Task – Questions

Knowledge and understanding for this core unit will be assessed by written answers to the questions below.

Organisations differ in terms of structure, the products and/or services offered and customers.
1. Evaluate the advantages and disadvantages of two types of organisation structures, including the reasons underpinning them. (AC 1.1)
2. Analyse connections between organisational strategy, products, services and customers. (AC 1.2)
All organisations are affected to some extent by external factors and trends. The impact of these factors and trends could be positive, neutral or negative, some are short-lived whilst others are long-lasting. Analyse a range of external factors and trends currently impacting organisations. Identify organisational priorities arising from the factors and trends analysed. (AC 1.3)
The CIPD’s report Workplace Technology: the employee experience (2020:2) states, ‘the impact of the latest technology revolution on how organisations create value and on the way people work spans all industries, economies and parts of society’. Assess the scale of technology within organisations and how it impacts work. (AC 1.4)
Drawing on your reading, explain one theory or model which examines organisational culture AND interpret one theory or model which examines human behaviour. (AC 2.1)
Assess how people practices impact on organisational culture and behaviour, drawing on examples to support your arguments. (AC 2.2)
Many organisations have managed considerable change in recent years. CIPD’s report, People Profession 2030: a collective view of future trends (2020) identifies ‘internal change’ as a key future trend.

a. Explain different approaches to managing change (AC 2.3) b. Discuss models for how change is experienced. (AC 2.4)

CIPD’s Good Work Index provides an annual benchmark of job quality. Data is gathered on seven dimensions of good work, including ‘health and wellbeing’. Assess the importance of wellbeing at work and factors which impact wellbeing. (AC 2.5)
Discuss the links between the employee lifecycle and different people practice roles. (AC 3.1)
Analyse how people practice connects with other areas of an organisation and supports wider people and organisational strategies. (AC 3.2)
People professionals provide a service to internal customers but to truly add value, people professions need to understand their customer’s needs. Discuss processes for consulting and engaging with internal customers to understand their needs. (AC 3.3)

Solution

Task 1

5COO1: Organisational Performance and Culture in Practice

Part 1

1.1 Advantages and disadvantages of organisational structures

In Sekhar and Srinivasan (2008), organisation structure is identified as supporting HR professionals, management and staff in their day-to-day practices. Further, a good organisation structure elicit immense gains to an entity in areas of transparency, saving on time and elaborate role distinction.

Hierarchical

For BMC, they operate through a hierarchical organisation structure. According to CIPD (2020), this is a structure where the command chain of an organisation is segmented from senior management teams and executive to general employees. In other terms, there is a leader at the top leading the other subordinates. Considering BMC case study example, their organisation structure is shown in figure 1;

Figure 1: BMC Organisation Structure

A set of advantages of hierarchical organisation structure are;

Clear career progress and succession planning– According to Bagdadli and Gianecchini (2019), in an entity operating with a hierarchical organisation structure, employees are appropriately positioned to ascertain varying command chains. The outcome of this is appreciating best strategy to advance their roles in the organisation within specified timelines.
Control of organisation operations effective– By adopting a hierarchy organisation structure, in BMC, Indeed.com (2021) note that it is possible to exercise authority and power. The employees are appropriately supported by the organisation. In BMC also, the communication adopted is elaborate guaranteeing good direction for organisation employees.
Specialists developed– In BMC, there are potential specialists in various subsidiaries hence effectiveness in their roles. For instance, in their finance, operations and technology departments, there are specialists working in them. As evidenced in Tooranloo and Saghafi (2018), this improves job roles subdivision and elaborate strategy.

On the other hand, their disadvantages include;

Costly in implementation– Today, BMC encounters challenges impacting on availability of resources. Hierarchical structure is significantly costly in terms of its implementation. Also, for the organisation, the hierarchical structure would get complex is acquisition is affected. Also, having people in higher positions in the hierarchy could mean more support and pay. This is what NiBusiness (2021) note as overhead costs which tend to be cost intensive to an organisation.
Low pace in making decisions– Since hierarchical has immense roles to be advanced, consultation must be effected as part of the decision making. The management roles and other subordinates would have to get engaged in active decision making. For BMC, this would include individuals from varying personalities engaged with embracing of various distinctions in opinions development and sharing of ideas.
Poor Communication/ Miscommunication– Departmentalisation of an organisation lead to the engaged departments contributing to inappropriate communication or miscommunication. This is due to presence of multiple supervisors being involved contrary to only sole executives. For BMC case example, supervisors in various subsidiaries are engaged leading to miscommunication.

