Issues Affecting No Name Aircraft Company - Case Study Example

No Name’ Aircraft Company Name: Institution: For a company to be successful both in the home country and internationally, it has to adopt some strategies. Successful international companies appreciate diversity of their employees and also treat workers as the most important assets in the firm. Such firms offer employees chances for growth and development through regular need based training programs. The performance management programs of such firms are often top notch. In this essay, the focus will be on ‘No Name’ Company which deals with aircrafts. The essay will discuss the issues affecting the company and also offer some recommendations. Company ‘No Name’ company is experiencing problems with achievement of profits which is a problem because the shareholders are threatening to withdraw their investment with the company. When shareholders are not satisfied with the performance of a company and more so the share price, the next step they take is withdrawal of their funds. Without sufficient funds from the shareholders, the company is likely to fail completely. Culture The culture at the ‘No Name’ company is also not favorable for good performance because firstly, there exists some miscommunication between the workers as well as between the management. Lack of communication within an organization is a vice that can see to the breakdown of a company that would have otherwise thrived well in the market. Over the years, research has asserted that organizations are built and sustained through human communication. Organizations have been identified as ongoing accomplishments achieved primarily or even exclusively through communication processes (Cooren, Kuhn, Cornelissen and Clark, 2011). As such, it is crucial for any firm to ensure that they maintain a healthy communication between the workers to ensure flow of work. Organizing any company is a communicative task. Additionally, the workers at the ‘No Name’ company have a tendency to resist any change introduced to them at the workplace. This is a vice because it implies that the management and the employees do not work in sync with each other. From a professional point of view, the employees resist change for various reasons. Firstly, workers fear the unknown as well as losing their pay, comfort and status. Employees may also resist to changes introduced by the management and those that do not seem feasible on their end. For organizations to effect change at the workplace, they ought to involve the employees in decision making. Participation of employees in making of vital decisions at the firm level ensures that they feel involved with the operations of the organization (Dent and Goldberg, 2013). When employees feel included in decision making, they are not likely to resist changes. Another issue that is affecting ‘No Name’ company is the fact that the quality of their aircrafts has over time been compromised. The company has received complaints from their customers regarding quality. The stakeholders have even threatened to withhold pay ranging from 50 to 100 percent of the money. More so, the company lacks a good communication strategy between the teams working on the aircraft. The chief executive officer is seen receiving calls from the manufacturers in China and Singapore asking him to clarify some instructions. In real sense, the company has mandated the line managers based in Australia to handle communication within the home company as well as with its subsidiaries. Quality is paramount for a firm to achieve competitive advantage as well as to perform in the market. Quality can be measured through an analysis of customer satisfaction (Cho and Pursik, 2006). Customer’s satisfaction is of great importance to ensure the success of any firm. Quality refers to the extent to which a product serves the purpose for which it was designed or intended. Consequently, customer satisfaction translates to customer loyalty which implies more income and profits (Jahanshahi, Gashti, Mirdamadi, Nawaser and Khaksar, (2011). Diversity Diversity at the workplace refers to the act of mutual respect between employees at the work place despite their age, religion, race, sexual orientation or gender. At ‘No Name’ company, the senior employees are intolerant to the trainees due to the age difference which in turn strains the relationship at work. Additionally, the China subsidiary does not tolerate the employees with disabilities. As such, the company lives in uncertainty not sure whether the potential employees rejected based on their disability may take legal actions against the firm. The company also lacks ways of enhancing interactions among the employees. The Human Resource does not offer a chance for employees to interact and get to know each other as well as appreciate diversity. Diversity ensures that a company is able to enjoy talents from people from all walks of life. Each person has a unique talent and a firm that appreciates diversity is able to take advantage of these skills. The skills in turn ensure a competitive advantage and profitability of the firm. Additionally, diversity and inclusion provides employees in any organization with the ability to live in harmony (Roberson, 2006). Harmonious co-existence between employees enables them to work in coordination thus ensuring flow of work. Performance management ‘No Name’ company has no clear strategy to review performance at their subsidiaries. Additionally, the company lacks clear ways of reviewing or rather appraising performance of expatriates. The company also lacks a way of identifying economic ways of production with regard to business targets especially with the rising costs of production and the expected returns. Implementation of decisions at the company is also not economically viable because for instance, the headquarters can order parts from Singapore while the parts are in excess in Australia. The company also lacks proper methods