Questions
Question 1
Organizational culture is the values and behaviors that contribute to the unique psychological and social environment of an organization. An organization’s experiences, philosophy, expectations and values hold an organization together and are an important component of an organizations culture (Gibson, 1991, 24). An organization’s culture is expressed in its inner workings, self-image, its interaction with the rest of the world and its future expectations. An organization’s culture also includes the freedom given to employees, how business is conducted, customer treatment and employees’ commitment towards objectives. The culture is developed with time, unique for every organization and shaped by the society in which a business operates. It has an effect on the productivity, performance, as well as providing guidelines on how the organization with relate with its customers and employees.
A bureaucratic culture is an ordered and formal organization with various levels and where responsibilities, tasks and authorities are delegated between offices, people or departments. A bureaucratic culture is held together by a central administration. In a bureaucratic culture, machines are mostly used in the running of the business activities. Speed, precision, unambiguity, reduction of personnel costs are raised to the extreme point. It is strictly ardent to the specifics of administrative procedure. Organizations that use this culture in most cases perform. For instance, McDonald Company has of late been performing very well due to cohesiveness of its teams, strong alignment towards goal achievement, application of modern technologies and job specialization (Koteen 199, 155).
An entrepreneur culture is one where an individual wants to be their own boss and forget about the concept of being supervised by someone. They want to be their own boss. The strategic leader makes all fundamental decisions and most communication is done by one on one conversations. Tasks are apparently not standardized. Execution of duties is done at a slower pace. It is driven by focus, authenticity, empathy, courage, innovativeness and proper timing. It is based on charismatic dominion. It mostly causes business failure as efficiency is compromised and decisions made have high possibility of being wrong (Gibson, 1991, 49). Coal co almost collapsed due to the adverse effects of entrepreneur culture.
Question 2
Explain the concept of motivation
Motivation can be said to be the processes that accounts for an individual’s direction, intensity and persistence of efforts towards attaining a definite goal or to behave in a certain manner. Intensity refers to how hard an employee tries while direction refers quality of efforts that are aimed at benefiting the organization. Persistence refers to the period of time that the employee can maintain their effort (Koteen 1997, 125). The content process looks at what motivates employees by clearly examining their needs while process theory defines the interrelationship between variables to determine why they are motivating.
For both public and private employees, fulfillment of the lower level needs before the high order needs brings about motivation (Kooiman, 1987, 41). Public employees are motivated by importance of the work and a feeling of accomplishment while private employees are motivated by short working hours, high profits and income. Positive example: The US government announced that its security forces had triumphed in the war against terrorism. This motivated the forces even further and would beef up security to ensure terrorism is subdued. Negative example: the Kenyan government accused its teachers of underperforming and this demoralized them.
Question 3
Concept of leadership
It is a process where one influences others to achieve objectives and directs the organization in a way that makes coherent and cohesive (Gibson, 1991, 322). Leaders should have skills and knowledge to enable them performs the duty of leading. Without the traits of a leader, one cannot lead to the desired end. Great leaders are made and not born. Leaders can therefore be trained to be good leaders.
Both private and public leaders need to have the necessary skills, experience in knowledge to effectively perform their roles. Public leadership entails more responsibilities and powers (Kooiman, 1987, 43). The association between goal-oriented leadership style and effectiveness is minimal. Old leaders are considered to be the best. In private leadership, less power is involved, less responsibilities and the relationship between goal orientated leadership style and effectiveness is high.
Public leadership: positive example-the chancellor of Oxford University has been using modern leadership skills to overcome the numerous challenges faced by the institution and ensure its success. Negative example- Uchumi supermarkets owned by the Kenyan government failed due to in effective management (Gurbuz, 2011, 206).
Question 4
Organizational politics is the pursuit of individual interests and agendas while disregarding the effects that such action will have on the effort of the organization to attain its goals.
Insurgency game: refers to creation of powers by resisting the directives from the authority.
Counterinsurgency game: the resistance to authority is countered to ensure that the defaulter does not become powerful.
The line‐versus staff game: refers to defeating rivals so that you gain power while over them.
Whistle-blowing game: is obtaining power by introduction a change in the organization.
Sponsorship game and coalition-building game: refers to attaching oneself to someone who has powers so that you marshal their support.
Positive example of organizational politics: Red cross boss decided to higher more experts in 2008 to help in handling disasters and emergencies. Most employees and board members were against the move (Gurbuz, 2011, 173). However, its relevance was seen in later years when disasters struck. Conditions were rectified with efficiency.
Negative: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation CEO disregarded the advice from stakeholders and decided to open a branch in Russia so that he would be seen to prevail in the disagreement. The conditions in Russia were tough and the branch collapsed while he topped the table during argument.
References
Butcher, D., & Clarke, M. (2001). Smart management: Using politics in organisations. Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave.
Gibson, J. L., Ivancevich, J. M., & Donnelly, J. H. (1991). Organizations: Behavior, structure, processes. Homewood, IL: Irwin.
Gurbuz, S., & Mert, I. S. (2011). Impact of the strategic human resource management on organizational performance: evidence from Turkey. International Journal of Human Resource Management, 11(4). doi:10.1080/09585192.2011.565669
Kooiman, J., & Eliassen, K. A. (1987). Managing public organizations: Lessons from contemporary European experience. London: Sage Publications.
Koteen, J. (1997). Strategic management in public and nonprofit organizations: Managing public concerns in an era of limits. Westport, Conn: Praeger.
