Organization

Define Organizational Culture What Is meant by Organizational Culture? Characteristics of Organizational Culture ? Positive (good) and Negative (bad) Provide relevant examples Research can be done by referring to similar researches that were conducted previously. The sources of references can be obtained from books, Journals, magazines or newspapers. Related research materials such as graphs, charts or pictures can also be used to support a statement. Students are also encouraged to give their opinions and their own understanding of the research topic.

Provide examples of outcomes from previous researches (done by another searcher) regarding topics that are similar or almost similar. – relationship between Organizational Culture and the success or failure of an organization. Gather the information needed from books, magazines, newspapers or Journals relevant to the topic being discussed. From the gathered information, identify how elements of Organizational Culture affect the success or failure of an organization. Provide examples. 1 State the outcome of the research based on the gathered Information.

Relate between the theories learned with the real situation. Is It true Organizational Culture Is a factor that determines the success and failure of an organization? Yes or No Provide a conclusion from the overall research and give your suggestions for the development of a better Organizational Culture to enhance the success of the organization. Format for preparing the assignment: Paper Use ћwhite-bond” quality paper Paper size : AAA (210 mm x 297 mm) Paper weight : 80 MGM Method of typing The text should be typed on one side of the page only.

For text : black-colored ribbon or ink cartridge that produces an even black color. For diagrams, tables and charts : black or colored ink. Line Spacing For text : double-spacing For references (refer vii), appendices and tables: single-spacing Font Times New Roman Size: 12 2 Margin Left margin : at least 4. 0 CM (1. 5″) Top, bottom and right margin : 2. 5 CM (1. 0″) Section New major sections must begin on a new page. A new paragraph must begin with a ћtab” from the left margin. V) Page numbering Excerpts, references, appendices and tables a) In the text.

If an excerpt is taken from a reference material, the reference must be stated. Ex : Stoner and Yankee define strategy as, “… The broad program for defining and achieving an organization”s objectives; the organization”s response to its environment over time. ” (Stoner and Yankee, 1986) b) List of References At the end of the assignments, all references or bibliography must be stated in alphabetical order according to the name of the author. Book:Name of author.

Introduction

According to moral concepts and judgment, corporate ethics is the study and assessment of business decision making.  Top managers must be able to address situations and issues such as the company’s obligations and responsibilities not only to the company and its employees but to the people that they serve.

In the past, there have been numerous accounts of conflicts on ethical grounds either between management and the people the company employs, the company’s virtue and their clientele or the community as a whole. This came about because of the lack of stability with regards to deciding what is morally or ethically right and wrong. Because of the changing and evolving world and laws of limitations there are companies that adhere to “ For example, multinational corporations operate in countries where bribery, sexual harassment, racial discrimination, and lack of concern for the environment are neither illegal nor unethical or unusual (The Free Dictionary, 2010).”

Top management and owners of the company will have to decide which path to take. Should they take the path that means having to neglect the rights of other people and the betterment of the country’s economical and environmental structure only to gain itself financial wealth and stability, or choose and decide on what is morally and ethically practical to both the company and the people it involves, be it the company workers or the company’s clients.

Developed Models Ethical Performance and Decision Making

According to Dennis Wittmer of University of Denver, in the research essay titled “Developing a Behavioral Model for Ethical Decision Making in Organizations:  Conceptual and Empirical Research,” trust is important amongst everyone in making business decisions as well as the growth, development and success of the company. Wittmer’s research essay, he mentioned James Rest who contributed some concepts and theories on Business Ethics and Behavior.

James Rest, Linda Trevino, Thomas Jones

According to Wittmer’s research on James Rest, he developed a model that can answer “a three-part division for studying ethical behavior:  moral thought, moral emotion, and moral behavior (Wittmer). Moral thought is having the ability to think of what is right, proper and just. Moral emotion is the inner feeling of the person. And moral behaviour is the act or action of doing something right, proper and just regardless of who is watching and evaluating your performance.  “According to this three-fold scheme, behavior is studied by behaviorist psychologists, moral thinking is studied by cognitive-developmentalists, and moral emotion or affect is studied typically by psychoanalysts (Wittmer).

