Internship Review: Vanity Fair versus Appomattox Advisory - Essay Example

? Vanity Fair versus Appomattox Advisory internship review {Your Background I was placed in two different work places for an internship. The first was Vanity Fair magazine where I was placed in the Editing Department and this was followed by a placement at Appomattox Advisory where I was given a chance to work with Brazilian funds. Throughout the course of the internship duration at both workplaces, I was offered great insight into the functional cultures and work environments of these organisations. Vanity Fair offered a large workplace setting where competitiveness within the organisation was an obvious trait. On the other hand at Appomattox Advisory the workplace setting was compact and external competition was more focused. There were other sizable differences as well in the ways that these organisations were structured which in turn affected their organisational cultures and work environments directly. This text will attempt to analyse these differences and others in context of each workplace setting. Moreover the reasons for these differences will also be dealt with based on pertinent theories and research. Introduction to Organisations Vanity Fair Vanity Fair is a highly popular magazine that consists of fashion, current trends as well as popular culture. The magazine is published by Conde Nast and has been in publication since 1983. As of 2008, the publication of the magazine was reported to be greater than 1.1 million. (The Association of Magazine Media) The organisation is centred in New York for operations within the United States of America. Moreover the magazine is considered to be one of the best amongst all culture and lifestyle magazines in publication. Historically Vanity Fair began publishing in 1913 but was merged into Vogue in 1936 due to the Great Depression. However after its resumption in 1981, the magazine has claimed success after success and controversy after controversy. Much of this has been made possible through the tireless efforts of the staff. Competitiveness within the ranks is an essential component of the magazine’s overall culture. Appomattox Advisory, Inc. Appomattox Advisory was founded in 2005 and is registered with the SEC (Securities and Exchange Commission) in New York. The company has a small staff with members who are connected to each other on an interpersonal scale. The company’s basic portfolio is investment management. Largely the organisation’s business rests on managing hedge funds and securities. Currently the company has an expanding portfolio of managing investments for institutions as well as high net worth family groups. The chief business focus of the company lies with alternative investments. During my stay at Appomattox Advisory I was assigned to the Brazilian Funds where I functioned as an analyst to the best of my abilities. Brazil is an emerging market and a fast growing economy that supports large areas for investment. Currently it is the largest economy in Latin America, the seventh largest in the world (based on market exchange rates) and the eighth largest in terms of PPP (purchasing power parity). Future projections see the Brazilian economy rising to within the top five economies within a few decades. (Goldman Sachs) Investing in Brazil is a very profitable option right now as the Brazilian market needs finance and the investing parties need high returns. Being a small team, it is simpler for the organisation to switch easily from one investing option to another. Moreover, the team work is more personally flavoured as well. Organisational Culture and Work Environment Organisational culture is a wide ranging term and can be seen to encompass the attitudes, beliefs, norms, values and experiences that are in practice by members of an organisation. Elements of the organisational culture determine how the members of the organisation interact amongst themselves and with people outside the organisation’s umbrella. (Hill and Jones) On the other hand, another school of thought defines organisational culture as the set of commonly held mental assumptions that are used by people in an organisation to define appropriate behaviours in different situations. (Ravasi and Schultz) There are no widely held onto definitions for organisational culture but a few precepts are commonly agreed upon. Generally it is agreed that organisational culture: are holistic in nature; are determined historically; are related to anthropological conceptions; are socially constructed; are soft; are often very hard to change. The work environment of an organisation is a direct function of its organisational culture and it refers to the way members of the organisation are dealt with by other members and the organisation itself. The resulting productivity, worker satisfaction, ease within the workplace and other factors are all intertwined to the concept of organisational culture. Vanity Fair and Appomattox Advisory possessed widely different organisational cultures in most respects. The salient differences along with reasoning are listed below. Vanity Fair’s Organisational Culture The first thing that is noticeable about Vanity Fair’s organisational culture is that it is a strong culture. Everyone in the organisation is bound by a common set of unwritten code of behaviour. During my placement at Vanity Fair, I hardly saw anyone step out of the behavioural system that was prescribed. The set of behavioural practices were not prescribed in manuals or other such material but were reflections of the way in which the employees at Vanity Fair behaved. People at Vanity Fair tended to behave in particular patterns because they believed that what they were doing was the right thing to do. In turn this has helped the magazine to cultivate strict adherence to its vision and objectives. The employees feel a compelling need to fit in by going with the overall organisational culture. In some places Vanity Fair’s culture resembles that of organisations with process culture. Process culture ensues in organisations where feedback is either absent or minimal. There is a strict methodology of how things are to be done and the employees involved in achieving are not concerned with what needs to be achieved. Most bureaucracies represent similar structures. Although such organisational cultures might seem to be repressive and condemnable but there is need to have such systems in place. This is necessitated as process culture tends to produce consistent output and