This conceptual work addresses organizations' responses to management improvement efforts, offering a practical approach for ensuring desired results when making improvements in managing organizations. In examinations of three methodologies for organizational improvement -- strategic planning, management by objective, and executive development -- this exceptional book analyzes the critical factors that influence change. The ground-breaking hypothesis evolved from this research affords executives rational means for planning changes in their organizations. Changing Bureaucracies: Understanding the Organization Before Selecting the Approach will be invaluable to management personnel in federal, state, and local governments, as well as executives in the private business sector. In addition, senior undergraduate and graduate level students of public administration, political science, government, business administration, and economics will gain vital insights into successful approaches to organizational changes. Book jacket.