ledge of such people in the decision making process. The pace of technology change is often requiring organizations to constantly be changing to keep up. Robbins et al. view communications technology as having particular influence on organizational design. Communication and the exchange of information among organizational members is no longer constrained by geography or time. And elimination of these physical and time constraints means that organizations no longer need to be structured solely to facilitate information flows and work activities (2000: 380). Thus organizational design can move away formalized structures designs that once where needed to have efficient information, flows to less formalized structures that facilitate innovation.Kilmann et al. state in order to be effective in fast-changing environments, design needs to be either more frequent or more revolutionary in the magnitude of its proposed (1976: 7). Ideally an organization striving to stay effective should be constantly evolving structure to find form that best suits its environment. A structure termed by Robbins et al. as a learning organization fulfils this. Robbins et al define a learning organization as an organization that has developed the continuous capacity to adapt and change because all members take an active role in identifying and resolving work-related issues (2000: 376).This essay has only touched on two aspects of the changing environment an the effects they have on organizational structure however it is clear that organizations can not remain static and hope to remain effective. Effective organizations are defined as being noteworthy, or in other words more innovative than other organizations. The only way to be innovative in organizational structure is to move forward into designs that take advantage of environmental changes and forces of the 21st century. These are generally less formalized than traditional structures as they are adaptive...