results and is often required in areas where similar tasks are to be repeated over and over. (Deal and Kennedy) I was part of the Editorial team and certain tasks such as editing media are quite repetitive in nature and often present short deadlines. In such cases, the concerned employee cannot start to question why the media piece needs to be edited as it would prove inefficient. Instead the focus is to get the piece edited as soon as possible. As people climb the ladder at Vanity Fair, they often need to start with such roles in order to understand how following certain instructions without questions aids in achieving team objectives and goals. Another aspect of organisational culture is how it connects to organisational structure. Roger Harrison classified four types of organisational cultures and the resulting organisational structures. (Handy) Vanity Fair is a mix of these different classifications of organisational cultures. Based on the classification by Handy (1985), the main organisational culture at Vanity Fair is a power culture especially in the higher management. This type of organisational culture tends to concentrate power in the hands of a few people in the organisation. Relationships with these people allow swift decision making that might also bypass the existing bureaucratic structure. Generally a central figure is essential to run these organisational cultures. Power emanates from the central authority and flows to other individuals who exercise it accordingly. In Vanity Fair’s case the editor Graydon Carter is seen as a dominating influence who controls much of the content published by the magazine through direct and indirect intervention. Similarly the issue of hiring is in direct control of the editor who can choose to hire or fire as desired. This is not to indicate that an authoritarian system exists within Vanity Fair. Instead people with the right kind of skills are groomed in the right direction but being groomed can often mean that the individual has to relinquish personal will for a few years especially at the start. A role culture also exists within Vanity Fair for routine tasks such as editing, media coverage, writing etc. The entire culture is for such departments are composed largely of exacting role definitions, procedures and definitions of authority. The power culture of Vanity Fair drives the role culture and allows them a more independent hand when it is felt necessary. Another aspect of organisational culture at Vanity Fair is task culture. This kind of culture relies on the power of small teams formed with some expert(s) to solve specific problems. Power flows through expertise alone. Commonly such organisational cultures possess multiple reporting lines such as those displayed in a matrix structure. Vanity Fair constructs such teams periodically in order to address specific outlying concerns before they transform into larger problems such as decreased circulation, decreases in advertisements received etc. Generally these teams are constructed with one expert at the helm of affairs and in total control. The power culture and the task culture are interconnected too as the team leaders respond directly to the editor alone. Most of the time members of these teams are multidisciplinary in approach as the problems that need to be solved require different areas of expertise to deal with. Vanity Fair’s organisational culture is perhaps best represented by the model presented by Edgar Schein, a professor at the MIT Sloan School of Management. According to him, every organisational culture possesses three distinct cognitive levels of organisational culture as experienced by an observer. Since my position at Vanity Fair was that of an observer, this model best explains the organisational culture at Vanity Fair. The model’s first cognitive level is composed of artefacts which are essentially physical objects such as offices, furniture, member’s dressing and other such objects. In these terms, Vanity Fair displays a greater than average composition of offices, furniture, paintings, and member’s fashion sense based dressing, clear mission statements as well as other operational requirements. The next aspect of organisational culture according to this model is values. Generally these values are widely held throughout the organisation and Vanity Fair is a good example of an organisation with a strong culture that enforces similar values all across the organisation. The attitudes of employees and their generalised behaviour are all direct outcomes of their commonly shared values within an organisational framework. The third aspect of organisational culture is composed of tacit assumptions. These are all elements within the culture that are not visibly identified in the daily interactions between members of an organisation. Most of these elements are seldom discussed openly between members of the organisation. This kind of culture existed pervasively throughout Vanity Fair from an entry level person like me right up to the editor. Certain issues were beyond the scope of discussion such as the magazine’s controversial behaviour in a few instances. Schein’s model is a good method of indentifying workplaces such as Vanity Fair where the first and second level of Schein’s model are displayed with moral and ethical fabric while the third level may not be that well supported. (Schein) Overall Vanity Fair is a “dog eats dog” kind of workplace. The pressure is overwhelming at times and the need to deliver is strong. Employees are forced to balance their creative needs with the needs of their superiors especially within the first few years. Appomattox Advisory’s Organisational Culture Appomattox Advisory is a small investment management firm that is composed of a small staff that knows each other very well. Most associations within the staff of Appomattox Advisory are older than the company itself. The members of the organisation have a set of common aims that they are working towards through synergy. The company was founded in 2005 by some like minded people to further their career ambitions as well as creating greater financial autonomy for themselves. The entire organisation is based solely in a single office on one floor in downtown New York. This offers members of the organisation to interact with each other personally whenever they want to. Overall the work environment is highly friendly and the team is not in competition with itself but is rather at peace with itself. This encourages greater cooperation amongst members of