A Review on the Models of Organizational Effectiveness: A Look at Cameron's Model In

AbstractOrganizational effectiveness is the main concern of all higher education institutes. Over the years there have been many different models of effectiveness along with the criteria for measuring organizational effectiveness. In this paper, four main models of organizational effectiveness namely the goal approach, the system resource approach, the process approach and the strategic constituency approach are reviewed. Moreover, this paper introduces several models of organizational effectiveness in higher education. Then, a brief review is made on some empirical studies that used the Cameron's (1978) model of organizational effectiveness. In the end, the paper suggests that Cameron's (1978) model seems the most appropriate for studying organizational effectiveness in higher education.Keywords: Cameron's (1978) model, Higher education, Organizational effectiveness model1. Organizational EffectivenessIn the 1980s, organizational effectiveness became more prominent and switched to being a concept from the status of a construct (Henry, 2011). This concept is related to issues such as the ability of an organization to access and absorb resources and consequently achieve its aims (Federman, 2006). As Gigliotti (1987) said, a unit which is individually ineffective in terms of cooperation with the rest of the organization is doomed to failure. Cameron (1978) pointed out that organizational effectiveness is the proficiency of the organization at having access to the essential resources. However, McCann (2004) noted it as the criterion of the organization's successful fulfillment of their purposes through core strategies.initwatanakhun's (1998) study illustrated that organizational effectiveness should focus on human resources and organizations and help individuals to achieve skills and self-esteem in order to control the new environment and find security and support. As Baker and Branch (2002) pointed out, the organizations, laboratories and universities that are involved in scientific researches suffer most, because they have to present effective management, behave more responsibly, and do jobs with limited resources in order to improve their effectiveness. Although willing to improve their effectiveness, the managers in these organizations first see themselves as scientists and then managers. However, they have to deal with the problems of the organization and system effectiveness. They are obliged to be innovative in their research, conduct, sponsorship as well as design and management of their organizations.In the literature, there is not a single model of organizational effectiveness to fit all organizations. According to Balduck and Buelens (2008), the issue of effectiveness in organizations revolves round four main approaches: the system resource approach, the goal approach, the strategic constituency approach and the internal process approach. These are effective and efficient approaches which are contingent upon the type of situation to arise. This paper deals with the characteristics of the four models of organizational effectiveness as referred to below.2. Main Models of Organizational Effectiveness2.1 The Goal ApproachThe first extensively used approach in organizational effectiveness is the goal approach. Its focus is on theoutput to figure out the essential operating objectives like profit, innovation and finally product quality (Schermerhorn, Hunt, R. N. Osborn, & R. Osborn, 2004). There are some basic assumptions for the goal approach. One of them is that there should be a general agreement on the specific goals and the people involved should feel committed to fulfilling them. The next assumption is that the number of goals is limited and achieving them requires certain indispensable resources (Robbins, 2003). As Altschuld and Zheng (1995) said the weakened significance of the goal-based approach for the evaluation of the effectiveness of research organizations and academic establishments is depicted in the accurate and clear measurement of the results. …