On the essay, Wittmer also discussed about the model contributions of Linda Trevino.  Her proposed theory on ethical behavior is the “interactionist.” This model assumes individual and situational variables. Treveno’s model points at the density of ethical decisions.  Individual variables differ from the persons ego, dependency on his field and his control of self. Situational variables can range from the organizational or environmental culture to company reinforcement or any thing that may be called or fall under the that category.

Thomas Jones, one of the contributors of Ethical behavior mentioned in Wittmer’s essay says, that I Jones’s model he talks and argues about a person having “moral intensity” in making ethical decisions.  It takes a lot of good character, judgment and determination for a leader to be able to do and make the right decision.

Conclusion

As Human Beings, it is hard to be able to make the right decision. We sometimes wonder what the best and just thing to do. Our emotions and thought normally does not coincide and we then are caught in a crossroads. However, with the knowledge that we know and the free will that was given to us, we are given the freedom to choose what path to take and decision to make.  This is the reason why there have be many attempts and continuous research on ethical behavior and corporate governance.

Resources

The Free Dictionary. (2010). “ Business Ethics.” Retrieved June 5, 2010, from http://encyclopedia2.thefreedictionary.com/Corporate+ethics.

Wittmer, D. P. (n.d.). ” Developing a Behavioral Model for Ethical Decision Making in Organizations:  Conceptual and Empirical Research.” Retrieved June 2, 2010, from https://portfolio.du.edu/portfolio/getportfoliofile?fiuid=37393

Exxon mobil organizational structure

Exxon Mobil Corporation makes its unparalleled distinction through an exceptional, organizational structure based on functionality. Each of the company’s line of business companies oversees a targeted group of operations around the operational stations in the world with an overseeing president at the head and broad authority to run itself. ExxonMobil’s functional structure strategy is through the focus of a number of refineries into regional clusters, which in turn give the company enhanced operational and supply maximization.

Key refining stations are based on the Gulf Coast in the United States, the northwest of Europe, Japan as well as in Southeast Asia. Together, these stations characterize 60 percent of ExxonMobil’s overall refining power. Besides this, over 80 percent of the company’s refineries are incorporated with chemical or lubes operations providing the company its long standing competitive advantages founded on the enhanced feedstock suppleness and minor site-operational costs. ExxonMobil’s inventive applications and championing strategy for technological advancements for competitiveness are one of the leading in the energy industry.

ExxonMobil management and corporate structure

As one of the analysts and authors unveiled, One of the methods used by Exxon to gauge alignment success is the Balanced Scorecard system. Balanced Scorecard, a measurement system that was developed in the 1990s by Robert Kaplan and David Norton, requires every action to answer to established corporate vision or goals. It’s based on the concept that you can’t improve what you can’t measure (Duvall 4). Exxon is mainly managed a Board of Directors though most of the power is given to the Chief Executive Officer (CEO) while the Board take the initiative and function independently in most of the vital matters affecting the company.

The effectiveness of the management team and Board of Directors is based on the ability to designate an individual who remains fully responsible to make all operations succeed. In most cases the chairman of the board may be a top manager in another company with a highly demanding responsibility and ExxonMobil knows this well enough to having support the management model of having an independent nonexecutive chairman with a CEO in charge of matters at the company in the past.

As it may be widely known, this management model is not only employed by ExxonMobil but widely used by its competitors such as BP, Royal Dutch Shell, Petrobras and many others. However, with the changing industrial and company demands, change of management may have taken a new turn when ExxonMobil embraced the model of having one leader who would serve both as chairman and CEO while maintaining the flexibility to change this structure whenever deemed fit by the Board.

This would in turn ensure that the company maintained a workforce and management team that would be dedicated to the development and growth of the company. Besides the specialization and structural operational division of the company’s business units, ExxonMobil’s corporate structure exhibits apt managerial and administrative control. The company corporate unit management structure is based on differentiated control locations as well as segmentation.

In the Houston headquarters, the company controls and manages the five global upstream business units/companies i. e. Exploration, Development, Production, Gas Marketing, Chemical, Coal and Minerals, as well as the competitive Upstream Research unit. The company’s administrative offices and team based in Fairfax, Virginia was also charged with the responsibility of overseeing and managing the four downstream business units namely; Refining and Supply, Fuels Marketing, Research and Engineering as well as the company’s Lubricants ; Petroleum Specialties.

