Teamwork, Organization Structure, Culture and Design at Biogenia and Sleepeasy - Essay Example

?Teamwork, Organization Structure and Design, and Organizational Culture: A Comparative Analysis of Biogenia and Sleepeasy Introduction Teamwork, organization structure and design, and organizational culture are three of the most fundamental predictors of success of an organization. Organizations with the appropriate organization structure and design, healthy organizational culture and teamwork develop commitment in the employees. “Committed employees are loyal to their company, more likely to recommend its products and more motivated to recommend the company as a great place to work” (Joseph, 2002, p. 3). Employees have a lot of impact on the tendency of an organization to be innovative and competitive (Bakker and Schaufeli, 2009, p. 147) which imparts need for the leaders to keep the employees motivated. Different organizations have different strategies of developing teamwork and also have different organization structures and designs, and organizational cultures. Factors that control these elements include but are not limited to the nature and scope of business, and the socioeconomic and political conditions prevalent in the areas where the business is established. There is no hard and fast rule which can be applied to all organizations. While there are numerous theories of teamwork, organization structure and design, and organizational culture, yet they have to be customized to suit the individualistic needs of different organizations. This paper draws a comparison and contrast between the teamwork, organization structure and design, and organizational culture of two organizations; Biogenia and Sleepeasy. Comparison of approaches to teamwork and teamworking Teamwork is the work accomplished by interdependent employees in a group to achieve a goal of mutual concern (Parker and Wall, 1998). Teamwork encourages employees to collaborate with one another (Salas and Gelfand, 2012) and allows employees to be more included in the decision-making process (Mat and Razak, n.d., p. 218). Teamwork is essential to the success of both non-profit and profit-oriented organizations (Rapur and Rapur, n.d.). “As “no man is an island,” the positive effects of productive teamwork can energize an entire organization, just as the negative effects of a lack of teamwork can cripple an organization” (Slechta, n.d.). Biogenia places a lot of emphasis on the development of teamwork among the employees. This is achieved by interchanging their roles which is an essential component of teamwork (Griffin, Patterson, and West, 2001, p. 537; Tannenbaum et al, 1996). This has a two-way effect on the employees that increases their tendency to be better team members. Firstly, every employee gets an opportunity to work in a different position for some time during which, the employee gains exposure to the job responsibilities associated with that position so that whenever required, other employees can be invited to do certain tasks that are different from the tasks they normally do in their respective positions. This provides Biogenia to incorporate multi-tasking in its employees which in the long run is in the best interest of Biogenia as well as its employees as they would be equipped with diverse experiences. “Moving to multi-skilled teams will alter the range and style of working” (Acas, n.d.). Secondly, when an employee gets to work in some other position for some time, it enables that employee to gain an insight into the potential issues and challenges encountered by the employee who regularly serves in that position. This not only increases the employees’ knowledge of the challenges faced by all departments of the organization, but also increases their tendency to cooperate with employees from other departments in the hour of need as they know that the cause is genuine as they personally had had an opportunity to experience the issues while they served in other departments for some time. “To perform the task better, individuals depend on knowledge from other units or departments” (Mat and Razak, n.d., p. 221). As a result of this, employees understand one another’s problems and are intrinsically motivated to do their bit to resolve the issues because the ultimate goal is the achievement of organizational goal, which is not possible unless all departments are fully functional. Benefits and careers of all employees are associated with the profitability of the business and hence, all employees are eager to play their respective roles in arriving at the solutions of problems. This is the philosophy of teamwork in successful organizations and Biogenia measures high on the scale of this philosophy. On the other hand, Sleepeasy has a lot of loopholes in the process of development of teamwork among the organizational personnel. The fundamental problem arises from the categorization of employees in Sleepeasy depending upon their job responsibilities. There is so much difference in terms of the benefits provided to employees serving in different positions in Sleepeasy that the employees find it very difficult to arrive at one platform and make a concerted effort as a team to achieve the organizational goals. However, this fact cannot be overlooked that Biogenia and Sleepeasy belong to different industries and the culture prevalent in the hospitality industry does call for a certain level of categorization of employees depending upon their nature of job unlike the chemical industry. Also, it is