of ensuring consistency of performance between the subsidiaries in China, Singapore and Vietnam with the headquarters in Australia. Any organization should have methods devised to ensure harmony in the firm. Performance management ensures that a firm is able to measure how effective it is in achieving the set goals. The firm should therefore come up with ways of measuring performance at work. Appraisals should also be held for each worker to ensure that the human resource department is able to correct employees as well as appreciate their achievements. Employees are also likely to perform better if their efforts and improvements are commended by the seniors. Firms should also make use of performance management to ensure that the data collected during the processes such as those of appraisals are used to reward employees such as by use of promotions, pay increase, transfers as well as to enhance profitability of the firm (Bacal, 2011). As such, companies should strive to manage the performance of their employees. Training and development Training and development is crucial to enhance the already existing skills and talents. The work environment is constantly changing and as such, the employees require proper preparation to handle the changes. At ‘No Name’ company, there is no clear method to train the workers. For instance, the expatriates are not given proper training whenever they are sent to work outside Australia. Additionally, the expatriates are only offered a half day training which is not sufficient to offer them with the necessary skills to handle the environment in other countries away from home. The other workers of the company are referred to the online platform for training. The disadvantage with the online forum is the fact that the material is similar for all employees despite the knowledge that employees have different training needs. Moreover, the company lacks proper feedback programs to enable employees give their opinions regarding the training methods and their effectiveness. The employees complain about the training but nothing is done about it. The level of performance by employees has also reduced justifying need based training and development on all the employees. At ‘No Name’ company, the senior managers fear training the lower level employees for managerial positions for fear of being sidelined during promotions. The phenomenon has then caused some of the good employees to be poached by other companies. Training and development is crucial to enhance performance in any organization while at the same time improving profitability of the firm which is often a paramount goal of any organization. Training and development fosters learning because employees can apply as well as infer from what they learn. Closing of the skills gap is an important area that the human resource should take into consideration to enhance penetration of the market. Existence of skills gap is a threat at the organizational and operational levels. From an employee perspective, training and development is an avenue to enhance skills to perform a job and also to enable them advance in their careers (Tahir, Yousafzai, Jan and Hashim, 2014). Recommendations Previously, the physical assets were placed more highly as compared to human capital at the workplace. However, in the world today, human assets, experience and skills are regarded with much emphasis with the knowledge that employees are the most important assets without which work cannot be done (Flamholtz, 2012). Training and development The human resource department of ‘No Name’ company should therefore invest on their personnel with the understanding that when employees are happy, the organization is bound to succeed. The aircraft company should thus invest in hiring the right candidates for each position and then train them adequately and regularly to ensure their performance is up to standard. Training should be need based because employees have different capabilities and as such, the company should make use of performance appraisals to determine the needs of each employee. Therefore, the workers should be closely monitored to determine their strengths and weaknesses to enable the human resource determine a training program for each of them. Additionally, the needs of the expatriates should be put into consideration because they run the ‘No Name’ company from the subsidiaries outside Australia. The employees sent to work away from the host company should be trained to enable them cope with the different working conditions in different countries. The expatriates should also be offered a platform to give their feedback on the training programs and whether they are effective in meeting their diverse needs. Diversity Diversity can be cognitive or out of identity. The identity diversity occurs when different employees are from different localities as well as possess different thoughts, understanding and beliefs. Cognitive diversity occurs when people hail from the same place but have different beliefs as well as understanding of situations (Page, 2008). ‘No Name’ company should thus work towards providing an environment where all employees are tolerated and treated equally despite the differences they may possess. For instance, in the China subsidiary, the company should start hiring even the disabled people. Hiring them will ensure different talents are brought to the organization while at the same time; it will reduce the chances of the company being sued and spending a lot of money that would have otherwise been used for development for court cases. Diversity ensures that different approaches can be taken to handle different tasks simultaneously. One good idea implies success for the whole workforce and for the benefit of the organization. As such, ‘No Name’ Aircraft Company should appreciate diversity and inclusion of all employees despite their race, religion, gender, or even nationality. If a candidate is qualified, he or she should be hired. The