Today, even simplest form of labor like, our day-to-day domestic work, is divided between services like house maids, milkman, laundry revise, daycare, transport services, along with restaurants or food deliveries. Most of the times, we do not realism how the concept of division of labor is more central to our lives than we think. Right from the beginning of the human life, to this day of again super-computers, the division of labor has made all the difference. The division of labor brings in greater productivity of labor. If not for this productivity, today would have been only slightly different than the ice ages.

This basic need for division of labor comes from the human desire to lead a better life. According to Smith, part of what makes us human, Is our propensity to truck, barter, and exchange Items. If everyone were to produce everything they need, there would be very less scope for any sort of Innovation and a lot of time In would be wasted In changing tools and materials. But, with the help of the division of labor, leading to efficiencies and surpluses, each member of the society could trade the fruits of his/her labor for other objects that are needed.

This would result in the improvement of quality of life and a win-win situation. Division of labor creates specialized knowledge of a reticular task. It saves the laborer time as the time needed to adjust to new physical or mental frame works is eliminated. Doing the same thing over and over, leads to innovation in the methods and tools employed in the task. If not for the extensive form of division of labor, the world wouldn’t have been what it is today. The effective Dillon of labor Is limited by the market size.

A vendor, who supplies to the only geography he has access to, can delve the labor to only a certain extent because, as productively Increases with the Dillon of labor, a large market Is needed o consume the products that it gives rise to. Thus as Eng as he doesn’t have access to larger market, the further division of labor is meaningless. Over the last few centuries, the advances in technology gas connected the geographies all over the world and so, the accessing the markets of these geographies has become easier.

Thus, many businesses that were previously supplying to limited markets of villages and small cities are now spreading rapidly over parts of the nations and those supplying to parts for a nation are taking over the world. So, in order to increase earplugs and productivity also over tight competition from others of their kind, they need to go for greater extent of division of labor. The sustain in the world of tight competition, be It In the global or local scale, the division of labor has to make best use of available resources.

This Dillon of labor, Is based on cheaper and faster access to resources, local human talent, cost of manufacturing and consumer base, thus increasing their productivity. For example, a lot of companies located in might have their production units in china or software development in US, taking advantage of natural or human resources available the locality. This has given rise to division of labor geographically. Today, majority of businesses, have various parts of the same product manufactured in various parts of the world.

Also, we see many cities or various parts of world emerging as specialists in particular businesses. Now businesses are moving to Africa and India where they can find more consumers. The world has become a small village. Everyday, we see many huge companies shutdown after having failed sustain in the competition to cater to the changing need for services and products, and many new ones taking over the globe. Unlike the old times, today people don’t limit themselves to one particular Job, they look out for more Jobs that can fetch them more money.

So, the increase in productivity achieved by division of labor at one Job, helps them divert their resources elsewhere to earn additional revenue. Today the information technology may be decreasing the kind of information asymmetry that existed before. Division of labor is omnipresent, be it in political organizations where the government is divided into legislative, Judiciary and executive branches or in latherer systems, where we have different doctors for different ailments. Today, there are enormous number of types and many more are getting added each day.

Also, in today’s world, Adam Smith’s Division of Labor has got a new meaning with the division of labor between the humans and machines. The human intellectual skill combined with physical strength of the machines has changed our lives like never before. The computers, which are machines of one particular type have created wonders. They have created a major upheaval in the nature of human work. On one hand there is a division of labor between humans and Computer and on the other hand, there is a fast growing division of labor within humans who can and who cannot do valued work in the economy filled with computers. L] In the old times, the division of labor based on labor was widespread. The male population was supposed to earn the bread, and the female population was assigned to take care of domestic work. Unlike those days, today we see more and more women entering Jobs that were previously reserved for males. As the society is slowly coming out of self-imposed superstitions and restrictions regarding the granting equal rights and opportunities to females, the competition between male and female for the various Jobs is increasing.

Only the best suited for the Job, irrespective of the gender, get the Job. Thus, the gender based division of labor is losing its impact. This reinforces the statement of Adam Smith saying ‘Competition is the best influence for increasing productivity’. Everybody wants to live a better life. This best of everything. Minored to attract buyers with good quality products and services in this barter, and sustain in the competition with others, there is a need for greater radioactivity. And again comes the role of division of labor to achieve more productivity.

