Organizational structure and culture of GE and Google - Essay Example

Organizational structure and culture of GE and Google Introduction An organizational structure is the framework of a group in terms of rules, regulations and chain of authority that control and govern the functioning of any group. Its purpose is basically to define the guidelines, parameters, and the procedural process that is necessary for a group its main objectives. On the other hand, organizational culture refers to the collective behavior of the people that are part of an organization. It is formed by the organizational visions, values, systems, norms, symbols, and working language. Organizational culture particularly affects the way people and/or groups interact with each other, with stakeholders, and with clients. This paper is particularly designed to compare the organizational structure and organizational culture of GE and Google organizations. GE is a diversified technology and services corporation whose products and services range from aircraft engines, water processing, power generation, and household appliances to medical imaging, consumer and business financing, and industrial products. Google is an American multinational public corporation invested in cloud computing, internet search, and advertising technology. Its mission is to organize the world’s information and make it acceptable and useful universally. Organizational culture of GE and Google GE has been able to attract leaders with extraordinary combination of attributes: passion, vision, and deep sensitivity to the huge issues that challenge the world around them. It is made up of employees who are self driven to make a difference. When it comes to the kind of environment, GE is the best place to work in. it has a high-performance culture that particularly emphasizes high-integrity business practices as well as work balance. GE’s CEO says, “We believe a company can accomplish more even as it does well.” This belief drives GE’s organizational practice from the philanthropic efforts of its foundation to the millions of volunteer hours donated by the employees to community initiatives worldwide. On the Google side, it’s really the people that make it the kind of company it is. “We hire smart and determined people and we favor ability over experience,” said Google CEO. Although the people of Google share common goals and visions for the company, they hail from all walks of life and speak a number of languages, reflecting the global audience that they serve. Google pursues interests ranging from beekeeping to recycling, from foxtrot to Frisbee, when not at work. Google strives to maintain the open culture often associated with startups, in which everyone is a contributor and feels comfortable sharing ideas and opinions. Google’s offices and cafes are designed to motivate and encourage interactions between Google members across and within teams, and to spark conversation about play as well as work. Moreover, Google’s are in a position to ask questions directly to Sergey, Larry and other executives about any number of company issues. Complexity theory and organizations This theory is primarily used for understanding how organization or firms adapt to their environments. It treats organizations as a collection of strategies and structures. It states that, when any organization or firm shares the properties of different complex adaptive systems, they are more likely to change and adapt to their environment and thus survive. Institutional theory Institutional theory focuses on the complex aspects of social structure. It takes into account the processes by which structures including norms, rules, schemes, and routines become implemented and established as authoritative guidelines for social behavior (Scott, 2004). Powel and DiMaggio (1991) affirm that, in order to survive, various organizations have to conform to the rules and belief systems prevailing in their environment. Organizational structure of GE and Google An organizational structure basically consists of activities such as task allocation, supervision and coordination, all of which are directed towards the achievement of organizational aims and goals. Structure determines the models in which an organization operates and performs. It provides the foundation on which standard operations and routines of an organization rest. An organizational structure also determines which individuals are involved in decision-making processes, and thus to what depth their views shape the organization’s actions. Usually if organizational structure fails to coincide with facts evolving in operational actions, the organizational performance drops. Wrong organizational structure may hinder coordination and thus hamper the completion of orders in due time and within set limits of resources and budgets. Jeffrey Immelt is the chairman and CEO of GE. He has ever worked relentlessly to transform GE into a leader in essential themes connected to world development, including emerging markets, environmental solutions, digital connection, and demographics. Further, GE has executive leaders – the women and men who are running GE’s many businesses. They are highly regarded as top leaders in the industry and are leading their respective organizations to become closer to customers, while seeking new operational efficiencies and ways to work toward a better future. Moreover, GE has a Board of Directors who ensures the company serves the interests of key stakeholders and shareowners with the highest standards of integrity and compliance. The board of Directors provides in depth oversight of the major strategic concerns and issues of the company, while serving equality as wise counselors and tough critics. GE is known to have a strong set of global business particularly in infrastructure and finance aligned to meet the current world’s needs, including the demand of environmental technologies, and global infrastructure; i.e. the growing and changing demographics that need access to information, healthcare, and finance. The significance of organizational structure is clearly shown in GE through the achievements of its Chairman and CEO Jack Welch. For instance, he established an open-ended relationship to gain a greater lock on one of the company’s biggest customers, Columbia and this has made a shift, gaining stem at the world’s most successful corporation. His tough tactics presaged a lot of the reengineering that followed across corporate America and mercilessly hacked its lackluster old-line units. Welch also pushed his managers to become more productive and today he oversees a vastly more competitive organization than the one he took over. He has actually become the gold standard against which CEOs are measure because of the organized structure he has imposed in the company ( Businessweek.com . Google on the other side was first incorporated as a private held company in 1998. Sergey Brin and Larry Page headed the company that time, and the company’s mission was to organize the world’s information and make it useful and anniversary acceptable. in the early 2008, Sherryl Sandberg, who was the vice-president then, of global online operations and sales, began her position as chief operations officer of Facebook, while ElDifrawi, who was formally the head of brand advertising, left and became chief marketing officer of Netshops. In the early 2011, Larry Page became the CEO and Eric Schmidt became the Executive Chairman of Google. Criticism of Google In addition to Google’s mission mentioned earlier in this paper, the means used to accomplish it have raised concerns among the critics of the company. The criticism of Google are based on possible misuse and manipulation of search results, concerns about its compilation of data which may not protect people’s privacy, its use of other people’s and organizations’ technology, and the energy consumption of its services, among others. For example, in 2007, a group of researcher observed a tendency to misuse the Google engine as a “reality interface” it was observed that most users tend to rely on the first page of Google search, ignoring everything not listed there or assuming that it is either useless or unavailable. Moreover, the policy on matters concerning privacy was highly criticized as creating an environment that discourage internet innovation as by killing the courage of internet users. Conclusion Generally, organizational structure creates a number of concepts in terms of strategies, and situations that affect every level of planning in any type of hierarchical institutions. The implication of organizational culture and structure basically apply to companies, corporations, governments, charitable organizations, and even sports organizations. This differs from one organization to another because they are partially defined by that very culture of the organization. Organizational structure and culture aids in strengthening good, cut away the bad, and manufacture an environment that breeds and encourages its members to succeed. Work cited Contreras Consuelo. Organizational structure and culture: promising practices that lead to cultural and intellectual diversity. Madison: University of Wisconsin press, (2007) Print. Scott, W. Richard. Institutional Theory. P408-14 in Encyclopedia of Social Theory, George Ritzer, ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publishers, 2004. Print. DiMaggio, Paul J. and Walter W. Powell. Introduction. The New Institutionalism in Organizational Analysis. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991. Print. How Jack Welch Runs GE. Businessweek.com. Retrieved 22 April 2012. Read More