the organisation. New level entrants such as me are given tasks fitting their experience and capabilities and are constantly reinforced by more senior members as required. Help is always available and is provided without much “interrogation” and a condescending attitude. This helps to make the overall environment very conducive to entry level individuals such as myself. In term of classification of organisational cultures, the classification provided by Robert A. Cooke helps to understand workplaces such as Appomattox Advisory better. Cooke contends that three kinds of culture clusters can exist within the organisation’s cultural inventory. These cultures could be constructive, passive / defensive or aggressive / defensive in nature. (Barney) The organisational culture model in place at Appomattox Advisory is that of a constructive culture. This organisational cultural classification is based on open interaction between members. Moreover tasks are dealt with in a fashion that promotes satisfaction needs that are higher order. These could include the need to form affiliations, to boost self esteem and the needs to self actualize. The real reason behind launching Appomattox Advisory was to find self actualisation within the field of investment and finance and the organisation is poised to keep this aim in place from top to bottom. Another major feature of constructive cultures is the leadership which is transformational. New ideas and innovation are encouraged and there is in general only a loose set of procedures in place. While working on Brazilian Funds I was able to offer team members a chance to find detailed statistics from a few web resources they were not aware of. I was encouraged and was given a position to teach the team which reflected the organisation’s progressive attitude. Not only did this help me find satisfaction but it also gave me a sense of purpose that found me going to the office out of my own accord rather than through stipulation. The related benefits of constructive cultures are similar to what have been related above. Working on Brazilian Funds, I realised two important things about Appomattox Advisory’s organisational culture. One was that innovation was encouraged at Appomattox as the company was based on alternative investment strategies. Innovation was part of the culture and work environment at all levels. The second thing to be realised was that the small structure of Appomattox greatly aided the organisation’s flexibility for switching between various business operations. Before Brazilian Funds for example the organisation was aiming to invest in forestry in various other parts of the world. The small and highly interconnected network of employees at Appomattox Advisory offered yet another advantage that was unique. No one even though about over time. Even though employees work late into the night at times to assess the feasibility of investing in certain ventures but no one even talked about overtime. Even without overtime based compensations, the working spirit at Appomattox Advisory remained productive and smooth. Moreover the overall culture resembled a clan culture where leaders act like father figures and guide the team from one venture to another. The internal focus is strong but is highly flexible as mentioned above. (Fraser, Bernstein and Schwab) Moreover, Appomattox Advisory also applies equally well to the entrepreneurial culture defined by Stephen McGuire. (McGuire) This culture believes in innovation to drive market leadership from the top tiers right down to the grass roots levels. The work environments are friendly and cognisant of people’s abilities and the members of the organisation are well versed in the overall vision and objectives of the business. All management is hands on and members of the organisation are empowered and focused onto their tasks. Moreover the members of such organisations are self motivated as mentioned above. (Montana and Charnov) Conclusion Vanity Fair and Appomattox Advisory possess organisational cultures that differ in large respects from each other. Vanity Fair is a large organisation that has been revived and possesses positions where various kinds of roles need to be played in an organisation. Some of the roles are innovative while others are repetitive. In general the conditioned roles form the entry and mid level employment cadres of Vanity Fair while innovation is a role largely played by more senior members of the Vanity Fair culture. Moreover the culture at Vanity Fair is highly competitive and often forces people to do things against their better judgement. In stark contrast, Appomattox Advisory is a small group of people who are determine to grow into a larger financial institution through innovation and alternative investment strategies. In order to achieve this, the organisation is poised to provide opportunities for innovation and growth to all levels of members within the organisation. Each organisational culture is well fitted and derived after iterations and suits each business environment in question. Bibliography Barney, J. B. “Organizational Culture: Can It Be a Source of Sustained Competitive Advantage?” Academy of Management Review, 11(3) (1986): 656-665. Deal, T. E. and A. A. Kennedy. Corporate Cultures: The Rites and Rituals of Corporate Life. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1982. Fraser, Beau, David Bernstein and Bill Schwab. Death to all sacred cows : how successful business people put the old rules out to pasture. New York: Hyperion, 2007. Goldman Sachs. “Global Economics Paper No 153.” 28 March 2007. Chicago Booth. 25 August 2011 . Handy, C. B. Understanding Organizations, 3rd Edition. Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 1985. Hill, Charles W. L. and Gareth R. Jones. Strategic Management. London: Houghton Mifflin, 2001. McGuire, Stephen J.J. Entrepreneurial Organizational Culture: Construct Definition and Instrument Development and Validation. Ph.D. Dissertation. Washington, D. C.: The George Washington University, 2003. Montana, P. and B. Charnov. Management. New York: Barrons Educational Series, 2008. Ravasi, D. and M. Schultz. “Responding to Organizational Identity Threats: Exploring the Role of Organizational Culture.” Academy of Management Journal, Vol. 49, No. 3 (2006): 433-458 . Schein, E. H. Organizational Culture and Leadership, 3rd Edition. Jossey-Bass, 2005. The Association of Magazine Media. Average Total Paid & Verified Circulation for Top 100 ABC Magazines . 2008. 25 August 2011 . Read More