Organizational Systematics [microform] : Toward a Classification Scheme for Postsecondary Institutions. ASHE 1984 Annual Meeting Paper / Robert M. Hendrickson and Jeffrey P. Bartkovich

Organizational systematics were applied to a classification scheme for postsecondary institutions using a combined phyletic-phenetic approach. Nine characteristics of organizational structure were operationalized for the college setting: institutional autonomy, centralized decision making, functional specialization, effective participation, formalized procedures, and four measures of organizational configuration, including hierarchy of control and division of labor. A second set of characteristics consisted of 23 institutional attributes that are commonly used to describe the diversity of colleges, including such items as control and faculty and student size. Data were collected from 150 colleges. Factor analytic techniques were employed, and 16 taxonomic clusters were identified as representing optimally homogeneous groups of institutions. The phyletic approach based on decision-making authority and functional responsibilities developed a classification scheme, composed of four institutional types: bureaucratic, bureaucratic/academic, academic/bureaucratic, and academic. A numerical phenetic analysis identified four factors: decision-making authority, functional differentiation, administrative configuration, and operational procedures. A questionnaire is appended. (SW)