Compare And Contrast Different Organizational Structures And Culture Commerce Essay

Compare And Contrast Different Organizational Structures And Culture Commerce Essay MasterCard is one of the most common names used by people in USA and the second only in worldwide billings to Visa. In order to answer the question about the position of MasterCard in the world, Leigh Clapham (n.d) announced that: As we examined the company, we felt our strategy and people were fine, so we really focused on culture almost by a process of elimination. We just felt our leadership and our execution could be much better, and culture was really at the heart of that. MasterCards organizational culture is defined as role culture because their employees have passive-defensive behaviors, which often means avoiding personal responsibility and simply attempting to make everything rule-based. (Leigh Clapham, n.d) However, these bureaucracies are very slow to respond to change which means that the Leigh Claphams desire to change behavior and culture in MasterCard is quite hard to achieve. However, role culture brings safety working environment to employees so that they are willing to keep their mind on their work. Microsoft In the past, Microsoft is known as the most successful and biggest technological company under Bill Gates leadership. In 2000, Bill Gates left and Steve Ballmer became the CEO of Microsoft. Under Steve Ballmers leadership, Microsoft went down in many aspects such as stock price, the capabilities of innovation, and especially the organizational culture. The organizational culture in Microsoft is competitive culture (Diane Ravitch, 2012) and also called cannibalistic culture (Paul Thomas). It means that, working in Microsoft, employees always have to take part in an unexpected competition. This internal competition, somehow, has created dysfunction corporate culture that obviously will thwart innovation. Its one of many things that lead Microsoft to Lost Decade (Kurt Eichenwald, 2012). Structure According to Bill Gates (1997), Microsoft has a very flat organization. Microsoft is currently employing 94,000 people which means much larger than MasterCard. In 2011, MasterCard was employing approximately 7000 people. However, likes Microsoft, MasterCard is also defined as a flat organization (?) Outcome 1.3: Discuss the factors which influence individual behavior at work Admittedly, organization is made up by individual and, as a result, individual plays an important role influencing organizational behavior. There are five major factors that influence individual differences in behavior at work: personality; perception; attitude; abilities and skills; conflict, stress and change. The individuals personality is one of the core factors of organizational behavior which obviously affect the whole organization. Personality is considered as the most complicated aspect that can influence an individual behavior in a big way. Family, culture and situation are several personality factors that have impact on an individual. Attitude is a tendency to respond to certain situations. Its also defined as a mental and neural state of readiness, exerting a directive or dynamic influence upon the individuals response to all objects with which is related. That means the managers of an organization have responsibility in order to create a favorable working environment which will enable their employees form a positive attitude. For example, the working environment in Microsoft is known as cannibalistic culture (Paul Thomas) meaning that its too competitive. It leads to result that their employees always have to compete with each other. They would rather beat their colleague than make innovation. Lacking innovation which comes from employees, Microsoft is performing a bad business in recent years. Perception is the way an individual interpret the environmental stimuli. There are also many factors that decide the right perception of an individual. But the most important is that the manager has to create a favorable environment which will help employees perceive them in a positive way. Abilities and skills are judged through the performance of an individual at work. It means that employees can perform well or not depends on his/her abilities and skills can match the job requirement or not. Microsoft is a typical example explains the relationship between skills, abilities and organization. Microsoft is using stack ranking system which was popularized by Jack Welch of GE (Diane Ravitch, 2012). This system enables manager rate their employees from the best to worst and then fail the worst. The worst one is also known as the person who cant match the abilities and skills with the job requirement. If the failed one is doing a terrific job and he knows he is going to get failed, he absolutely perform his work in a positive way. The last factor in five core factors that influence an individual is conflict, stress and change. Working under cannibalistic culture means Microsofts employees always have to work under pressure and stress. The result is that they cant do their best when they deal with problems or have to innovate. Then, they perform the bad work, greatly influence to the organization and Microsoft is now close to financial failure. The knowledge about these responses is determining factors for the organization. Every organization requires a positive behavior from their employees and such behavior is recognized by observation, learning or training. Besides the job, the managers have responsibilities to create a good working environment which, somehow, will influence to employees behavior. Outcome 2.1: Compare the effectiveness of different leadership styles in different organizations Leader plays a vital role for the development and the existence of the organization. Leader helps develop organizations objectives, visions, missions and value. Naturally, organizational culture is created based on its leadership and contrariwise the organizational culture also has impact on shaping and developing leadership. The leader styles could be distinguished into four types: autocratic, democratic, persuasive and, participative. Microsoft under Bill Gates leadership is different with Microsoft under Steve Ballmers leadership because of different leadership between these two CEO. Bill Gates leadership is called autocratic. Gates made all the decisions, large or small. He allowed no middle managers between him and his employees. Gates was Microsofts chief decision maker, chief technologist, chief salesperson, chief dealmaker and chief visionary, all rolled into one. (Robert S. Portfolio, 2004). His leadership styles made the communication between him and subordinates was shown in one-way. He made decision and everyone had to do exactly what he said without questions. It greatly effects on employees work performance. Making all decisions himself means he decides to change Microsofts culture into overbearing culture (Edward Cotton). He also dropped the innovative culture which is built from the contribution or initiative from subordinates. However, his style ensures the fulfillment of the strategies. We cant avo id the excellent business performance of Microsoft under Bill which was a certain part created by his leadership style. In 1993, Microsoft had $3.79 billion in revenues, $953 million in profit, and 14,430 employees. In 2000, revenues soared to $22.96 billion, profits to $9.4 billion, and the headcount to 39,170. Between 1999 and 2000 alone, the company had taken on nearly 8,000 new employees. (Robert S. Portfolio, 2004) When Steve Ballmer became the CEO of Microsoft, he tried to change the organizational culture and encourage innovations by using his leadership style which definitely different from Bill Gates. Steve Ballmer (2012) said: Im really trying to give out the instructions, so that many decisions can be made by people. By saying this, he affirmed that his leadership style is democratic which allow him and followers make the decision together. Robert W. Selander was the CEO of MasterCard for 14 years from 1999 to 2010. Robert W. Selander announced that: I have to be careful about not conveying where Im coming from too early on in the process, because Im looking to get feedback from others. Obviously, his leadership styles can be defined as participative leadership. It helps MasterCard create the innovation culture. Participative leadership enables Robert W. Selander to gather and analyze subordinates ideas and views. It makes all MasterCard decisions seem to be more objective than Microsoft. Under Robert W. Selanders leadership, MasterCard grew and turn into one of the most successful payment company. In 2006, MasterCard sold for $39 in its initial public offering. It closed at $218 on June 25. (Roslyn Courtney, 2010) The organization measures its performance and uses that information to improve products and services. In order to do that, it absolutely needs employees contribution and everything is encouraged and shaped by the leadership. Leaders have responsibilities to ensure that their employees are motivated and guided by their leadership and organizational culture also. In other words, leadership has affected the whole organization including human resources, processes and profits.

