Organizational Structure and Analysis - NSW Institute of Sport - Case Study Example

Organizational Structure and Analysis Name: Course: Tutor: Date: Organisational Structure & Change Introduction: The NSW Institute of Sport is an organisation established with the intention of supporting elite athletes within NSW. Through it is the development and growth as an organisation; it has become segregated with departments working in a ‘silo’ mentality. Looking at both the company’s strategy and environment we will analyse the problems within the institute and propose ways that can fix this for the betterment of the organisation. Organisational Background The NSW Institute of Sport (NSWIS) is quite a unique organisation when compared with many other organisations. The NSWIS is located at Sydney Olympic Park and was established as a legal body under the Institute of Sport Act, 1995 following a review suggesting central harmonization and supervision of high performance games programs. During the 1980s-90s, much analysis was done into the success of Australia in sport at an International. In 1981, the Australian Institute of Sport opened and that was the start of a prodigious growth period for Australian Olympic Sport. Following this, it was identified that the opening of state institutes would be effective in supporting more of Australia’s elite athletes Today the Institute has over 700 high performance sportsmen on crew or personal scholarships and offers 31 sport programs across 24 games. The purpose of the NSWIS is to support the elite athletes in NSW. This is possible through a great network of support services, which includes career education, gym training and sports psychology. The NSW Institute of Sport works at two different levels that relate to the National Sporting Structure, using the term ‘compete and collaborate’. On a domestic level the NSWIS wants to ‘compete’ with all the other state institutes to ensure that, it is the number one institute in Australia. At an international level, the Institute aims to collaborate with all state institutes to ensure it works towards Australia International success in sport. Structure of the Organisation The organisation is a quasi-autonomous national government organisation, where it abundantly follows the lines of a government body, receives 80-90% of its funding from the NSW government, but its governance is separated from the Government. The separation from Government control ensures outcomes are not based or driven by political motives, and it ensures the longevity of the Institute. The focus of the organisation is on providing services to elite athletes throughout NSW. Its structure is designed around a simple structure, with an emphasis placed on the key athletes’ service areas. These two main areas are the Coach, Athlete and Program Services Area, and the Sport Science and Medical Services Area (Howard, 2006, 58). Problem The main problem that I see is that while the organisation is specialised into looking after athletes, the Coach, Athlete and Program Services Area, and the Sport Science and Medical Services Area. CAPS & Sport Science departments are separate and there staff fall under two managers, this effectively creates a ‘Silo’ affect where one departments is doing what they want to do, to support the athlete and the other department are doing what it needs to do. The staff of each area do not effectively come together to service the athletes and therefore the most efficient application of resources does not occur and the athletes suffer. What this does is it creates a ‘silo’ effect within the organisation. Strategy Analysis The organisation’s mode of operation is hindered by the structure that is used now. The CAPS and the Sport Science departments are separate and are managed differently, giving rise to some form of inefficiency in operations. The effect of this is that the athletes do not receive as much support as they need, since the organisation performs inefficiently. The implementation of a full working strategy is therefore not supported by the current structure. The fact that the organisation seems to be under no immediate pressure to perform, since there is no clearly defined competitor to its operations, makes it lack a well-defined strategy of what is defined in the field as success. Consequently, nobody seems bothered by the fact that the structure of the organisation is not efficient enough. According to Chandler, structure follows strategy, and therefore a formal structure is needed as a means of implementing the strategies (Streeter 2008, 17). To ensure a satisfactory structure, the organisation needs to carefully identify a clear working strategy. This strategy is identified and formulated in line with the goals, vision and mission for the organisation. This is necessary and highly feasible, because the NSWIS has a clear working mandate, which is to promote sports. Once this is done, the departments need to be restructured in a manner that will ensure that coordination among various departments is achieved. According to Miles and Snow, there are four distinct types of organisation depending on how they change their products with change in other factors. These include a defender, prospector, analyser and reactor (Porter, 2004, 36). The New South Wales institute of sports lacks a need to outperform and is mostly characterised by a static form of strategy setting, which are mostly implemented as a reactive measure. This is opposite of proactive measures, where challenges are identified before they materialise. The reason for this approach is that the success of the organisation can only be defined by the success of the affiliated athletes. The organisation is always assured of funding from the government hence there is no worry of decline in funds for the organisation based on their performance (Howard, 2006, 55). Consequently, the organisation only responds to strategy change when faced with a decline in performance of the athletes who are under it. There is no much effort that is dedicated to changing when the activities of the organisations are running normally, as based on the expectations of the management. The organisation is therefore more of a reactor type of organisation, that adjusts to its environment in an inconsistent and unstable way. There is no consistent mechanism that the organization has put in place to deal with a changing environment, but the strategies are sporadic and inconsistent. The organisation needs to set itself up as a defender, since there are no significant threats involved and there is a guarantee of funds on some four-year basis. There is a wide range of services that are offered by The New South Wales Institute of Sports, all that are done to support and improve the athlete performance. The range of activities is defined by the Australian Olympic Sports association. The reason why they diversify the services is to make sure that they develop all the disciplines that are represented in the Olympics, as well as in the local sporting arena. This approach aims to ensure that all talents are captured and none is ignored. In my view, what promotes all these activities is the complexities that are involved in sporting, ranging from coaching, talent identification, and facilitation of performance. The organisation is specialised into looking after athletes, the Coach, Athlete