Introduction
Change has become an essential part of the organizational strategy. In today’s competitive environment, organizations need to change its strategies, policies, structure and style if they want to be successful and meet the changing needs (Martin, 2006). Moreover, with the changing external and internal environment, an organization needs to adjust accordingly to be successful. Organizations face consequences of being rigid if they do not change at the right time. Thus, it shows that the organization should change with the changing environment. Organizations need to consider different aspects when they are planning to grow and expand, and therefore to properly grow, the organization must make some changes in its internal environment. Internal environment includes the human resource strategy, marketing strategy, the organizational structure, leadership style, the authority and reporting lines, etc. This report presents the scenario of one of the organizations, Lone Wolf Property Management, that is having issues in managing the growth and expansion.
The problems of Lone Wolf Property Management need to be managed and for this, the company must revamp its organizational structure and design and revise its organizational policies. A single owner founded lone Wolf Property Management, and the owner is still the same, however the owner has retired from the routine operations. The headquartered of the company is incorporated in the village of Rockville Centre, New York. The main services offered by the company are property management of single-family homes and smaller multi-family residences. The company has been operating since 1980 and at that time, the company had only one real estate agent. With the passage of time, the company has grown and currently, the company has 20 full time and part time employees. A significant portion of the work is managed by temporary employees or contractors. In the last five years, the company has reported a significant growth and with the economic downturn, this business segment of multi-family has observed a noteworthy growth (LaCour-Little, 2013). With limited income, people have started to rent out their rooms, parts of the houses, and people that cannot afford a complete home on rent are taking these portions of the houses. Investors are investing to re-buy properties to rent out, and this has increased the demand of professional property management businesses. Today, professional property managers have become trusted investment managers as they add value to the investors (Dunlap, 2014). Property managers play a critical role in keeping the tenants satisfied, and this helps in retaining the tenants (Hunt, 2013).
The company offers the services of real estate sales; however this is the secondary offerings of the company. Real estate business is one of the most regulated businesses (Roulac, 1976). According to the laws of New York State, the property managers should have a real estate license to sell the properties. However, the assistants of the company do not have a license. In the recent past, the company has received a significant growth in this service. Therefore, it has become imperative for a company to do something to get license real estate agents to manage its future growth and sales. Also, with the current organizational structure, the management is unsure how the future growth will be managed.
I have been working in this company for five years as a property manager and have been promoted to the higher management. At the higher management, I have been given the responsibility to analyze the resources of the company and how the company can manage its future growth and how revenues, cost savings and profitability can be increased. Therefore, this report presents the problems faced by the company and how these problems can impact the growth and expansion of the organization. To overcome these problems, I have discussed that the organization needs to change its structure, policies, human resource strategies and marketing strategies. Therefore, the report comes up with different solutions to overcome these problems. The report also uses theories and concepts from the literature and relates these concepts with the company’s situation. The report then presents conclusion at the end of the report.
Problem STATEMENT
“Lone Wolf Property Management plans to grow and expand; however the current structure is not feasible and stable, and therefore, the organization must change its current organizational structure, policies and strategies to grow successfully.”
Details of the Problems
There are several problems that the company is facing internally. If the company wants to grow and expand successfully, then it is critical that the management not only identifies the problems but also the management needs to come up with solutions to overcome these problems. The problems faced by the company are related to the organizational design and organizational structure. The company also needs to formulate proper compensation and benefits plan. Moreover, the company is attaining contracts from local reputation and from word of mouth, instead of having a proper marketing plan and formulate a specific sales strategy. In addition to this, the company has very few employees on its payroll. At present, the company is relying heavily on the part time or contractors and, therefore, these part-timers do not devote sufficient time to the company. According to the law, real estate agents selling properties should have a license; however, the assistants of the company do not have a license. Therefore, this can be another problem for the company in the long-run.
The company plans to grow and increase its sales in the future. To do so, it is critical for the company to come up with a proper plan regarding the organizational structure, and how to implement these changes in the marketing strategies, compensation and benefits, organizational design and structure. If the company does not change its organizational structure, policies, leadership style, then it will be difficult for an organization to grow. Therefore, a proper change management plan should be implemented in the organization.