fairly possible for Biogenia to interchange the job responsibility of employees as they all are generally equally complicated works e.g. marketing, research, sales and manufacturing all require in-depth study of the respective courses whereas housekeeping in a hotel does not require years of education and may be as well done by an uneducated but well-mannered employee as a highly educated employee. But the undereducated employee cannot be made to serve as a manager for some while. Likewise, managers are too educated and status conscious to serve in the position of a housekeeper. This justifies the categorization in Sleepeasy to some extent. Comparison of organizational structure and design Biogenia has four areas of function, namely research and development, support, manufacturing, and sales and marketing. Although the four are entirely different in their subtasks and activities, yet employees frequently work in a cross-functional manner. The way power is distributed in an organization determines its organization structure (Right, 2012). There is an equivalence and parallelism among the employees which suggests a horizontal organizational structure. “The horizontal organizational structure emphasizes an employee-centered approach with emphasis on teamwork and collaboration” (Hawthorne, 2012). Another indicator of the horizontal organization structure of Biogenia is that its principles are organized around cross-functional processes rather than individual functions or tasks, which is a fundamental trait of horizontal organization structure (Mize, 2002, p. 15). Biogenia places emphasis on the recruitment of highly educated employees. While Biogenia might have uneducated staff serving in such positions as housekeeping of the home office or undereducated staff for clerical works, yet this hardly has an impact on its business as the uneducated or undereducated staff has no interaction with the clients of Biogenia. On the other hand, even the uneducated employees of Sleepeasy are exposed to the clients as they have to go into their rooms and do the housekeeping while the clients might be there. While the focus of Biogenia is on the education and training of employees, the focus of Sleepeasy is on the conscientiousness of employees because Sleepeasy understands the fact that even the employees working at the lowest level of the organization structure would be exposed to the clients. Sleepeasy has a vertical pyramid of organization structure wherein the number of employees reduces as we move up the pyramid e.g. so many housekeepers in comparison to one manager. However, the responsibilities as well as authroity of employees increase as we move up the pyramid which is why Sleepeasy grants bonus to managers annually upon the accomplishment of goals. “Vertically structured, or "tall" companies have a chain of management, usually with a CEO at the top making decisions and then delegating authority to lower-level managers” (Huebsch, 2012). The style of leadership in Sleepeasy resembles an autocratic style. “Autocratic leadership is an extreme form of transactional leadership, where a leader exerts high levels of power over his or her employees or team members” (Vector Study, 2008). Comparison of cultures “Organizational Culture refers to a system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations” (Revathi, 2008, p. v). There is disparity between Biogenia and Sleepeasy in terms of the way they treat their workforce. Providing employees with opportunities of education and training is a very important way of improving the workers’ motivation. “Through various packages of incentives, such as salaries, bonuses, promotions, performance-related pay, and training opportunities, human resource management can link performance to reward” (Devadass, 2011, p. 568). While Biogenia is genuinely dedicated to the training and development of each and every member of its workforce, Sleepeasy grants different workers with different benefits and opportunities of development depending upon the placement of a worker in the organization structure, with those at the top entitled to more benefits and the ones at the bottom to the least. This can be estimated from the fact that nobody but the managers are entitled to an annual bonus worth 20 per cent of the basic salary if they fulfill their duties responsibly. “These characterizations of the employee–employer relationship emphasize organizations’ attainment of favorable outcomes through the generous treatment of employees” (Aselage and Eisenberger, 2003, p. 491). However, while this serves as an incentive for the senior management, it serves as a disincentive and demotivation for the subordinates despite the fact that management would not have been able to achieve their goals had they not had full support and dedication of the subordinates. This disparity of treatment creates a culture of status consciousness, lack of a sense of association and disloyalty with the organization specially on the part of the lower class employees. “Organizations must understand the impact of such distinctions on the behavior of their employees” (Joseph, 2002, p. 7). The high employee turn-over rate can be attributed to the very lack of association of the unsatisfied employees with the parent organization. On the other hand, the culture of Biogenia provides its employees with such an environment wherein they can relate to one another like a family. Since all employees are entitled to equal benefits, and each individual employee is provided with opportunities