Description of Organization and Its Objectives - Paper Example

Business organization, strategy and corporate culture are fundamental issues that determine the success of any organization. Other considerations for the sustainability of operations include human resources management and resources mobilization. This study focuses on a chain store that began its operations as a small store dealing in groceries but after a period of aggressive expansion and strategic management of human capital attained the status of a global retailer with various overseas subsidiaries providing unmatched customer experience. The business was established on a firm operational principle of providing customers with high-quality products at low prices everywhere. Through product differentiation, the management of the company set out elaborate aggressive frameworks to venture into various product lines so that it offers the customers different product under one roof.

The founder of the business established fundamental premises around which the operations and management have much centred. He created a system in which leadership was to be reflected in the quality of service that the customers would get in the form of high value and best experience. The founder entrenched the concept of working together among stakeholders in the business to achieve low-cost living for buyers and enable them to actualize the value of saving while at the same time living a better life. The mission of the business is to endear itself to the hearts and minds of its workers as well as customers. The underpinning for this is the fact that the two groups of stakeholders play a critical role in determining the prosperity of the firm while its the mission is to help buyers to save money and live better.

The business considers it essential to help the buyers save their money by offering products at the relatively lower process than competitors. Cost leadership is at the centre of the company strategy that fast-tracks its objective of saving the customers money. It is a generic strategy through which the firm undertakes to do all within its ability to keep the products and services at every day low prices. By placing itself as a low price firm, the business greatly endears itself to the customers and increase its sales volume. Through large sales volume, the business can accumulate a higher aggregate from the minimum profits from a unit of sales. Also, through approaches such as using modern technology in logistics, communications and inventorying, the firm can reduce the expenses while maintaining lower prices for its commodities. All these activities are in line with the business objectives of always keeping operating costs low. It is only through reduced expenses that the company can retail products at lower prices, retain profitability and competitiveness. Another approach through which the firm keeps the price of its commodities low is striving to achieve economies of scale. Ideally, attaining economies of scale is a critical objective of the company which it uses to bargain for lower prices from suppliers and maintain a steady flow of high quality but cheap products in its stores everywhere. Furthermore, economies of scale allow the business to support high sales volume and reduce prices.

The firm ties its focus on higher sales volume to sustain low prices for its commodities to various strategies including market penetration and market development. These two ways result in a broader market base that results in increased sales volume. Conceptually, from a higher sales volume, even if the firm sells at reduced prices, they still manage to attain higher total profits and competitiveness. Market penetration included offering discounts on products, carrying out promotional activities and providing customers with exceptional packages. On the other hand, market development involves growing the market base by entering its non-traditional markets. The firm takes the products to where the customers can reach them conveniently as opposed to waiting for them to look for the business and products themselves.

The business embraces customer-centric management but without neglecting the human resources which it has accorded the title of associates. At the core of the administration is the open door policy in which the executive management leads both from the front and behind. The open door approach provides the company with a participative framework in which there are a flexible hierarchy and information flows both vertically and horizontally. The president who also doubles up as the chief executive officer has established layers of leadership including, managers, heads of department and board members but they work through comprehensive consultations. Virtually every employee within the business at some level occupies a position of leadership that makes them attain an excellent space where they can prove their acuity.

Leadership Practices of the Current Primary Leader of the Business

The chief executive officer believes firmly in the high productivity of unrestricted human capital thus believes in setting up a system, of operations that are more inclined towards freedom and leadership than management. By grating each worker at the firm some sense of autonomy, the president thus retains only leadership role of setting rules of operations, instilling corporate values in the workers and ensuring that they get excellent training to respond to emerging issues. Therefore, there is always adequate room for innovation in which a worker has the freedom to try a new way of doing something as long as it falls within the ambit of the laid down policies and frameworks.

