Organization behavior and analysis
Q.1. Hofstede culture theory in Sony Ericsson
In the world of business, many companies have their own organizational culture, and Sony Ericsson is not an exception. An organizational culture is a group of internal values and behaviors in any organization, and this involves experiences, ways of thinking, beliefs, and future expectations in an organization. This organizational culture has been an essential factor for driving behavior, decision making, and also in shaping the management style of Sony Ericsson. The organization culture of this company does not require its employees to follow strict dress code or office timings, but rather the employees of the company must abide by business ethics and code of conduct (Tran, 2014). The organizational culture is more concerned with employee satisfaction. This organization makes use of the Hofstede culture theory, and this is used in the analysis of the corporate culture. This model has been applied in the Ericsson organization in different dimensions of the organizational culture, which is used in defining the style of management in an organization. This theory is involved in the process-oriented and goal-oriented process, which are concerned with the effectiveness of the organization. The process-oriented culture is the means or rather how work is conducted in an organization. On the other hand, result-oriented culture emphasis is placed on the goals of the organization. Through this, the employees are out to achieve specific organizational goals despite the involvement of substantial risk (Merkin, 2006).
This Hofstede theory is in differentiating the parochial from the professionality of the employees. This theory reflects both the internal and external frame of the organization, and the identity of employees is with the immediate manager, especially with the local culture. Employees within the literature are internally focused and directed and also involves robust social control. The professional learning in the organization identifies employees by the profession and content of work. This theory is also applied in the communication climate of the organization where the open and closed system determines the communication climate. The open system welcomes new employees, and the belief is that everyone fits well in the organization. The close system, on the other hand, makes it difficult for employees to join, and it is believed that only a certain kind of individual may fit in the organization. This theory is also applied in the structuring, control, and discipline in the organization. It may involve either tight control or lose control, where strict control is characterized by seriousness and punctuality. In contrast, loose control includes casual and improvisation, and this makes the Ericsson company apply free power since banks and pharmaceutical companies mostly use tight control. The theory can also be applied when dealing with the customers where normative and pragmatic culture can be used, among others.
The Hofstede theory has faced various criticism where it was argued that it failed to recognize the diversity in the analysis of its culture, which explained that there are multiple, dissenting, and emergent cultures in an organization. This theory was also criticized on the ground of its one company approach since its analysis supposed that a single IBM culture could be used to make inferences about the entire worldwide organizational cultures and is faced by masculinity criticism (An and Kim, 2007). Later studies proved that one company could not be used to make inferences about the entire worldwide organization cultures. Through this, the Ericsson company, through its Hofstede model theory, acknowledged the presence of diversity within and between the units of the same organization.
References
An, D., and Kim, S., 2007. Relating Hofstede’s masculinity dimension to gender role portrayals in advertising. International Marketing Review.
Merkin, R.S., 2006. Uncertainty avoidance and facework: A test of the Hofstede model. International Journal of Intercultural Relations, 30(2), pp.213-228.
Tran, B., 2014. Ethos, pathos, and logos of doing business abroad: Geert Hofstede’s five dimensions of national culture on transcultural marketing. In Transcultural Marketing for Incremental and Radical Innovation (pp. 255-280). IGI Global.
Q.2. Update of organizational culture by use of organizational learning theories and employee empowerment theory
Being a senior manager in the Sony Ericsson company, culture change is essential for the organization to promote employee empowerment. The senior manager should come up with employee empowerment theory and learning theory to help improve organizational culture in the company since good and appropriate corporate culture helps promote the economic growth of the company. The manager can update the company’s corporate culture by use of Kotter’s theory. This theory involves a transformational process that helps prevent failure of business organization. It achieves this by preparing the organization to accept a change and keeps the level of complacency as low as possible, and this makes sense of urgency prominent. An organizational shift in the telecommunication industry is characterized by a high uncertainty level in the transformational process, and this level of uncertainty in the company caused for culture change in the company and Kotter’s theory. I will use the organizational learning theory where I will improve the company by gaining experience and using that experience to create knowledge and then transferring this knowledge within the organization to strengthen the organization by creating, retaining, and moving the understanding. This organization learning will involve conceiving, acting, and reflecting, and this reflection is what facilitates learning. The organizational learning theory occurs when people in a company interact while finding solutions to the problems affecting the company (Pollack and Pollack, 2015). This theory will help stress on the importance of developing a learning culture within the organization, and the organization achieves this by developing a culture that prizes knowledge sharing, the manager can also encourage employees at all levels to continue their education regularly and also allowing individuals and teams to challenge the status quo of the organization. This organizational learning will help increase employee satisfaction and also boosts productivity, profits, and efficiency. This will help improve the company’s growth. Through this theory, leaders are developed at all levels as the individuals of different levels come together to find solutions for the company. This theory will increase the ability of the company to react quickly to fast-changing market conditions.Through the formation of leaders at different levels will create an environment where all employees are teachers and students, and this promotes the equal exchange of information that allows each person to contribute substantially. The company will also embrace the lessons that are learned from the failure, and this study makes the organization have more knowledge about best practices, and this makes the company adapt more. I will also use the employee empowerment theory where I will come up with various ways that will empower and motivate my employees (Appelbaum et al., 2012) In empowering the employees I will also introduce education and knowledge delivery to my employees thus equipping the employees with necessary skills that will be of great help in running the activities of the company effectively, and this promotes the company’s economic growth. This employee empowerment theory will give employees a certain degree of autonomy and responsibility for decision making regarding their specific organizational tasks. Empowerment to employees will be achieved by providing employees with access to information, the company’s resources, support, and also the opportunity to learn and develop. This empowerment results from the best customer service, and Ericsson is not an exception among other companies like Zappos. Important critiques have resulted from culture change like, for instance, ideological oppression. The ideology critique prevents the company from knowing who and what matters in a company, and this ideology results from unjust structures, and to promote meaningful social change in the company under the conditions of ideological oppression, the company must clearly understand the connection between epistemic and economic dimensions of injustice. This is difficult to achieve since most affected people are ignorant and so to avoid this, the company should disrupt and replace the cultural ideology (Celikates,2016). This ideology critique should be able to address normative challenges, methodological challenges, a critical challenge, among other problems. Culture change in Ericsson company involved defining identifying desired values and behavior, connecting culture and accountability, and also align learning with the brand. The company should also measure its efforts, among others, in an effective change of the organizational culture.
