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The concept of organizational goals, like the concepts of power, authority, or leadership, has been unusually resistant to precise, unambiguous definition. Yet a definition of goals is necessary and unavoidable in organizational analysis. Organizations are established to do something; they perform work directed toward some end.

— Charles Perrow

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More quotes by Charles Perrow

Technology is a technique or complex of techniques employed to alter “materials” (human or nonhuman, mental or physical) in an anticipated manner.

For many purposes of organizational analysis technology might not be an independent variable but a dependent one.

Charles Perrow (1967)

People's attitudes are shaped at least as much by the organization in which they work as by their pre-existing attitudes.

The essence of the normal accident [is] the interaction of multiple failures that are not in a direct operational sequence.

Apparent leadership problems are often problems of organizational structure.

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Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Charles Perrow (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.