The chief executive officers try as much as possible to include and keep the workers active in realizing the vision of the firm. He acknowledges the fact that every employee has a particular self-interest in the company but leverages them by inspiring them to keep on the track of the corporate objectives. As opposed to executives who work from the comfort of their offices and just receives reports from the supervisors, he gets so close with workers even those who occupy the lowest ranks which instrumentally improves their confidence in a shared vision and make them feel like part of the business family. He inspires them to freely share their ideas that can be then integrated into the strategic plans to transform the company.

Through continued interactions with workers of all calibres, the CEO can understand their struggles, listen to their ideas and respond better to their welfare. He believes that the business can only survive as long as the human capital realms motivated, involved and deeply engaged in fast-tracking the corporate goals. At the core of his management is the understanding that every employee within the firm has something unique that if identified and harnessed can be instrumental in keeping the business on its growth trajectory.

How the Current Leadership Has Affected Organizational Culture

The business leadership has endeared the goal of saving customers money while making them live better among all the workers in its different stores. Therefore, they have succeeded in developing a customer-focused culture in which all activities done by associates (workers) should resonate with the preferences and choices of the customer. The management has chosen to lead by example to realize better experience among the customers, For instance, they humanely interact with the workers, embrace the values of the company thus becoming good examples to their juniors. The management is driven by the belief in the potential of every worker; the administration has provided them with a space to explore their abilities as long as they confer positive contributions to the firm. Therefore, the human resource base at the business is confident to embrace creativity, taking smart risks and moving swiftly.

With an objective of improving efficiency in services delivery to the customers, the management has nurtured in the workers that they ought to be humble, teach each other and trust them to do their jobs. The freedom granted to workers to innovate and contribute actively in formulating new ways of doing things at the firm enables them to own each process and remain accountable for the output. This sense of individual responsibility among associates also derives from the fact that the management only sets the rules of operations then allows workers to operate on their portfolios. The executive thus retains just a leadership role as opposed to strictly monitoring each activity of the workers.

SWOT Analysis of the Business

Strengths

The firm draws its competitiveness from its cost leadership. It has established itself in the market as a low-cost alternative business for customers. Ideally, in free market customers tend to be automatically inclined towards companies that offer high-quality products at lower prices. With an assortment of low-cost products from different product lines, the business can attract new customers as well as retain existing ones that are a source of assurance for its high sales volume and profitability. The slogan of saving money and living better also resonates well with cost leadership leading to increased customer loyalty to the business products.

Another strength that helps the firm maintain low prices, cost leadership and competitiveness is its investment in unmatched information systems. It has developed various technologies that facilitate supply chain operations, communication and inventorying across its many stores distributed throughout the world. For instance, through the integration of the bar code technology into its stock management, the consignments can be quickly scanned and included in the inventories. The scan and go technology which allows users to scan their purchases and pay for them at a self-checkout kiosk. It is an invention that affords the buyers a unique experience and increases the perceived convenience of buying from the firm.

Weaknesses

Despite that the firm has set out an elaborate retention program for its workers, their turnover rates of employees remain relatively high. It loses many employees, especially those employed on a casual basis. The workers move to other jobs where they get better working conditions or that allows them to tap their high skills. From an economic perspective, the high turnover of workers from the firm results in losses for the company since they invest significantly in training but ends up losing them before they can add expected value to the operations within the business. Also, the chain stores have to continuously spend vast sums of money in training new staff after the existing ones quit.

Second, though the firm tries to offer decent wages for its employees as well as other packages, its cost savings makes the salary remain comparatively low. It has also been involved in a series of lawsuits lounged by employees who claim to be overworked, discrimination of women, disrespect and unfairly compensated. The net effect of these cases is that the reputation of the firm has been overly tainted thus making workers fear working there.

Opportunities

The firm grows at faster retain the home market without proximate sales. Therefore, it has the chance of transforming its domestic growth and focusing on expanding to the new international markets before its competitors which guarantees it higher sales volume and profitability. Conceivably, the overseas market is an ideal opportunity for the firm to grow and establish a new network of loyal customers. It is only through a broader market base and higher sales volume that the everyday low pricing policy will result in benefits to the firm. Another opportunity that the business can capitalize on is improving its image by focusing on the social aspect of its oper...