Microsoft's Organizational Behavior - Case Study Example

Module Microsoft’s Organizational Behavior Many believe that Bill Gates was a visionary leader with an aim of cultivating the new passion in an individual. Others liken Steve Ballmer, Gates’ successor, to a polarizing visionless leader who has just done nothing but drive the company’s profits on a downward spiral. Critics have unanimously agreed that Microsoft has over the past decade been on a losing trend towards its main rivals and that the stepping down of Gates was just the final blow. Ballmer has come under much criticism due to the apparent lack of innovation, dearth of new hit products and a stock price that has continued to wane (Jingoes). Tech companies such as Apple and Google have outdone Microsoft and have thus made it difficult for the company to meet its past glory under Gates. Another agreement that is in consensus amongst many is the fact that the cultures of the two CEOs have been different and this has made it difficult for the company to operate like it did before. Culture is defined as the shared beliefs, values and assumptions within an organization and they help in defining how the organization responds to circumstances (Griffin and Moorhead 6). Gates’ culture was more liberal but the changes that occurred after Ballmer took over have led to stagnation. Gates had instigated a culture of innovation and vision that attached significant importance on talented developers. When Ballmer took office, he changed all these and culled the forest of projects that were initiated and sustained under Gates’ tenure. He became the supreme leader and stifled the internal competition that had been granted by Gates earlier. He introduced a new culture that employees are struggling against but had to eventually give in because he was the overall leader (Jingoes). The first way that the management is trying to change its culture is by varying the people hired to make decisions and policies in the company. This means that the management will not be vested on engineers who were given a higher priority before when it came to making development decisions. Democracy has been stifled in this case with Ballmer as the overall boss. The second way is by shifting some of their goals for development of their products (Jingoes). Many believe that this is meant to align the company to the new computing era and improve on its competitiveness. In the past, business people ran the technology divisions but the new move seeks to place in-charge techno-savvy individuals. This will definitely change the way products are developed (Griffin and Moorhead 8). Ballmer looks at the ability of the individual given their past record and thus prefers more of a techno-savvy executive as opposed to business minded people. However, one thing that has changed in this area is the fact that the new rules that rank developers have been introduced; they are known as stack-ranking where employees are ranked in terms of their performance as top performers, good performers, average or poor (Jingoes). Employees cite this as the most destructive management system as it has already destroyed their innovative nature. Whereas Gates allowed many people to work on a similar project to encourage healthy competition, Ballmer has a different ideology. Employees are to be graded on a daily basis which means they start competing amongst themselves and lose focus on the bigger picture. They end up competing amongst themselves and not with other companies (Griffin and Moorhead 11). This has created a perception that the best they can do is according to what others think about them rather than how well they utilize their talents. Perception allows one to engage in environmental scanning and creativity in aligning the company goals to the products and services offered (Griffin and Moorhead 15). However, this has been killed with the techno-driven ideologies being misplaced instead of utilized for the benefit of the company. The ability of Apple to beat a company such as Microsoft is because the former places emphasis on their developers and their talents. When product development turns into a one-man show, then innovations will be reduced and the motivation will wane. Though some argue that the shift in management, which is one the most significant determinants of a company’s cultural shift, is good, there is a lot to be desired. The fact that employees are up in arms with the ranking criteria means that there is something wrong with the implementation and/or the managers put in place. A company is supposed to help in growing talent and help individuals to exploit their potential by according them the requisite freedom to exploit their talents, skills and experiences in coming up with products that meet customer expectations (Jingoes). People are different. Maybe comparing Gates’ leadership style and Ballmer’s style is the wrong approach. However, there is one thing that people agree on: the results always tell of who the best is. For instance, Steve Jobs was as a known refiner as opposed to a leader. Gates was a visionary who thrilled at the moment when products spoke of one’s abilities. Both leaders were good at what they did and the companies’ results exemplified this despite their different tactics (Jingoes). Ballmer, on the other hand, has been blamed for stagnating Microsoft with the leadership shift and the cultural changes not bearing the fruits that are expected even after ten years at the helm of one of the most profitable companies in the world. If he would borrow some of the ideas that made Microsoft a top notch company, he would understand the importance of letting each unit to foster its individual cultures that are vital in any setting. Researchers should always have the freedom to interact, integrate and work on projects as opposed to placing a tag on each developer to evaluate their worthiness as based on the manager’s outlook. It is critical to understand that each cultural change affects the mentality of the employers and this leads to an uncomfortable phase as each tries to conform to the new standards. This may lead to a slight drop in the company’s financial outlook (Griffin and Moorhead 19). However, within a short time, this should be replaced with booming results based on how well the implementation of the new changes takes place. Nevertheless, these changes affected the financial performance by mainly stifling the freedom that researchers had while coming up with new products. Ballmer placed a cutoff level where researchers were more interested in gaining better ratings from their managers rather than producing what would become the next generation IT products while eying on Microsoft’s excellence (Griffin and Moorhead 22). The performance of any company is mainly based on how well they can represent their products to cater for the needs of the clients at that particular moment. However, it is not the same here. Ballmer is looking for a team that will handle all activities from his point of view rather than from a general goal that the company seeks to emulate and replicate. Products have had flaws that other companies have capitalized on and beaten them in getting newer clients and thus a larger market share (Jingoes). The Office package that they have depended on for a long time has been duplicated by amongst others Google Inc. through their Google Docs application and this has given Google an edge over them. Their Windows Vista did not gain the expected market share owing to lack of significant client-appealing features. Programmers have been relegated to their units with competition amongst themselves rather than competing against the products in the market. This means that their products are only good according to how well their manager views them rather than how the clients perceive them. Though Gates was a programmer and Ballmer is not, there are some issues about culture that one can invest in and produce considerable results (Jingoes). In conclusion, it would be appropriate if Ballmer took the managerial position and organized the company into manageable units with different cultures geared at achieving the overall mission and objectives of the company. This approach will give employees the required autonomy that will aid in making Microsoft a better company and return to the previous performance glory. Work Cited Griffin, RW and Moorhead, G. Organizational Behavior: Managing People and Organizations. New York: Cengage Learning, 2011. Print. Jingoes, A. Microsoft: From an Organizational Behavior Perspective. March 14, 2011. Web. September 21, 2012. Read More