of training and education depending upon the nature and scope of his/her work, employees tend to relate to the organization which in turn, inculcates loyalty in them for the organization. “It is critical that policy makers consider a broad range of motivational determinants that they initiate incentives which all work in the same direction (organizational goals), and that the potential negative effects of new incentives are considered and counteracted with balancing measures” (Devadass, 2011, p. 569). In the case of Biogenia, the negative effects are counteracted by equal emphasis on the education and training of all employees rather than some of them. In-depth analysis of the organizational culture prevalent in Biogenia suggests that it is essentially a collaborate (Clan) organizational culture. Traits of a collaborate (Clan) organizational culture include openness, friendliness among employees, group loyalty and fostering of tradition (Tharp, n.d., p. 5). On the other hand, Sleepeasy has a control (Hierarchy) organizational culture which is highly structured and wherein employees’ behaviors are governed by procedures and rules (Tharp, n.d., p. 5). “Having an organizational culture that encourages employee involvement and creates a sense of ownership and responsibility appears to be important for the management of workplace diversity” (Guidroz, Kotrba, and Denison, 2009, p. 4). This provides Biogenia with an edge over Sleepeasy as the former provides its employees with more opportunities of involvement and inclusion as compared to the latter. Conclusion Concluding, Biogenia and Sleepeasy work in different industries and have according different requirements of organization structure and design, teamwork, and organizational culture. Biogenia outweighs Sleepeasy in teamwork. Also, the equality enjoyed by all employees in terms of benefits, privileges and perks in Biogenia provides it with an edge over Sleepeasy when it comes to organizational culture. The organizational culture in Sleepeasy is controlled to a large extent by the managers and accordingly, they are the ones that draw maximum benefit from it and the leadership style is autocratic in nature whereas in Biogenia, there exists a uniformity of authority at all levels and the leadership is more democratic or participative in nature. Biogenia and Sleepeasy have different organization structures but they suit the individualistic needs if the two organizations, so it cannot be said that organization structure and design of one is superior to the other. References: Acas n.d., Teamwork: Success through people, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Aselage, J and Eisenberger, R 2003, Perceived organizational support and psychological contracts: a theoretical integration, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 24, pp. 491-509. Bakker, AB, and Schaufeli, WB 2008, Positive organizational behavior: Engaged employees in ?ourishing organizations, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 29, pp. 147-154. Devadass, R 2011, Employees Motivation in Organizations: An integrative literature review, 2011 International Conference on Sociality and Economics Development, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Griffin, MA, Patterson, MG, and West, MA 2001, Job satisfaction and teamwork: the role of supervisor support, Journal of Organizational Behavior, Vol. 22, pp. 537-550. Guidroz, AM, Kotrba, LM, and Denison, DR 2009, Workplace Diversity: Is National or Organizational Culture Predominant?, The Linkage Leader, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Hawthorne, M 2012, The Advantages of Horizontal Organizational Structure, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Huebsch, R 2012, The Vertical Structure Vs. the Horizontal Structure in an Organization, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Joseph, J 2002, Social Identification, Group Differentiation and the Nested Group Model, Kellogg Journal of Organization Behavior, pp. 1-21. Mat, A and Razak, RC n.d., The Influence of Organizational Learning Capability on Success of Technological Innovation (Product) Implementation with Moderating Effect of Knowledge Complexity, International Journal of Business and Social Science, Vol. 2, No. 17, pp. 217-225. Mize, JH 2002, The horizontal organization, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Parker, SK, and Wall, TD 1998, Job and Work Design: Organizing Work to Promote Well-Being and Effectiveness. Sage: London. Rapur, B and Rapur, M n.d., Importance of Team Work for Nonprofit Organizations, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Revathi, G 2008, Organization Culture at Sarva Shiksha Abhiyaan State Project Set-Up, Tamil Nadu, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Right, J 2012, Vertical & Horizontal Organizational Structure, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Salas, E, and Gelfand, M 2012, Collaboration and Negotiation in Multi-Cultural Environments, Journal of Organizational Behavior, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Slechta, R n.d., Teamwork: Components of an Effective Team, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Tannenbaum, SI, Salas, E, and Cannon-Browers, JA 1996, Promoting team effectiveness, In Handbook of Work Group Psychology, West, MA (ed.), UK: John Wiley and Sons. Tharp, BM n.d., Four organizational culture types, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Vector Study 2008, Types of leadership, viewed, 15 April 2012, . Read More