LITERATURE REVIEW
Organizational Structure and Design
The organizational structure explains how the activities and tasks of the organization are directed. The current organizational structure of the organization is loose and unstable. Therefore, it is imperative for an organization to change its organizational structure to manage the future growth of the organization. The company can revise the organizational structure and come up with a functional organizational structure. Functional organizational structure is one of the traditional ways of organizational structure. As the organizational structure of the company is loose, therefore, such a traditional organizational structure can be very helpful. Functional structure can be helpful in improving the task allocation, reporting lines and in dividing the work to different employees (Jones, 2010).
Functional organizational structure focuses on different and important functions of the organization. By focusing on different functions, the organization can keep an eye on all the important functions. As all these functions are improved, it will help the organization in improving the overall quality of service (John, 2002).
Role of Leadership
The role of leadership is critical in any organization. The leader is supposed to lead from the front. At the time when the organization is looking to revamp its organizational structure and design, the leader of the organization must act in a way that the employees and everyone in the organization would follow and trust him (Northouse, 2012). The leader must communicate and show the vision to everyone. The vision must be communicated in a way that every employee in the organization would believe that it is achievable, and the leader will lead the organization in achieving the vision (Hackman, & Johnson, 2004).
Change Management
Change management is one of the most important steps for businesses when they are planning to make any important change in the organization. Change management refers to managing the overall change to ensure that the objectives of implementing the change are achieved, and the change implemented can be called as successful. Balogun, and Hailey (1991) stated that organizations need to have a proper change management plan to achieve the objectives of implementing the change. There are different theories presented by different scholars to manage the changes and this part of the report uses the change management model of Lewin to manage the change appropriately.
Lewin change management theory
According to Lewin (1947), a successful change can be divided into three steps or stages.
Unfreeze
The first stage of the change is termed as unfreeze. In this phase, the organization must understand that change is imperative and critical for the organization. The basic idea of this stage is to present the idea or reasons for implementing the change. Moreover, this stage also reflects why the current system or process will not work in the long run. Everyone feels uncertain because of the new system or change as they are not aware of the consequences and, therefore, they tend to resist the change (Lewin, 1947).
Kotter (2006) stated that to manage the change, the organization first of all needs to identify why the change is essential for the organization. So, to improve the current situation Lone Wolf Property Management needs to introduce a change management plan and manage it properly. This change will include; changes in the organizational structure and design, leadership style, human resource strategies and marketing plan. Therefore, it is critical for the management to come up with a change management plan as there are drastic changes to be made. The change is essential for an organization to grow and expand its business. If the company continues to follow the same system and procedure then, it will be challenging to achieve the organizational goals.
Change
This stage of the change management process is to implement the change. In this stage, the employees, management and people start working or following the new processes or follows the new system (Lewin, 1947). The uncertainty created in the unfreeze stage tends to reduce or eliminate in this stage. The change does not implement or happen overnight as it takes time to implement the change successfully and for people to start the new processes or follows the new system (Senior and Swailes, 2010). It is critical for the change manager or the person responsible for the change to ensure that everyone supports the change. This can be done by communicating and showing the vision of the change and the reasons for implementing the change. Moreover, the consequences of continuing with the current system should also be communicated so that everyone is aware that the current system will not work.
ANALYSIS
In order to make changes in the organizational structure, the company must formulate different functional departments such as operations, marketing, finance, and human resource. This will help the organization to focus on all these aspects. Moreover, the organization may need to hire and recruit more employees to develop a proper functional organizational structure. Each department should be the head by the department head, and they must be accountable for their work.
The role of each department will be important in managing the growth. For instance, the human resource department will be responsible for identifying the needs of the employees in the organization and in defining the roles and responsibilities of the employees. HR department will be evaluating the performance of the employees and then rewarding employees accordingly. HR department will also be recruiting employees based on their skills, qualifications and experience for different positions. Similarly, the marketing department will be responsible for formulating a proper marketing plan, and this plan will be modified with the passage of time accordingly. The marketing department will work with the sales staff in formulating the marketing strategies and how to increase the sales of the company. Thus, functional organizational structure will help the organization to focus on different departments and functions, and it will result in improving the overall organizational performance and will help in managing the future growth.
