Management Organisation and Strategy - Essay Example

Introduction In order for any manager to maintain a smooth and a good organizational culture, he or she should adopt some very important organizational cultural practices (Salder & Craig, 2003). The cultural practices that any organization will adopt must provide a strong link between the employees, the management, the customers as well as the leadership styles, organizational culture and the societal culture. This means that they have to be structured in such a way that they provide great motivation and courage to the employees for improving their working skills and productivity to satisfy the needs of the customers. In addition, the cultural practices also must infuse some aspects of the organization like values, experiences attitudes and beliefs. This is because these organizational cultural practices are the instrument that every organization uses to cause motivation among all of its workers and employees. These cultural practices comprises of beliefs and ideas of which each member of that organization must comply with to achieve the objectives and the goals of that particular organization (Thompson & Martin, 2005). This then means that the cultural practices must be made in such a way that they are acceptable to all the members of the organization whether in the management or employee level. IKEA’s competitive standing against a background of generic competitive strategy models through organization culture Many questions have been raised as whether there is a relationship between the organizational culture societal culture and the leadership styles in an organization. All of the above factors are very important as far as the running and success of any given organization is concerned especially in terms of fulfilling its goals and objectives as well as being effective and efficient in the achievements. The leadership styles used by a certain organization represent part of the culture of that organization and then the culture of the society influences the culture of the organization as well as the leadership styles that the organization should use (Salder & Craig, 2003). For example for any organization to have a culture of using any charismatic, participation, situational, transactional, transformational, the quiet or servant style of leadership, then the societal culture must be put into consideration One of the most important aspects that should be considered in implementing organizational theory is the issue of behaviour patterns in the organization as far as IKEA is concerned. This is the reason as to why most of the organization organizes for seminars and workshops for their employees so that they can be informed about the organizational cultural practices the organization implements; this is a great advantage because it enables the workers to change their behaviour accordingly to be in line with the organizational goals and objectives (Thompson & Martin, 2005). This also enables their behaviour to add much credibility to their work as well as increase ethical value of the organization hence adding its popularity hence giving it a platform for competition. It should be noted that any theory that an organization opts to implement, must be thoroughly scrutinized by the professions before critical decision about its creation is made. This is to ensure that it works for the betterment of that particular organization. A better strategic vision is therefore very important to ensure that all the cultural changes that are made are geared towards the wellbeing of that organization. Another importance of organizational cultural practices is that it brings understanding between the employers and the employees. As a result, it then leads to development of loyalty and trust within the organization. If for example in a particular organization the team leader in a department does not cope well with the rest of the employees, then it means that there is need to investigate and find out the root cause of the problem. By doing this, the organization ensures that the cultural practices that have been set do not just benefit the organization but also are taking care of the welfare of the employees. There are a many cultural practices that are used by the organizations to achieve the above benefits and especially the issue of creating a good relationship between the employer and the employee. Organizational culture refers to the norms, shared values and expectations that determine the governing of a certain organization. It actually describes the manner in which people interacts as well as approach the work. Societal culture defines the norms, expectations and shared values of a society or a group of people living in a particular place governing them. For any given organization to run well, there organizational culture, societal culture and the leadership style must be in harmony (Hill & Jones, 2007). IKEA’s competitive standing against a background of generic competitive strategy models through brand management For any company to be successful in the business it is involved in there must be a great deal of brand management that is practiced. It is because of the fact that this is one of the ways in which a company attempts to achieve it goals as far as the issue of customer satisfaction is concerned. According to Rik (2003), this refers to the process of applying marketing techniques with reference to specific product, brand and product line. The process not only entails the issue of the brand but also the management of the particular company to ensure the goals and objectives of the company or the business are achieved. There is a need for any particular company to get to understand what brand means for them before being engaged in integrated brand management. Therefore, the owner or the manager of the company is expected to explain what the brand means for the company. This means that the managers in conjunction with the other employees especially the marketing department should be involved in the process of branding after getting to know the needs of the customers that are out to satisfy. The exercise should be led by the company’s CEO. It should be noted that for a particular brand to be effective to the customers then it means that there must be a brand promise, which stands for the real implications of the brand. This explains why the president and the overall overseer of the IKEA Company are involved in the process of branding. The company has made a brand promise to its customers in the sense that all of its products are known to evoke feelings from the customers resulting to them buying and ordering for more of the products. They are able to make the right promise top their customers because of the fact that through the marketing department, there is always a continuous study to get to know what the needs of the customers are and then the company goes ahead and fulfils them. A company must apply a number of ways to ensure that the customers’ gets learn about the brand it is offering. Some of the strategies that the company has employed includes issues like advertisement as well as the effort of the management of the company to get to understand the motivational factors of the customers as well as the abilities as far as