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2.19.3 Components of a system The major components of a system are i)
Inputs: No social structure is self-sufficient or self-contained. All need resources and raw materials from the environment to survive. This importation of energy
is typically referred to as input. Inhuman service organizations,
input refers to clients to be served and the resources available to serve them. The various human,
materials, financial, equipment, and informational resources required to produce goods and services. ii)
Transformation processes Open systems use the energy available to them to transform or reorganize raw materials received as input. Clients represent the raw materials that (hopefully) become transformed from individuals or families with problems to individuals or families in which problems have been alleviated or resolved. These refer to the organization’s managerial and technological abilities that are applied to convert inputs into outputs. iii)
Outputs: Open systems export some product into the environment. A client who has completed all the services prescribed represents this product inhuman service organizations. The outputs include the products, services, and other outcomes produced by the organization. iv)
Feedback: information about results and organizational status relative to its environment. vb Sub-systems:b The parts that makeup the whole of a system are called subsystems.
And each system, in turn, maybe a subsystem of a still larger whole. Thus, a department is a subsystem of a plant, which maybe a subsystem of a company, which maybe a subsystem
of a conglomerate or industry, which is a subsystem of the economy as a whole, which is a subsystem of the world system. From such a perspective, the manager is able to seethe needs and operations of various departments as part of a large whole. vi)
Synergy: Synergy means that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
In organisational terms, synergy means that as separate departments within an organization cooperate and interact, they become more productive than if they had acted in isolation. For example, it is obviously more efficient for each department in a small firm to deal with one financing department than for each department to have a separate financing department of its own. vii)
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