The company AirportConnection has been in business for over 20 years. Its goal is to provide quality limousine service at an affordable cost in order to simplify the lives of those whose work is hectic. The company aims to be professional in every aspect, and toward that end guarantees on-time service within the area it services. It services the Ronald Reagan Washington International Airport and Dulles International Airport, as well as several city locations within Virginia. It also offers connections to other cities such as Philadelphia, New York, Richmond and Baltimore.

They offer limousines of all types and sizes and that can handle different types of terrain. Their fleet ranges from three-passenger sedans to 20-passenger Hummers. The company is committed to expanding beyond the city limits, as is evident through its offering of connections to other cities. AirportConnection is a small company based in Silver Spring, Maryland. The structure of the organization was divided into three sections: financial, marketing, and human resource management.

Each department has its own mission, but one that is in keeping with the overall mission of the company, which is to provide luxurious and affordable service to working people. The role of the information technology intern in the company was relevant to the marketing and sales department. The World Wide Web is widely considered to be one of the most active and potentially rewarding marketplaces in existence. The company’s website is therefore considered a powerful marketing tool.

It is often the first impression that prospective customers have of the company, and it should reflect the professionalism and ease-of-use that the company would like to project as an integral part of its image. In keeping with this, its website provides a way for distant customers to contact representatives—from any city in the country (or world) that they happen to be located. Convenience is a large part of the mission of AirportConnection, and for this reason the company hired a technology intern to update the website and their database. The website needed to be simplified in order to promote more ease of use.

It was also necessary to create a more complete link between the website and the company’s data storage systems. The nature of the position was to provide assistance with the electronic gathering, sorting, and entry of data into their system in order to facilitate the accuracy and on-time service that they guarantee their customers. Reservation data from the website and other areas (such as phone orders) had to be transcribed and formatted for easy retrieval. The data was alphanumeric and needed to be posted, logged, or otherwise recorded and updated.

The database (Limo Anywhere 3. 1) training included an overview of the pages dedicated to the different categories of information that could be contained in the Limo Anywhere 3. 1 database. A lot of the training was done on managing the customers’ accounts. The pages dedicated to this contained information about the customer’s account balance, booking history, payment preferences, discounts, and preferred drivers. I was allowed to navigate through these fields, and learned how to create and retrieve information from incident logs, etc.

I was also trained in tracking information about flight arrivals, departures, and other general status information. A lot of my training came also from the books I read during that period, for example Start your own limousine service, New customer development program, and The business plan for your limousine service. The first two of these books was very informative in the area of conducting market research (p. 17), and some of the information I was able to use when creating the Google Adwords advertising campaign.

Though it was not possible to conduct primary research, I was able to use the internet to conduct some very valuable secondary research. Looking at the way other limousines companies were behaving and the types of customers they were targeting helped me in re-designing the website. It is also important to note that AirportConnection had already done a significant amount of market research on its own. Access to the reports, etc. also helped me gain ideas on how to fashion the website. The books also contained some valuable information on how, why, and when to update websites and what to include on them (Start your own, p. 38).

Signature Services are specific know-how, competencies and/or offers that you, your team or your business bring to your audience. They can include, but are not limited to, any intellectual capital (e.g., proprietary processes, unique models, specific systems etc.) that you create and name. To help you determine just what your Signature Services are, below are a few examples of clients of mine from a diverse group of industries, both personal and business:

1. Care 2 Communities turns converted shipping containers into sustainable health-care clinics in the developing world.
2. Income Store, a two-time Inc. 5000 designee, helps individuals, companies and private equity firms buy revenue-generating web­sites at two times earnings.
3. Donny Epstein, founder of the Epstein Institute, travels the world along with his wife, Jackie, treating titans of government and industry (including self-help superstar Tony Robbins) with his proprietary methods of healing. Donny is the creator of EPI Energetics and the developer of Network Spinal Analysis and the Reorganizational Healing and Living program.
4. The California Rangeland Trust is a nonprofit organization founded by a group of innovative cattlemen and cattlewomen in 1998 to conserve the open space, natural habitat and stewardship provided by California’s ranches.
5. Jeanne Bliss is founder and president of CustomerBliss and co-founder of The Customer Experience Professionals Association. Based on her extensive experience as a customer service executive in five Fortune 500 companies, she has created The Five Competencies: a proven framework to build your customer-driven growth engine.