I have been selected as the top management and, therefore, as a leader I have to lead from the front and take Lone Wolf Property Management to accomplish the vision. As a leader, it is important that I should communicate with all the employees of the organization and help them in overcoming the obstacles they face. Moreover, I need to understand how the employees in the organization can be motivated and then help the management in formulating such policies that could keep the employees motivated. As the company has been focusing a lot on temporary employees, therefore, I need to convince the top management to change its policies and organizational structure. I believe the company needs to recruit more permanent employees and offer them different benefits to retain them. In addition to this, the benefits and rewards should be given to all employees as every employee needs to play his or her part in order to make the organization successful.
According to Feng and Geltner (2011), the real estate businesses must understand the strengths and weaknesses and must assess the performance of the internal employees. Morever, they stated that real estate business should encourage accountability as well as encourage them with rewards for superior performance. So, as a leader I will formulate an organizational culture where all the employees will work for the betterment of the organization rather than their individual benefits and then benefits and rewards will be given accordingly. It is important to retain the employees particularly the talented employees, and therefore everyone should be treated in the same way (Dobhan, 2014). As a leader, I believe the role of change management is also vital as the current organizational structure, policies and strategies need to be changed, and this change should be made appropriately. Otherwise, the change in strategies will remain only on paper or verbally and will not be incorporated by the employees and in the organizational culture.
Lone Wolf Property management plans to grow and increase its revenues and profitability. However, to do so, it is critical that the company must change its current process and structure. According to the second stage of Lewin change management theory, the company needs to change its current organizational structure and design, as well as human resource policies and strategies. It is significant for the management to communicate the reasons for the change and how these changes can be helpful for the organization. Therefore, the management of the Lone Wolf Property should discuss with all the employees and try to communicate and discuss the issues currently being faced by the company. The management should also ask the employees about strategies to overcome these issues and how the company can grow and expand. The management should prepare a new organizational structure and then divide the responsibilities to each department or head of department. This will help the employees to know what they are supposed to do, and they can focus on their specific job or tasks assigned. Thus, it will help the organization to focus on all important departments, and this will in turn help the organization to grow. Moreover, to successfully implement the change, the company can also involve the current employees and then help them to achieve the objectives.
Refreeze
The last stage of the Lewin theory is Refreeze. In this stage, once the change has been implemented, and people have started working on the new ways and procedures, then the organization needs to refreeze (Lewin, 1947). The main concept of refreeze is to halt or to make the people accept the change process and to ensure that the change has been implemented successfully (Levasseur, 2001). Therefore, once Lone Wolf Property management has implemented the changes, as people tend to accept or start working on the new ways, the management must help the employees. The role of management should be to ensure that everyone supports the change and feels confident about the new procedures and strategies implemented. This stage will be important for Lone Wolf Property, because if the management does not go through the refreeze phase, then employees can be left in the transition phase. If this happens, then the employees may not be sure whether to follow the new procedures or the previously used procedures. In order to accept the changes and to stabilize the changes, the management can also reward employees as well as formulate a feedback system where employees can share their feedback.
solutions to overcome these problems
- Create a new vision and mission statement and communicate this mission and vision to the employees of the organization
- Formulate a proper human resource management plan and induct more salaried/ permanent employees
- Try to reduce the dependency of outside contractors and focus more on employees within the organization
- Come up with a proper marketing plan and not just rely on word of mouth for marketing
- Create a proper organizational structure and organizational design
- Come up with a human resource plan of benefits and compensation to motivate the employees
Conclusion
Lone Wolf Property Management plans to grow and expand. The company has reported significant growth in the last five years; however, the current structure is loose and will not allow the organization to capitalize successfully on the opportunities. Therefore, it is critical that an organization must make changes in its organizational structure, design and strategies. The report has presented important strategies and changes in the organizational structure to grow successfully. It is important that the management. Otherwise, the changes can backfire and hurt the organization in the long-term.
References
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