Organization Diagnosis free essay sample

Organizational diagnosis of Starbucks Corporation regarding its organizational development, organizational behavior and strategic human resource management. Starbucks has a robust OD and employs SHRM. | Organizational development and behavior are a vital part of any organization and can be a critical area that determines an organizations success in any industry. If and how these concepts are uniquely applied, organizations can define many different areas of their organizational structure. The Starbucks Corporation has become a well-known globally successful company. In analyzing the application of the organizational behaviors of communication, culture, and decision making, we can determine how these concepts have made this corporation successful. Organizational Communication Communication in the Starbucks organization is exceptionally successful. In order to appear transparent as an organization, provide sound direction of communication, maintain solid channels of communication, and still the rumor-mill; Starbucks has taken immense strides in concentrating on this aspect of its organizational behavior. Although Starbucks goes to no great lengths to define or list their organizational structure, recent changes in the organization define the organization as a matrix structure. These changes in the organization, done to improve the customer experience, helped define the communication directions used by the organization. The matrix organizational structure is a very effective way to take full advantage of all communication channels. Whether the organization wishes to label the organizational structure or not, the structure is the pivotal point of success in its organizational communication. The matrix structure is made up of cross functional work teams that have the ability to report to heads of the organization other than the primary supervisor. This structural behavior has allowed the corporation to have successful communication upward, downward, and laterally with its employees. Maintaining effective communication, Starbucks uses a model of communication used generally by smaller group networks, all channel communication. All channel communication allows employees to communicate actively with each other, making all members free to contribute. Surely, this channel of communication has contributed to the success of the organization. The organizational communication extends beyond just the employee and to the customer as well. Starbucks does a great job in using technology, marketing tactics, and their employees to communicate success, goals, and vision to the customer. Examples of this can be seen on the Starbucks website. The website shares the companies guiding principles, vision as a company, social responsibility, and mission statements. What this has done is allowed the organization to maintain a transparent image. This has helped to still rumors about the organization as these rumors come about. Starbucks has no problem rolling out a time table for important decisions to employees and the public as important decisions that come about. The organization will post on the corporate website and issue press releases that explain decisions and behavior that could cause uncertainty. Starbucks does a great job of illustrating pros and cons of future and current decisions. A good example of this can be seen in a recent posting of the structural changes the organization made in order to maintain stability and continue excellent customer service. This posting, aimed to head off uncertainty and quall the rumor-mill, explains to all partners of the organization (employees) that necessary changes will be made in the organizational structure including consolidation, reorganization, and a stated number of necessary layoffs. These styles of communication will continue to allow the organization to have success in their industry. Organizational Culture The Starbucks Corporation presents a strong appeal for potential employees with a strong organizational culture. This culture maintains values that reach every corner of its organization; and reaches outside its walls to the communities as well. Reviewing some of Starbucks cultural characteristics reveals how successful and appealing this cultural model can be. Starbucks organizational appeal Many of the business concepts and the attributes of the Starbucks organizational culture are very appealing. First, Starbucks has become a well known global entity. This has been achieved by a well recognized product that relies on its quality and unique marketing strategies. Customers can always be expected to be confronted with enthusiastic employees, happy to serve, and focused on the needs presented by their customers. Employees are well trained and have a vast amount of knowledge about all the products offered by their company. The effort that is placed on the quality of their product can be seen by the average consumer. They strive to provide an excellent product and, as proven by their tremendous success, few patrons leave the store with any dissatisfaction. It is apparent that the values and mission statements projected by the company are having great success in creating a strong cultural behavior. Organizational Values Many of the values held by the Starbucks Corporation business model are shared by consumers and adapted by closely watching organizations. One value that stands out for the company is in community support. According to Starbucks Corporation, they support many community organizations such as Conservation International, The Earthwatch Institute, Save the Children, Mercy Corps, the African Wildlife Foundation, and Planet Green. Values such as this have set standards and send messages that profitable companies have a responsibility to the communities that support their organization and to the needs impacting the environment and the world surrounding them. As well, the Starbucks organization list in its guiding principles the importance of embracing diversity, providing a positive work environment through respect and dignity, and a commitment to satisfying all customers all the time. Embodiment of cultural characteristics