Defining your Signature Services

Just by reading the examples above, you may already have a clear idea of what your personal, team or business Signature Services are. If you aren’t, make an inventory list of all the competencies you possess and services you offer. Then take a close look at each one, and see if you can articulate it more specifically, narrowly or uniquely as a Signature Service.

If you’re still stuck, try talking to a few of your clients and co-workers and asking them to add to your inventory list. They will often get to the heart of the issue immediately be describing exactly what you provide. Sometimes the hardest thing to see is what’s right in front of us.

Executives have Signature Services, too

A Signature Service is not just the purview of entrepreneurs and organiza­tions. Executives also have Signature Services, in the particular skill set or talents they bring to their organization. For example:

1. “I help individuals and teams who are experiencing confusion, iner­tia or lack of movement get to the heart of the matter quickly and find meaning through dialogue and actionable feedback.” — Leslie, vice president of HR at a Fortune 500 financial institution
2. “Managing complex, multicultural and multigeographic worldwide transformation projects.” — Nancy, chief innovation officer at a Fortune 500 high-tech company
3. “Planting seeds for the future in daily conversations and combining the ability to get people on the bus with the vision for where we are going.” — Stan, vice president of marketing at a leading internet company

Clarifying what your Signature Services are as an executive allows you to make stronger choices about where to spend your time, prioritize projects and surround yourself with others whose Signature Services complement your own.

Effective leadership unites and inspires individuals to use their knowledge, creativity, and skill to excel at meeting organizational goals. Institutional Effectiveness may be defined as the ongoing quest for quality and the demonstration of how well an institution is fulfilling its mission and realizing its vision. The institution may appreciate quality and effectiveness by employing a comprehensive system of planning and evaluation in the major aspects of the organization.

It provides documentation of planning, assessment, and the use of results in decision-making. That’s why institutional effectiveness is a leadership tool that intends to strengthen the quality of services, to produce a continuous cycle of improvement inside an organization and to monitor its effectiveness in achieving its mission and purposes. Accordingly, the institution collects and analyzes relevant data and uses this information in the institutional planning process as a basis for sustaining quality and self-improvement.

There is no one best way to assess institutional effectiveness, no certain formula described, that an institution must use for measuring or demonstrating its effectiveness, as “assessment efforts” vary among “different types of institutions” and “among institutions of the same type” (NEASC Policy Statement on Institutional Effectiveness, 1992). Successful assessment efforts depends on the institution’s mission and its available resources.

Every institution should have an Effectiveness Office having the task to coordinate and support evaluation activities and being involved with the development and implementation of a broad-based system consisting of integrated institutional effectiveness activities: coordinating the on-going strategic planning process – including the “establishment of priorities and implementation of action plans”, monitoring the “development and progress of the strategic plan”, “overseeing the generation of data, and reports for institutional research purposes” to improve planning and decision-making, to review and provide feedback on assessment plans and reports, overseeing the coordination and conducting of organization assessments and program reviews in ways that will “continuously improve the quality of services”. (Office of Institutional Planning, Research and Evaluation, New York).

All these activities are undertaken for the purpose of continuous program improvement and to insure institutional effectiveness. The strategic plan, which is another leadership tool, can be defined as an “answer to the question: How will the organization accomplish its goals? ” (MAP for Nonprofits, St. Paul, MN)

Strategic planning involves environmental scanning for external trends. It includes a variety of internal and external assessment activities, like: annual review of institutional vision and mission statements, review of the implementation report on the prior year’s operational plan and of other internal effectiveness indicators, assessment of progress in addressing recommendations resulting from strategic planning activities during previous years. The purpose of strategic planning is encouraging thinking about organization’s broad goals and priorities, and how well they are being achieved. The modern approach emphasizes “strategic thinking” or “strategic management”.

It regularly scans the organization’s external environment for significant changes, trying to understand the implications of these for programs, organization structures, staffing, etc. It is known that board policies or program priorities might change because of the planning process, but usually there is no slavish adherence to a plan, the document existing only as a guideline and changing as the world changes. Some of them though are never implemented, proving to be useless, because organizations are always faced with fast changing and difficult to predict environments. Some say that inside an institution there could be no official strategic plan document, as in this complex and rapidly changing world there should only be the process of “thinking strategically”.