Divisional Structure

As identified in Accountingtools (2021), a divisional organisation structure include “entities actively operating their businesses in distinct geographical locations, market environment, products and groups of services”. For instance, in my current organisation (Saudi Aramco), having opened subsidiaries in Middle East, they have ended up embracing a divisional structure. This is as illustrated in figure 2;

Figure 2: Divisional Organisation structure

For advantages, they are;

Accountability– This structure is used in facilitating the varying organisation divisions in accounting for their practice. A comparative analysis of the departments is done with those underperforming noted.

Teamwork– This harness entire employees operating as teams with interaction with the rest harnessed. This is for attainment of high-level development goals.

In light of disadvantages, they are;

Not appropriate for small organisations– Considering a large organisation such as BMC or Saudi Aramco, they have large departments and divisions. Nevertheless, for a small organisation, these departments would be non-existence hence no need of adopting divisional structure.

Misaligned culture in different divisions– Existence of varying divisions means their culture would be distinct. Misalignment in their roles would be the result hence impacting organisation sustainable operations.

1.2 Connections between organisational strategy, products & services, customers and revenue generation

Products and Services- Considering the case study organisation BMC operating in the hospitality industry, their approach entail dominating their food, accommodation and recreational products. For achieving this, products and services are group as either high quality with a holistic embrace on best strategy in the entity practice. This harness responding efficiently to customers needs in their global market. Similarly, in Saudi Aramco where I work as a people professional, their operations are in line with need for achieving the stipulations of Porter’s 5 Forces Analysis (Juliana et al., 2019). This is as illustrated in figure 3;

Figure 3: Porter’s 5 Forces Analysis Tool

Customers– Organisation strategy has direct link with clients guided by need to promote customer relationship management and high-level customer value proposition (CIPD, 2021). Hence, CIPD (2021a) note the necessity for people professionals aligning employees functions with entity objectives for clients satisfaction. In BMC organisation strategy, their strategy associate clients by adopting VRIO Framework (Miethlich & Oldenburg, 2019). The aspects put into account Value, Rarity, Imitable and Organisation (see figure 4);

Figure 4: Organisation Strategy Association with Customers

Revenues– Organisation strategy has a direct link with revenues where weaknesses and strengths evaluation are pursued for leveraging on competitive advantage and dominating markets (Laurett & Ferreira, 2018). This can be done by using SWOT analysis noting on both external and internal factors. A case example is in Saudi Aramco where their organisation strategy entail an embrace on innovation and technology in active practice ensuring a high-level capability of achieving revenues generation and profitability.

A case example is for BMC organisation strategy having a direct link with products, customers and revenues. This is appropriately explained by using Balanced Scorecard Tool (Rafiq et al., 2020) highlighting on the level of measuring relevant integration of organisation practices and people professionals (see figure 5);

Figure 5: Organisation Strategy Link to Revenues

1.3 External factors and trends impacting/likely to impact BMC’s future strategic direction

According to Zivkovic et al. (2020), external factors and trends entail “progress and holistic strategies which influence an organisation successful operations in their business environment”. This is also highlighted in the course Avado notes as influencing change in entity operation with aspects which represent organisation changes with aspects which evidence a situation of fact of information impacting a specific result. Additionally, according to CIPD (2021b), the external factors impact “organisation culture can society change, market environment, innovation Green HRM strategies and COVID-19 pandemic uncertainties”.

For evaluating external factors and trends impacting people professionals, appropriate use of PESTLE analysis is required (CIPD, 2021c). The outcomes from this are well applied in an organisation for leveraging on competitive advantage. PESTLE Analysis for BMC’s future is as illustrated in table 1;

Table 1: BMC’s PESTLE Analysis

Political factors– In Khalid and Rahman (2019), politics tend to reduce individual output and eventually impacting an entity productivity. A case example is in (ref), evidencing people professional impact of Brexit issues to access job changes and success of an entity.

Social-Culture– In various entities, varying people in the society shift an entity success in market and business environment of operations.

Technologies– According to CIPD (2021d), due to COVID-19 pandemic prevalence, technology relevance in modern business environment is core for facilitating working strategies. This is while flexible working and remote working essential to attain work prominence.

Green HRM-This is defined by Saeed et al. (2019) as “a collection of policies, strategies and systems which stimulate green behaviours or an entity employees to create environment appropriate, resources efficiency and corporate social responsibility”; This influence capacity of an entity in achieving sustainable development.

Demographic changes, diversity and inclusion– Transitioning from Generation X to Z and Millennials in workplace impact scope of organisation practices improvement. This is influenced by needs for change, demands and operations scope.

1.4 Current strategies priorities for BMC and what has caused them

COVID-19 Pandemic

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