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The literature on organization behavior suggests four types of influences on domain consensus of organizations: (1) organizational design, (2) routine patterns of technical interorganizational contacts, (3) persuasive efforts by organizational leaders, and (4) organizational environment. In this study, conducted prior to the phase-out of health systems agencies (HSAs) in Alabama by the governor, responses from questionnaires to administrators of HSAs and hospitals in the state were used to compute a measure of HSA domain consensus. This measure served as the dependent variable in a regression analysis, with measures of the four types of influences as independent variables. The analysis suggests that one major influence on domain consensus was persuasion by HSA officials, particularly subtle, long-term efforts; a second major influence was organizational environment, specifically the experience and training of hospital administrators interacting with HSAs.

In an era when schools and teachers often seem to operate at one hundred miles an hour, Teaching Backwards offers a more reflective and measured approach to teaching and learning. Where many teachers focus on delivering content in a linear fashion, those who teach backwards start with the end in mind. This means that they know in advance what levels of knowledge, attitude, skills and habits they expect their learners to achieve, they define and demystify ambitious goals, and they establish their students' starting points before they start to plan and teach. Teaching Backwards ensures that lear

This article speculates that the applicability of specific models of interorganizational relations for public agencies may be linked to the stage of the organizational life cycle in which a particular agency is located. Five classes of models are examined, each of which implies different types of interorganizational problems and different amounts of freedom for public administrators to handle these problems. It is suggested that administrative freedom of action in interorganizational relations is at the maximum near the "midlife" of public organizations, at the minimum near their "birth " and "death. "

The authors suggest that most existing attempts to classify interorganiza‐tional environments are founded on inappropriate assumptions concerning human action, particularly when such frameworks are applied to public‐sector settings. Proceeding from that contention, the authors apply the concepts of referent organizations and rule sets to develop an alternative typology of interorganizational environments. The resulting matrix suggests four distinct types of interorganizational environments: (1) the natural market, (2) the structured market, (3) the bureaucratic environment, and (4) the associative environment. An examination of these environments and their relevance for public‐sector organizations suggests that rule‐based conceptions of interorganizational action that take into account the role of referent organizations are more consistent with traditional democratic theory than are purely market‐based conceptions of action. The alternative framework presented in this paper also has useful implications for both practical public administration, and especially for general concepts of public policy.