Acknowledging that choices among alternative approaches to planning, job design, communications systems, etc., should take into account organization and human variables seems logical and may appear obvious (though the number of organizations in which illogical choices have been made is large). Not so obvious, however, is the fact that there are logical linkages among the integrative mechanisms themselves.
For example, the choice of a particular approach to planning cannot and should not be made independently of the approach to designing jobs or distributing rewards in the organization. Instead, in an effective administrative system, planning is complemented by job design, which in turn fits logically with the reward system, etc. Conversely, many problems in modern organizations are directly traceable to inconsistencies among the component parts of the administrative system-approaches in one area simply do not fit with, or even work at cross-purposes to, administrative efforts in other areas. The need for a high-quality fit among the components in an administrative system is well illustrated in the following (real-life) example where the inconsistency between planning and control is glaring.