and Program Services Area, and the Sport Science and Medical Services Area (Howard, 2006, 58). The cost of these activities is to a large extent, if not wholly, funded by the States and the government of Australia. The implication here is that money is not pegged on activities that are done, but is given to the organisation, which in turn determines how to use the money. Development of Sports is most pegged on the financial gains that are made by the country when the athletes participate in events, but the national glory that is attained. This is why it can be seen from the budget allocation that there is a lot of money that is allocated to the organisation. The result of this is that the organisation has adopted a form of differentiation strategy in its operations. Due to the organisation being a government department, it is sometimes hard to establish the strategy of the organisation. It essentially has a monopoly over the support of athletes in NSW, and the competition it faces is from other state institutes and the athletes that each looks after. The success of these athletes at considerable competitions is indicative of the success of each of the institutes (Olsen & Scharffscher 2005, 13). As stated earlier the NSWIS started in 1996, which is over 15 years ago. This is quite a long time in the sporting world, where changes occur every day and there is always a need to establish a formula for the next event. It was designed as an evolutionary company that can develop as sport in Australia develops. This strategy can take into account changes in the key external factors like government changes, such as funding policies and sports programs, or changes to sports brought about by performances or event scheduling. Environment Factors The environment has the ability to affect the long-term and Short-term vision of the company (Howard, 2006, 58). Day to day the company is fairly stable, as there is no competition for profit and funding of the Institute from the government. It is guaranteed over a four-year period, as well as sponsorship contracts mean that there the ability to plan in advance for any significant changes that may threaten the institute. However, various environmental conditions will affect the running of the institutions. Although these will not affect the funding for the organisation, sports are a serious political and national tool for glory, and therefore they will be under ultimate pressure to perform and yield tangible results. From the analysis of the organisation, it appears to be more mechanistic as opposed to organic. This is evidenced by various activities and mode of operations that are brought about by external factors. The organisations functions in quite a stable environment and differentiation of tasks are relatively low. In addition, there is limited integration of departments and functional areas, with a centralized decision making for each of the two departments. The mechanistic nature of the organisation, has led to the lack of unity within the two key departments. Reporting is directly to the top of the department and the communications channels are usually vertical. Policies are formulated and implemented in each department, wasting away the rich and diversified experience that would be availed by the combination of experience from the two departments. There is an urgent need to enforce cooperation and joint decision making among the departments, so that the interests of the athletes will take the centre stage, as stipulated in the mission statement of the institute (Olsen & Scharffscher 2005, 15). The differentiation system that is adopted at the New South Wales Institute of Sports is quite formalized, serving the needs that are stipulated in the Act that was used to establish it. The two main departments are remarkably much involved in pursuing their laid down expectation, but unfortunately; the system does not achieve the best through this kind of approach due to the nature of the sporting environment. In sports, things tend to change so often and therefore, there is always the possibility that environmental factors will quickly necessitate a change in strategy. This may be something as definite as the performance of other states or countries in sports, or even the use of the advanced sporting technology. The contingency theory looks at differentiation as a means to achieve the internal and external environment fits. Consequently, every organisation needs to find an adaptive mechanism that places it at the vintage position for the sake of surviving through the changing environment. The NSWIS needs to amongst other things, reorganize the operation of its departments so that it will be more responsive to the needs of the athletes, as well as ensuring that the future needs of the sporting world are identified in time and adequate preparation mechanisms are put in place. In the set up of NSWIS, multiple institutes operate in the same capacity in many other states in Australia. The world of athletics has unlimited stakeholders, ranging from event organisers, athletes, managers, funs, governments and world bodies like World Olympic Council. However, the role of many of these organisations is different, and in the case of NSWIS, the environmental factors that are involved are not exceedingly complex. This is because funding is defined, while their relationship with the athletes is on a contractual basis, which has well defined terms of services. Implementing change within this organisation should therefore not be a complex issue, as the environment allows this (Olsen & Scharffscher 2005, 18). The overall leadership should be able to come up with a working model that will ensure that the institute is effective, without encountering many unnecessary hurdles. Conclusion The NSW Institute of Sports is charged with a noble task of developing and promoting various sports people and activities. The implication of this is that it has a significant influence on the pride of New South Wales, as well as the entire Australia, since sporting is a highly valued and regarded event that is used for recreation and promotes national unity and pride. The role of promoting sports is thus extremely influential and should be administered with the utmost care and the importance. The organisational structure of the NSW Sports Institute needs to be restructured in a manner that it will ease communication and allow more integration of skills and experiences, as well as collaboration between the two departments. This is what is lacking at the moment, and its integration into the program is what will help to bring maximum performance and effectiveness from the institute. Bibliography Howard, Graham 2006, ‘Modelling Organisations for Competitive Advantage.’ Management Services, Vol. 40, Issue 10, pp. 8 Olsen, Odd Einar & Scharffscher, Kristin S 2005, ‘Make the change as smooth as possible’. Utility Week, Vol. 23, Issue 10, pp. 27 Porter, E 2004, Competitive strategy: techniques for analyzing industries and competitors. Free Press, New York. Rowley, D & Sherman, H 2001. From strategy to change: implementing the plan in higher education. John Wiley and Sons, New York. Streeter, W 2008, Structure Follows Strategy: Organizational Architecture for International Operations. The William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan, United States Read More