aircraft company should also set aside some days when employees can all meet and participate in different team building activities. The activities will enhance better relationships amongst the employees outside the workplace. The relationships will in turn foster more tolerance among people of different diversities (Dyer, 2007). Culture Every employee wants to work in an environment that resonates with their values and beliefs. The environment should be healthy to foster healthy working relationships. The culture of any firm is often unique and works as a tool to differentiate the firm from that of competitors. At the same time, culture helps firms to attract good employees as well as retain them. A culture is distinctive and a communicative process that enhances communication between employees and the management. Communication is paramount within an organization to ensure sustenance of the firm. Organizations often have superordinate objectives that are complex and difficult to achieve if handled by one person. As such, it requires that employees work harmoniously to achieve them (Keyton, 2011). Harmony in achievement of objectives is only possible through proper communication channels for employees and their instructors. ‘No Name’ company should thus come up with proper means of communication between its supervisors and the employees. The company should formulate proper flow of information within different hierarchies of the organizations as well as with the subsidiaries outside Australia. Without proper communication, the company is bound to fail because work cannot be done without efficient flow of instructions. It has been noted that the employees of ‘No Name’ company often find it hard to cope with change introduced by the management. From a professional point of understanding, employees often possess feelings of insecurity whenever change is reinstated within a firm by the management. As such, the company should work towards involving the employees in making of decisions that directly involve them. It has been proven that involvement of employees either formally or informally creates feelings of job satisfaction, motivation and job retention. Employees are more likely to implement and value decisions they have been consulted on. More so, whenever, employees are consulted, the decisions are likely to be more successful in their implementation (Scott-Ladd and Chan, 2006). The quality of the products manufactured by the aircraft company has also been questioned by stakeholders who have even threatened to withdraw their payments. Stakeholders are pillars of any organization because their resources are used to develop the firm. As such, it would be detrimental for ‘No Name’ company if the stakeholders withdrew from the company. Customers have different needs and the firm should work towards a satisfaction of the customers to ensure good flow of business. Some customers require a good service but in this case, the customers require good quality products. Quality can be improved if a company comes up with a good design of the product even before it is produced. Additionally, the firm should also come up with the necessary technology to produce the product and to ensure it meets customers’ specifications. The input variables used in the assembly of a particular product should also meet the required standards to ensure the end product is of good quality (Koksai, Batmaz and Testik, 2011). ‘No Name’ Aircraft Company should also come up with a quality control department that will ensure constant inspection of the assembly lines while at the same time repairing or discarding the defective machinery in the production unit. The quality control department personnel will also inspect the products at each stage of production thus ensuring that customers only receive quality products. Performance management A good performance management program should provide the management with accurate information regarding performance levels of each employee. Each firm should thus come up with a program that provides feedback on how effective workers are in performing their designated tasks as well as what can be done to improve their capabilities. Performance management enables employers to make decisions regarding pay rise, retention, promotion and transfer of employees (Wortham, 2007). ‘No Name’ company should therefore formulate a strategy to manage the performance of the employees in Australia as well as of those in their subsidiaries. The program should consist of appraisals where the supervisors record the performance of each worker weekly. The appraisals will enable the firm to determine the employees who perform well and methods of appreciating their efforts and those that are not and ways of improving their performance. In addition to the appraisal of performance, the supervisors should also involve the employees in the process so as to understand why they performed the way they did at a particular time. As such, the aircraft company should formulate a policy where each employee is given a chance with the supervisor to discuss their performance (Luthans, Norman, Avolio and Avey, 2008). That way, the management would better understand certain factors that may affect performance of employees. Conclusion In summary, the ‘No Name’ Aircraft Company is failing in a lot of areas such as diversity, culture, training and development and performance management. The failures are then affecting the satisfaction of stakeholders who are not satisfied with the products and services offered by the company. As such, the paper has offered some recommendations for each of the failing sector so as to bring the company back on its feet again. References Cooren, F., Kuhn, T., Cornelissen, J. P., & Clark, T. (2011). Communication, organizing and organization: An overview and introduction to the special issue. Organization Studies, 32(9), 1149-1170. Dent, E. B., & Goldberg, S. G. (2013). 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