Affecting_Change

Smith and Falmouth (S&F) is a small Mail Order Network and Tele-shopping company that operates in Canada the U.S. Smith & Falmouth's online has an organizational structure that is decentralized. The Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Irene Seagraves, at the top of the hierarchy, followed in line by the Chief Operating Officer, and the Project Manager, James William Argyle. James works closely and directly with the Logistics and Marketing managers, Brian Kervor and Adam Searle. Together, theses three make up the driving force of authority at S & F Online and have two groups of people to carry out their ideas. The logistics team is made up of three employees and the web development team that has six different employees within it. The company started an e-tailing division named S&F Online, in the hopes of staying competitive in the industry and to add overall financial stability to the parent company. To get the program off to good start, the founder and CEO, Irene Seagraves assembled various teams to help develop a program that would essentially manage the inventory and successfully market the new branch of the company. She is confident that the new teams will be able to accomplish her goals of creating a profitable online division that will complement her parent company. Most decisions of any significance are made by each of the three managers. Consistent with low formalization is empowering employees with the discretion to make day-to-day decisions about job-related activities. It’s a necessary component of a customer-responsive culture because it allows service employees to make on-the-spot decisions to satisfy customers completely. According to Robbins and Judge, employees form an overall subjective perception of the organization based on factors such as degree of risk tolerance, team emphasis, and support of people. This overall perception becomes, in effect, the organization’s culture or personality. These favorable or unfavorable perceptions then affect employee performance and satisfaction, with the impact being greater for stronger cultures. Just as people’s personalities tend to be stable over time, so too do strong cultures. This makes strong cultures difficult for managers to change. When a culture becomes mismatched to its environment, management will want to change it. (Robbins and Judge, 2007)The organizational culture of all companies is ultimately created through the current customs, traditions, and general way of doing things that are largely due to what has been done before and the degree of success it has had with those past endeavor's. (Robbins and Judge, 2007) Generally, this will lead us to the personality and style practiced by the founder, shaping the culture of the organization. Consequently, organizational culture will emulate the character traits of the owner or founder and follow closely the vision they believe it should be. Keeping the company's organizational culture in line with the owner's vision is accomplished through various methods. Employee selection and the criteria for performance is directed by custom fitting those hired to the established and desired cultural norms. The actions by administrators and upper management also help mold and direct desirable behavior through rewards, promotions, advancement, and general approval. The socialization process individuals go through upon entering a new company is similar to a test for adapting to the culture of the organization and is revealing as to the fit of the employee. The head of the company has a personal philosophy that will ultimately establish the type of behavior that is acceptable in terms of keeping the organizational culture alive. Smith & Falmouth's dominant culture is personified as a reflection of the values and goals of the CEO and founder, Irene Seagraves. Irene has decided to capitalize on industry forecasts by adding an e-tailing division to capture market share on the Internet through web-based business sales. She has appointed a web development team, a logistics team, and a marketing manager to coordinate operations with her original parent company. This is applying a great deal of performance pressure on the current team members and slightly changing the focus of organizational culture in her company and that is apparent, as the old and new team members have developed their own subcultures as a result. Creating a culture with low formalization has allowed the current team managers the freedom to make decisions and implement them. This essentially empowers them through the type of structure in place and allows different subcultures to be formed. Deciphering Smith & Falmouth's internal subcultures and the current employee control structures is necessary to understand the underlying motivation of the team members. Through a better understanding of the current control methods and mapping out the dominant members, a management practice method can be implemented with a more desirable result. Keeping in mind the strong personalities and characteristics of the main managers listed below, I will be taking an informal approach to achieve Irene's goals and try to re-enforce the company culture through general approval, teamwork, and support. Honesty and a willingness to carry a share of the workload should help encourage trust and acceptance. James William Argyle is the Project Manager. He is a team oriented and is proud of his carefully developed teams now in place. Fiercely