support of the student’s thesis statement, I am looking for the student to:

· Explain Gulick’s approach to public management;

· Explain each of the subsequent theories;

· Provide a strong argument in support of their argument drawing upon the works of each theorist.