Starbucks continues to satisfy employment needs and provide excellent customer service. In part, this success can be attributed to the cultural characteristic of innovation and risk taking. At Starbucks, employees are empowered and encouraged to think outside the box. Starbucks encourages and rewards employees for innovative ideas and encourages employees to sway from drink standards to meet the specific request of the consumer. This leads to the characteristic of attention to detail. Because the company promotes the enthusiastic development and satisfaction of its customers, employees are expected to remain focused on the needs of the customer. In this business, this may mean the development and use of special listening skills and multitasking abilities. Employees, focused on the ever-changing ingredient orders that vary from customer to customer, show how valuable this characteristic is to the corporation. The Starbucks Corporation also exhibits the cultural characteristics of people orientation and team orientation. The company shows employees how important they are to their organization through the decisions they make that impact different members. Some of this can be displayed through the offering of health benefits to part-time employees. Cultural strength Starbucks maintains a very strong spiritual culture. Starbucks performance toward suppliers, communities, employees and customers gives rise to the awareness that Starbucks is one of those corporations that does not explicitly use the term spirituality at work for their actions, nonetheless live it to the fullest. Starbucks shows this spiritual culture in their promotion of fair trade, environmental contributions, workplace diversity, and its self acclaimed statement of employee enlightened self-interest. The bonds that Starbucks forms with its partners, employees, and community are evident when one simply opens the front door of the establishment. Starbucks maintains a strong appeal for a great place to work by asserting its strengths in its acquired cultural characteristics, values, and spiritual culture. Many other organizations are adapting these structural concepts after seeing the success of this organization. Starbucks can maintain this strong organizational culture with continuing dedication to its employees and customers. Starbucks has achieved success in corporate culture and has set the bar high. For many organizations this should be a wake-up call to catch up. Decision Making Perception is a process that all people take part in as we move through the course of events in our daily lives. When we meet people, make business decisions, evaluate performances, or pass judgments, our perception surrounding such events help persuade our next course of direction. In a sense, perception, accurate or flawed, is our reality. Causes that shape or distort our perceptions have a tremendous effect on the impact of an organizations behavior. Individuals, by nature, develop perceptive shortcuts when passing judgment and inflect both positive and negative effects. Starbucks has realized this importance in the decision making process of its organization and has been successful in modeling guidelines to direct employee behavior and shape corporate perception to aid in its success. Because Starbucks understands that decisions can be based on perceptions of individuals, influenced by upbringing, beliefs, or current state of mind; models are developed to guide individuals through the process. The creation of these models creates a standard that is followed to deliver a satisfactory result. These models identify a need, create a process to determine what qualifications will satisfy the need, identify matches to the need, then a decision is made on what match best suites the need. These models are not a perfect solution to the decision making process. Errors and bias still creep in to this process through the use of intuition, gut feelings, experience, and impulse. In addition, these models try to shape moral and ethical decisions, these models of ethical and moral perceptions focus on rights of the individual and social justice. Standing on the platform of transparency, Starbucks posts these models of decision making behavior based on what they call the Ethical Decision Making Framework on their website. Starbucks lists 6 points to this framework to guide and model decision making behavior: 1) Identify the ethical problem. 2) List possible solutions (what could you do? ) and any obstacles to resolving the problem. 3) Seek input from others, if appropriate. 4) Determine the best approach (what should you do? ). Is it consistent with our Guiding Principles, the Standards of Business Conduct and any applicable law or regulation? Would your approach embarrass you or Starbucks? How would your approach look published in the newspaper? Would you be comfortable with the example it sets for future decisions? 5) If the path isnt clear, ask for guidance. 6) Follow through on your decision. In addition to providing these framework guidelines Starbucks makes these statements very clear to each employee: You are empowered You can deliver great customer experiences, knowing that Starbucks supports you in doing the right thing and conducting business with integrity. You have responsibility You play a critical role in ensuring that Starbucks is a great work environment and in protecting our culture, our reputation and our brand. You have help If you are unsure what to do in a situation; you have resources available to you, including the Standards of Business Conduct and the Business Conduct Helpline. You have a voice When you believe something isnt right, you can speak up and share your concerns knowing that Starbucks wants to hear them and does not tolerate retaliation against partners. OD Conclusion The Starbucks corporation uses developed guiding principles and mission statements to guide in the decision making process and these also appear publicly on their website. These models play a vital role in the decision making process. Starbucks has been very successful in its ability to circumvent perceptive errors through the use of relational models. However, even with the