competitive, he dislikes any one intervening in his power and control and does not wish to change or restrict his authority as it stands. He has built a personal relationship with each of his colleagues and has gained tremendous popularity with his inspirational style. He has become accustomed to his latitude and authority for making decision and has a history of success through outsourcing web contracts and freelance marketing partnerships. Brian Kervor is the Logistics manager and is hardworking and driven for success. He is not as charismatic as James, but gets along very well with the employees. He has a mathematical eye for detail and successfully implemented the online order and tracking system solution with the help and support of the whole logistics team. He has a head for numbers and is keenly interested in the technology of the web development team. Adam Searle is the highly skilled Marketing Manager. He oversees S & F Online interests and represents the mature and responsible type of leader with tremendous dedication and enthusiasm. He is not easily intimidated and is well liked among the team members. He treats everyone with true respect and is very aware of all the key players, developing tight relationships to his advantage. Hardworking and often putting in long hours with out any complaints, he can be a little overbearing to the softer spoken close-knit groups like the web developers, as they tend to be a timid bunch in his eyes. (Simulation, 2009)I will need to be accepted into the personal circle of relationships to gain trust among the managers who I believe are at the base of structural control. The decisions made by management that are most respected and carried out with no questions, are done by trusted or sometimes the most feared managers. At S & F Online, I think that the Project Manager, James William Argyle is a force to work on and a person that the groups of developers are fearful of. I must become an accepted colleague of his and offer him my trust and friendship, in order to redirect the current culture to a more positive and less individual style. I also believe Adam Searle is the most powerful and respected member of management and does not intimidate any of the teams in logistics or development, but may be an underlying authority threat to James, which remains a well kept secret by him. Adam appears to be the most self reliant, having the most confidence in his own abilities. He does not rely on strategic placement or favoritism and authority to accomplish his goals. He is the silent and true pillar of strength in this group and will be a powerful ally. A committed effort to become a part of his accepted circle will be easily done using a management style reflecting truth, honesty, and recognition for his meaningful and outstanding efforts toward the overall company goals. I will attempt to spend time with him outside of work, and include him directly and openly in my plans to redirect the strategy of organizational culture back to the benefit of the company. The culture has drifted too far from the mission of the parent company and become a format for individual accomplishments and authority that reward self-centered and egotistical behavior. Use of personal alliances and strategic positioning has allowed the focus of organizational success to wander. Adam will become a valuable asset and exemplary leadership role model for S & F Online. I intend to rely on his honesty, integrity, and gung-ho style of accomplishment that is so naturally directed toward the mission of the company in an attempt to minimally change the current culture for success and re-establish S & F Online as a unified and team oriented unit with common goals. Leadership roles are successfully accomplished when it can softly exert influence in a positive way to direct the group efforts toward the achievement of a common goal. The leaders skills at managing the groups work efforts toward the predetermined company missions, values, and goals exhibits successful teamwork and company benefit. (Simulation, 2007)Up until now, before being placed into the COO position, S & F Online operations have revolved around the Project Manager, who handled operations in the past. He has a six-member web development team maintaining the Online Sales Channel that makes up the website and the online payment gateway system. The Project Manager works closely with the Logistics Manager and his three- member logistics team who manage all the order handling, customer support, and delivery operations. Order fulfillment status is directly reported to the Marketing Manager, who coordinates all the product lines, marketing budgets, and promotional activities provided by Smith & Falmouth. This close coordination of teams has yielded good success and results so far, but the CEO wants to see improved statistics over the next nine months. I have chosen to implement a direct leadership style with formal structure, yet informal relationships between the staff members. In this fashion, I hope to create a flexible working environment that will encourage creative solutions to overcome the online challenges for S & F Online. The timeline will be difficult to meet with any formal and authoritative leadership style, so a more informal style that develops personal relationships through open communication, trust, and honesty is necessary. The current team structure in place will only resist when faced with forced authority changes.