deferrence between organisation and CoP

 

DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ORGANISATION AND COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE

 

Firstly I want to define Organization and Community Of Practice.

 

ORGANIZATION:

“An arrangement of people and resources working in a planned manner toward specified strategic goals. An organization can be any structured body such as a business, company or firm in the private or public sector, or in a nonprofit association”.(BNET 200?).

(Rick 200?) “Organization is the product of organized individuals all aiming for the same goal;all affecting each other simultaneously through their actions. They share the same resources and they all play on the same team”.

I can support these definitions, as organization is defined as a group of people who are managed in a systematic way 

for the achieving of their common assigned goals and which lead to the success of the organizational goal.

For example I worked for an organization in India called Maruti Suzuki where I am a member of that organization, my organization consist of group of people like sales executives, accountants, tele callers, EDP operators and managers ,these all people work together and managed by a higher authority to complete our assigned goals, like monthly targets and customers satisfaction. We all are working together to fulfill our individual goals and for the organization goal.

 

COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE (Cop):

 

“Communities of practice are group of people who share a concern or a passion for something they do and learn how to do it better as they interact regularly”.(Wenger 1991)

“Informal, self-organized, network of peers with diverse skills and experience in an area of practice or profession. Such groups are held together by the members desire to help others and the need to advance their own knowledge”.(Business Dictionary 200?)..

“A group of people who share a common passion for a subject can, through regular interaction and communication, improve their knowledge and expertise in a given topic area”(Vota,2008).

By these definition I can say that community of practice is a group of people who come to gather in regular period to learn or to share their knowledge for individual benefit.                                                   I want to support this by an example in my organization where I was working I looked after sales of four wheelers I don’t have any knowledge about the mechanical parts of them, one of my college who is from mechanical side came to me and asked to say some ma

rketing skills to him, I said I cant say all that in one day I asked him to meet me in lunch hour or after finish job and in return I asked him to make me learn about mechanical side of four wheeler we both agreed and started to discus about these things when ever we got time, till I read about Cop, I dint know that we are in Cop. The knowledge I got from him is very useful for me to implement in my organization and in my daily life.

My Conclusion:

After getting an idea about the organization and community of practice I can differentiate  between them.

 

DEFFERENCE BETWEEN ORGANIZATION AND COMMUNITY OF PRACTICE

 

·  Organization is a structured one, they consists of sales executives, accountants, managers, etc, where as Cop is an unstructured one.

·  There is an hierarchy of management in the organization like managers take the decisions and gives the guidance,  in Cop there is no hierarchy and no management .

·  Group member are bound to the orders and rules and regulations of the managers like in organization maintaining dress code, coming to office in a right time, there are no rules and regulations in Cop.

·  For sharing of knowledge or making learn about new things to staff is costly in organization, where as in Cop there is no need of cost for sharing of knowledge it is like charity.

·  Organizations have a goal and strategy, they are mostly  profit oriented. where as Cop don’t have any strategy and goal.

   

I came with an a diagram (fig.a.)to differentiate between Organization and Cop.

Fig a.

In this diagram organization is represented by triangle where the dots are the individuals which are been in systematically bounded and they are in hierarchal. where as Cop is represented by semi circle where individuals are unstructured and free to come in and go out. Ex: when I work in my organization iam bound by my rules and regulations and monitored by my higher managers and I have to be within my organization and when I discuss about my doubts and ideas with my colleges in lunch time without any rules and regulation and free to come and go  is community of practice.

 

Reference:

(BNET).sited http://dictionary.bnet.com/definition/Organization.html retrieved on (17-02-2009).

(Rick) sited  in. http://www.starcrusaders.com/self-management/article2680.htm retrieved on        (19-02-2009).

(Wenger 1991) sited in http://www.ewenger.com/theory/. Retrieved on (19-02-2009).

(Business Dictionary 200?) sited in. http://www.businessdictionary.com/definition/community-of-practice.html. retrieved on (19-02-2009).

(Vota,2008) sited in.http://wayan.com/community-of-practice/.retrived on (19-02-2009).