The Outcast in Mark Twains The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn Essay

Life as an Outcast in Huckleberry Finn One of the themes that has been addressed by writers since the beginning of civilization is the issue of the split between living in society and living by oneself. We see this in that peculiarly American genre of books known as "road books", in which the protagonist embarks upon a long journey or period of time away from society in order to "find themselves." One of the quintessential examples of this type of book is Mark Twain's novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, technically a "river book" rather than a "road book". In it, as in many "road books" before and since, spending a long period of time away from society allows the protagonist to see the difference between the rules of mainstream society and the freedom of the wilderness. Through his journey, Twain illustrates the futility of living within society as contrasted to the freedom of being an outcast. It is interesting that Huck's morals are much stronger when he is on the river than on the shore. Huck's "attacks of conscience" only occur on the river. For ex...

Flowers for Algernon

Charlie's disability to communicate with people Isolated him as a person and leads to him being left out of society. Charlie's lack of vocabulary and ability to communicate at a high degree due to his mental disability is the cause of many issues that happen to him. Charlie, understanding his own mental capabilities, wants to intellectually grow, â€Å"while they [work] they start to talk about things like god or about politics, I want to talk like that† (Keyes 15). Charlie's struggle to articulate ideas with others eaves Charlie vulnerable to social injustice, where Charlie is isolated from society.Consequently, Charlie becomes mentally stressed because he is not permitted into society. This saddening issue for Charlie leaves him thinking, â€Å"If you are smart you can have lots of friends to talk to and you never get lonely by yourself all the time,† (Keyes 15) referring to himself because he is alone. His misunderstanding of friendship makes him think that the only way of having friends is by being smart, when he tries to talk smart he is still a reject from society. Charlie is alienated from he rest of society and is being mistreated for the lone reason of not being able to properly communicate with his peers.Furthermore, Charlie's struggle to comprehend information in relation to its context leaves him sensitive to being mistreated and misused. Charlie neglects the fact that he is being made fun of, but thinks they are laughing with him, as friends. Charlie at work is being used as the punch line of a joke, â€Å"Carp [says] hey look where Charlie [has] his [operation], what did they do, put some brains in. Then Frank [says] Charlie, did you open a door the hard way, they make] me laugh, they are my friends and they like me. (Keyes 22) Charlie Is blind of the fact that they are not his friends and they are making fun of him, and taking advantage of his mental disability. As a result, Charlie's disability to comprehend between true or false and right from wrong, Is used against him to take advantage of his Innocent character. Charlie's goal Is to become smart, to be accepted In society, and for this reason Charlie volunteers to be the test subject of an experiment to create a medicine that will Increase the Intelligence of the patient.Professor Newer, he scientist In charge of the experiment tries to please Charlie, â€Å"he said that means [l am] doing something grate for science and I'll be famous and my name will go down in the books. I don't care so much about being famous. I just want to be smart attempts to impress Charlie with promises of fame and great contributions to science reveal his true motivations, it is Newer who wants his name to go down in the books, not Charlie. For the reason that Charlie cannot make his own decisions properly or understand the severity of the experiment, he is being used for an experiment that is o bring fame and fortune to the scientist.Charlie's disability to comprehend what is happening clearly, he is being taken advantage of through unethical use of medical experimentation which is a social injustice that happens to Charlie. Moreover, Charlie struggles to interact with society suitably due to his past experiences, which show the injustice that is shown to him at a younger age. Charlie grew up in a strict family where respecting women are a big thing, Charlie