working in the company is concerned (Hill & Jones, 2007). By doing that, the company has been able to stand and compete with all of its competitors. The IKEA Company has been able to keep the promise to the customers because of the fact that it entails management of the capabilities by the use of processes that can help the company to deliver what is required of it to the customers. Frame work for the IKEA Brand Management IKEA has a number of core values, which have been the main guideline to its branding. The company is one of the companies that are very much committed to persistence. It has been persistence in ensuring the needs of the customers are very well understood. This is whereby the company ensures all of its employees are well versant with the issues of core values of the company so that in everything they do, they can be in a position to get to understand what they should insist on doing. The company also focuses on the issue of producing products, which will provide happiness to the whole world. This ensures that the company in its effort to provide the happiness to its customers ensures that they their products are produced in a great level of creativity and innovation. This is why there is so much use of modern knowledge and technologies in all of the company’s production. There are four very important elements associated with the IKEA Company’s efforts toward brand management, which are the marketing, management, customer and product. They issue of management is catered for in terms of proper training for all of the employees. The managers are well trained in the matters of the field, good ways of accounting and in the running of the business, then for the customers they have a chance to make their purchases online, the marketing department is very much involved in branding and finally the product is made as per the needs of the customers. There are three very important parts of brand management as far as the IKEA company is concerned which are the image, feature and the core values. These are very useful for the company in building the brand name to all of its customers (Rik, 2003). It is through the core values of the company that the customers have been able to understand clearly the purpose and the faith of the brand of the company. The feature, which is very strong for the company, has helped the customers to be able to identify the company’s brands. This is because; people have been in a position to clearly understand the brand produced by the IKEA because all of their products have had a repeated feature, which the customers easily identify. The issue of image has been used by the company for the purposes of winning it customer’s identification. The IKEA has been committed in trying to build the image of the brand for all of its products. This explains why most of the people in the whole world think very positively about the products that are offered by the IKEA Company as compared to other companies. This explains why the three element appears in the centre most of the circle in the concentric (Rik, 2003). The other four very important elements are the brand identity, strategy, management and value. They are the main processes that are used by the company to ensure the customers get to know the brand very well. Brand identity entails the naming of the particular brand, also the aspect of using the brand name as well as the logo. The company comes up with unique names for their products, which are known in the whole world. This is a film that is unique and in case the company would want to come up with a new action then the name itself would sell the brand or the product. In addition, the use of the name IKEA is very appropriate to the customer because it is unique and easy for them to remember. Beside the name, all of its products contain some logos and symbols. The following are the main symbols used for the identity of IKEA company’s brands that appears in all of their products and brands (Rik, 2003). The moment people see the logos and hear the name they know it is from IKEA. Brand strategy entails the transmission of the massages about the brand of the company to all of the customers. This explains why the company must be aware of its niche first before embarking on other issues (Rik, 2003). Through that, then the company is able to know the kind of message to pass across for the customers, especially through the advertisement and the company is able to create impressive images to the minds of the customers. IKEA has been able to fully embark and maintain the practice and that explains why their products can be sold in the whole world without any struggle. In actual sense they have been able to self advertise them in the whole world very easily and in very balanced way (Dennis, 2001). The brand value of the company has been maintained through continuous innovation and creativity. According to Dennis (2001), the brand value of any given company refers to the feeling the customers and the entire world feel concerning the brand. One of the uniqueness the brands of the IKEA have to the world is the effort it has continuously put in ensuring that the people get products of high quality made from the latest technology and contains a very unique design, which suit any age. This has been derived at after the positive feedback that is received from the customers all over the world (Hamel & Prahalad, 2004). IKEA’s one way of brand management is the use of knowledge management which entails the different strategies, methods, practices and ways that have been laid by a particular organization to represent, create, identify and distribute as well as adopt to the experiences and insights observed in the business on the process of its running (Hannagan, 2005). Conclusion For any business to thrive and take lead in today’s business world, no matter which industry it is, there is need for a market analysis. It is very evident that a company like premier book services dealing with the offers services in accounting to small business as well as individual people, where there is great demand, dynamic technology and great competition, market analysis is very important (Armstrong & Kotler, 2007). It will be beneficial for such firms to use both the past as well as the current techniques of an effective analysis to be able to maximize their profit, make better decisions and come up with perfect solutions for their problems. This means that the analysis is a very important component of any business. Reference Armstrong, G. & Kotler, P. 2007. Marketing: an introduction, 8th ed. New Jersey: Pearson Prentice Hall. Dennis, A. 2001. Marketing: principles and practice, 4th Ed). Financial Times, New Jersey: Prentice Hall. Hamel, G. & Prahalad, C. 2004. Competing for the future. Boston: Harvard Business School Press. Hannagan, M. 2005. Management concepts and practice. England: Prentice hall. Hill, C. & Jones, G. 2007. Strategic Management: An Integrated Approach, 8th Ed. California: Cengage Learning. Rik, R. 2003. Brand Management. Essex: Pearson Education Limited. Salder P. & Craig J. 2003. Strategic management, 2nd Ed. London: Kogan Page Publishers. Thompson J. & Martin F. 2005. Strategic management: awareness and change, 5th Ed. California: Cengage Learning EMEA. Read More