References
Appelbaum, S.H., Habashy, S., Malo, J.L., and Shafiq, H., 2012. Back to the future: revisiting Kotter’s 1996 change model. Journal of Management Development.
Celikates, R., 2006. From critical social theory to a communicative method of critique: On the critique of ideology after the pragmatic turn. Constellations, 13(1), pp.21-40.
Pollack, J., and Pollack, R., 2015. Using Kotter’s eight stage process to manage an organizational change program: Presentation and practice. Systemic Practice and Action Research, 28(1), pp.51-66.
Q.3. Belbin’s team role in solving issues
Teamwork in the senior management team is the most significant way of resolving problems that can affect the company. The Ericsson company can apply the Belbin’s team in solving its problems where team worker will help the team to gel using their versatility in identifying the work required and complete it on behave of the team this promotes corporation, perception, and also diplomatic (Yeh et al., 2006). This team also acts as a shaper and provides the necessary drive to ensure that the team keeps moving and ensures that it does not lose focus, and this makes the company thrive even on pressure, and this makes the company overcome obstacles. This team also makes sure that the company’s strategies are carried out efficiently. It is also used at the end of a task to polish and scrutinize the work for errors, thus subjecting it to the highest standards of quality. In making effective use of teamwork, the company can use either organic structure or bureaucratic structure depending on the organizational structure used by the company. The natural structure is characterized by an extremely flat reporting structure within an organization where interactions among the employees tend to be horizontal across the organization, rather than vertically between layers of managers and their direct reports. A bureaucratic structure, on the other hand, involves a hierarchical organization with the management where there are clearly ordered levels of management in which lower levels are subordinate and are answerable to higher levels. It also has various characteristics that define it, including division and specialization of labor, technical competence guidelines, among others. The most favorable structure is the bureaucratic structure informing teamwork where the subordinate is answerable to higher levels, and this promotes accountability, predictability, and job security, among others( Prusak, 2011). The culture of this structure is based on impersonal relationships and discourages favoritism since every individual has an equal chance to prosper. This structure promotes the effective use of teamwork, and this helps solve issues effectively in the company. It also enhances the efficiency of administrative structure to achieve effective delivery of services, thus resulting in a paradigm shift in the boundaries of public administration in shifting from one theory to the other. The organic structure also forms good teamwork since all the employees are on the same level with their bosses, and information transfer is done immediately and effectively since you are all in the same level (Ramezan,2011). This structure improves the morale of the employees and also increases their commitment. It also brings employees close to each other since they are not divided within the organization, and this makes them work towards a collective achievement through their teamwork and solution to problems affecting the company are easily provided since the individuals have equal opportunity in giving their views. These issues in the company are solved with ease. These two structures are faced by criticism where bureaucracy is viewed to promote excessive rules, regulations, and paperwork that brings interagency conflict. Tasks are also duplicated by various agencies that lead to too much waste, and growth is challenging to check, and this leads to a lack of accountability. To solve these critiques, the company should eliminate paperwork, empower people, and always know your priorities, among others.
References
Prusak, L., 2011. Building a collaborative enterprise. Harvard Business Review, 89(7-8), pp.94-101.
Ramezan, M., 2011. Intellectual capital and organic organizational structure in the knowledge society: How are these concepts related?. International Journal of Information Management, 31(1), pp.88-95.
Yeh, E., Smith, C., Jennings, C., and Castro, N., 2006. Team building: a 3‐dimensional teamwork model. Team Performance Management: An International Journal.