use of relational models, errors and bias can still play a role in the decision making process, but the organization has adapted a level of accountability through this process to minimize the impact of errors and bias. Communication, culture, and decision making, represent only a small part of the concepts that makeup organizational development and behavior. A corporation that applies the concepts of organizational theory and behavior can determine the success of any organization. Starbucks has concentrated on the successful application of these three areas of organizational development. With this successful application, Starbucks proudly promotes and shares the models that make them successful to anyone who cares to investigate. As a result, Starbucks continues to be a successful corporation. Evaluation of SHRM With human resource rising as the primary asset of an organization, human resources (HR) management are being faced with new challenges to come up with strategic approaches that can add value to the organizations when sourcing for new employees. To address this issue the human resource managers have to formulate sourcing strategies that will add value to an organization in pursuit of identifying, recruiting, developing and retaining highly talented employees who can take the company to new heights and provide a competitive advantage to the company. However, the global workforce has become extra mobile and much more aware of its worth making talented employees hot items on the global labor market. Employers are forced to work more hard to be able to retain, motivate and develop good employees. Human capital is the most important and expensive resource of an organization. Many professional and market analysts agree that up to 80% of the organizations worth is contained in their work force. Highly successful organizations understand this vital differentiator and take the required measures to get the most out of their human resource assets. Strategic recruitment, hiring, retaining and training programs by the human resource management should focus on getting the best out of its workforce for the organization. Each employee requires more learning in order to improve their skill set. No matter how good a candidate is they cannot be 100% percent qualified. Thus, the human resource manager should implement a learning management system. Starbucks Corporation has understood this aspect and that is why it recognizes that its employees are one of their highly valuable resources. The very first guiding rule in their mission statement also addresses the Company’s principle towards its employees: â€Å"Provide a great work environment and treat each other with respect and dignity†. The management recognizes that the Starbucks employees play a foremost function in the expansion of the company. Starbucks Corporation training can be termed as systematic enhancement of knowledge, skills and attitudes by an employee in order to perform a given task. Development is the growth of an employee in terms of capability, understanding and awareness. In Starbucks Corporation training and development has helped the company to: Develop a workforce that can perform higher-grade assignments. Increase efficiency, effectiveness and standards of performance by the employee. Keep the employees informed. Provide superior training of new recruited workforce. Provide compensation and benefits. Workers need to be compensated for their performance in order to encourage them to keep up or improve on that performance. The moment the human resource manager establishes the performance of the worker, managers should establish rewards commensurate with the worker’s achievements. This will ensure maximum production and effectiveness of the employee. Current compensation programs should include a mix of basic pay, equities and variable pay. This has been presented well by the Starbucks human resource management as all Starbucks employees are known as â€Å"partners† no matter which job position the employee holds. Starbucks’s cultural values bestow employees with a feeling of meaning to their job performance even if it is only serving a cup of coffee. Each one of the partners (even part-timers) is entitled to get health care, take part in the Bean Stock program, and also get a free pound of coffee every week. In the Bean Stock program, Starbucks employees are given stock lower than the fair market value a number of times per year. At the same time Starbucks employees also take part in a 401(k) profit sharing plan. Human resource management (HRM) practices of Starbucks Corporation are among the best as attested by being rated as one of the best companies to work for by Fortune magazine. The management knows that the most important asset of any organization, its employees, requires an extensive investment, commitment and financial benefits in order to remain highly motivated and committed to the company. Tracking the employee production will enable the management to know where and which areas need improvement the most. Employees who do not perform to the level of set standards can be trained to improve on their abilities or given duties which they can perform best. The aim of any organization is to maximize profits and reduce costs. Tracking employee production will also enable the organization to cut production costs e. g. Lying off those employees who are not producing. Ultimately these measures will add value to the organization in terms of cost effectiveness. SHRM Conclusion Business strategy remains important in ensuring that a business performs well. It is important that human resources management is carried out in a proper manner. SHRM has a function of delivering strategy insights in the organization enabling it to be more effective in sourcing, evaluating and otivating employees in this increasingly unstable business environment. In addition, HR has to continue providing administrative services which are dependable, responsive and cost effective to the needs of the organization. Starbucks has been able to continue being successful due to their strategic human resource management practices. 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