experiences a sexual arousal when he sees a women.For natural reasons Charlie gets an erection where his mom seawards that it happens, â€Å"he can't read and write, but he knows enough not to look at a girl that way. I'll beat that filthy mind out of him,† (Keyes 112) and she traumatized him to a very high degree. Charlie's mom prevents any sexual thoughts coming to Charlie's mind and scares him from ever thinking of it. Charlie is a victim of malpractice a a very young age for a reason that cannot be punished upon because it is a natural behavior. Evidently, Charlie struggles at an older age to create a strong relationship because of the fear his mom put into him.However, Charlie after the successful operation falls in love with his teacher. They are very close and start to form a sexual relationship, but Charlie is still petrified by is mothers abuse, â€Å"l [know] what she [is] doing, she [is] kissing me, it started, I felt nausea. I turned away, she said, I [cannot] do this anymore, and left. † (Keyes 113) Alice is not accepting the past events causing Charlie's reaction and is being unfair. Charlie's past events and memories force him to interact with society differently from others, where he is not being treated unjustly in a relationship.Charlie's mistreatment due to his immunization and comprehension disability causes him to struggle interacting with society. Firstly, Charlie's weakness in communication unjustly isolates him from society where he is lonely and struggles to make friends. Secondly, Charlie's incapacity of understanding general conversation makes him vulnerable to be victimized and used as others please. Finally, Charlie fears of forming a sexual relationship because of his traumatized past. Even being able to live both the intellectual and mentally disabled life Charlie still faces the difficulties of social injustice.

The Scream Free Essay Example, 1000 words

Baron thinks he is average in intelligence. Elsa found his jealousy â€Å"cute. † But she said that she and Duke are just best friends, nothing more or less. The less part is too highlighted. It’s like a threat that Baron should not interfere with a solid friendship. When they started going out, Elsa eventually lost time for Duke. Baron believes this made Duke a bitter man, but he might be just paranoid. Elsa and Duke got married and after a year, it was Afghanistan. One month in Afghanistan and Elsa calls him. Baron got the great news that he would be a father. He was so happy, shedding a tear drop or two. But something in Elsa’s voice bothered him, something trembling, and something unexpected. He told this to his psychiatrist. But his psychiatrist thought he was just being anxious because it was his first month away from his normal life and wife. He is concerned of their marriage because many military marriages fall apart. Baron couldn’t figure it out. But the idea that something was so wrong stays inside his mind, growing and growing. We will write a custom essay sample on The Scream or any topic specifically for you Only $17.96 $11.86/pageorder now He wants to know why Elsa seemed so sad, when she told him that she was pregnant. She should be happy, jumping for joy, because they want to start a family. But her voice and happiness seemed controlled. What was she afraid of? As a self-confessed bi-polar man, Baron is not happy about it. When he told his wife that he is a paranoid bi-polar mess, she embraced him, much too tighter than ordinary. Those embraces are getting frequent nowadays. He embraces her back with both arms. Her soft body can be comforting to his messy mind. Then, Eliza runs to them and a group hug happens. Life is good; at least when he’s calm and his mind does not travel to places where it should not go. Duke drops by for a visit, for what reason Baron is not clear about. It’s not Elsa’s birthday. It’s Eliza’s birthday tomorrow. But he’s not a godparent. Maybe he wants to catch up and see that Elsa is happy with her husband. And she must be. Baron believes this so. But the strain in the environment is like a strain on his head, like a bag is on his face and he can’t breathe. When he first saw Duke, he looked so distinguished. He was a doctor already, not a nurse. His red BMW shone like the red sun. Elsa was so happy to see him and invited him to stay until Eliza’s birthday. It’s Sunday so they all go to the wharf. Eliza is running a few steps ahead. She looks back and smiles, with her green eyes and dimples lighting up the sunset even more. The orange of the sky mixes with the blue.