Quinlan’s Organization
Introduction:
This case study
is about UK
In my answer to
the first question I will analyze the organizational culture of the company and
to what extent is this culture responsible for the company’s current
difficulties. I will then discuss the nature of the company, its management
structure, marketing and global labour market.
In the second
question, as the HRM at Quinlan’s, I will explain these morale problems and how
they might be tackled.
The third question
will be about the meaning of the flexibility as one of the problems that the
company is facing and how Quinlan’s should respond to these new challenges.
Main Body:
Q1. Analyze the organizational culture of Quinlan’s.
What factors explain this culture? To what extent is this culture responsible
for the company’s current difficulties?
Introduction:
In my answer to
this question I will analyze the organizational culture of Quinlan’s and its
factors in order to see the responsibility of the culture effect on the current
situation.
Main Body:
The interest in
the organizational culture was initially driven by a desire to understand its
impact on organizational performance. The economic success of Japanese
companies in the 1980s, at a time when western firms were seen as inefficient
bureaucracies, also gave impetus to the culture literature. Japanese companies
seemed to have particular methods of employment management that created
committed employees capable of producing high quality goods (1). Culture can
be defined as the set of the key values, beliefs, understandings, and norms
shared by members of an organization (2). The idea of culture has a
much longer history. Jaques (1952) was perhaps the first to use to term within
a work context in his The Changing Culture of a Factory, which analyzed
participatory management in a metal company. Subsequently psychologists like
Argyris (1964) noted the effects of the organizational values on individual
psychological health. Writers like Pascale and Athos (1980), Peters and
Waterman (1982) and Deal and Kennedy (1982) argued for the replacement of the
old fashioned values with strong cultures. The message was that in order to be
successful, companies had to change their core values. The strong use of culture
therefore links the management of culture to organizational success. This
approach has been most clearly found in the work of Peters and Waterman (1982),
Deal and Kennedy (1982) and Kanter (3).
According to
Schein’s theory of culture, culture can be analyzed at three levels with each
level becoming less obvious. At the surface we find artifacts, on the next
level lie values and norms and at the deepest level we find a core of beliefs
and assumptions (4).
Applying a level
of beliefs and assumptions to Quinlan’s, Quinlan’s believed that they are
dominant because they thought that customers understood what it stood for. This
belief had come to Quinlan’s over a long period of time. As the information
given on the case they was performing well over 70 years so for this belief had
become part of their culture. It was
strongly product-oriented, concentrating on the quality of stock and assuming
that this would communicate everything the customer needed to know. The world has
changed so much after the World War 2. GATT, The Cold War, The fall of Berlin
Wall, EU, NAFTA, WTO and more all these had made changes in the world. Most of
these changes Quinlan’s did not take into consideration. This belief had affected
Quinlan’s spending on the advertising. It was spending very little on
advertising compared to the others. From the information given on the case you
can see that the way they used to be dominant was not the correct way. They
were conducting their daily affairs out of time. They did not notice that that
the time was moving but they were not moving with it. For a long time Quinlan’s
was considered as a family firm from this you can assume that the relationship
between the staff was strong. This strong relation made most of the workforce
in UK
Applying level
of values and norms to Quinlan’s, Quinlan’s was like being recruited to the
civil service. Once you joined you rose slowly but surely throughout the
organization-many spent their whole careers working for Quinlan’s. Quinlan’s
have traditionally been a non-union company. We can say that this was good
because this for sure would increase the morale of the staff but is this for
the good of the organization or not.
Quinlan’s had once proudly boasted that 95% of its products were made in
Britain-
Applying the
surface level artifacts to Quinlan’s, Quinlan’s was the most popular, most profitable
UK
From all of that
we can say that Quinlan’s organizational culture was strong. This type of
organizational culture can not change easily. A strong culture like Quinlan’s
could take a longer time to change them more than other companies. This must be
taken into consideration when you are trying to change the organizational
culture of this type of organization.
Some company history is useful here in order
to explain the factors of this culture. Quinlan’s was for most of its history
essentially a family firm. Sir Thomas Quinlan was for over 30 years dominate
and domineering presence. Chairman until his death in 1965, his attention to
detail was legendary. Other family members occupied key positions in the organization.
From 1981 until 1998 the company was run by a non-Quinlan but they were company
men. By using Handy (1993) types of culture we can say that the type of culture
in Quinlan’s is Power culture. Power Cultures- have a single power source,
which may be an individual or a corporate group. Control of rewards is a major
source of power (5).One of the major disadvantages of this type of
culture that these cultures put a great deal of faith in the worth and
abilities of the individual (6). The way that Quinlan’s used to operate was out
of time. How an organization can survive with a little spending on the
advertising and their competitors are spending a lot. How you can compete with
your competitors if you do not have a marketing department and they have. From
all of this you can see the major factors that explain the culture in
Quinlan’s.
The extent of
this culture being responsible for the company’s current difficulty is big.
Many changes happened in the world but the company did not react to it because
of its culture. Quinlan’s culture can be considered as Unadaptive corporate
culture which on the Visible Behaviour managers tend to behave
somewhat insularly, politically, and bureaucratically while the Expressed
Values managers care mainly about
themselves, their immediate work group or some product associated with that
work group (7). The general election of May 3, 1979 was a major turning
point in 20th century British political history. The victory of the Conservatives
and their radical leader Margaret
Thatcher led to the destruction of the consensus politics that had
previously dominated the scene (8). The freedom of capital movement was the
first thing that came out of this government. The fall of Berlin USSR Europe .
Out of all of this Quinlan’s culture has affected their response to these
changes. Their culture made them believe that they do not need to change. They did not notice that the old customer
that they used to serve had changed. Their old fashioned way is not helping
them now. Many things had changed in the
world but Quinlan’s seemed to miss radical changes that were occurring in the
retail market. Quinlan’s competitors were however, making use of the
increasingly global labour market.
Conclusion:
In my answer to
this question I have analyzed the organizational culture of Quinlan’s. I have discussed
the factors explaining this culture. From my arguments, I can say that the extent
of this culture responsible for the company’s current difficulty is big. Their
culture was like a wall in front of their success and, as Lester Townsend
admitted, ‘We lost touch with our customer and forgot about the competition’.
Q2. As the Director of HRM at Quinlan’s you have
become aware that the morale of your workforce has declined. What explains
these morale problems and how might they be tackled?
Introduction:
In my answer to
this question I will use the information given on the case in order to explain
the decline in morale within the workforce. I will try to explain the effect of
the new management style on the morale of the workforce and I will come up with
suggestions to tackle this problem.
Main Body:
The nature of
the HRM involves important elements of strategic management and business
policy. The term HRM refers to the design and application of formal systems in
the organization to ensure the effective and efficient use of human talent to
accomplish organizational goals (9).Over the past decade, HRM has shed its old
personnel image and gained recognition as a vital player in corporate
strategy.
Whyte (1957, p.1)
spoke of the ‘Five M’s of the factory life: men, money, machines, morale and
motivation’. As a Director of HRM at Quinlan’s I am aware that the morale
of the workforce has declined. There are factors which explain this problem.
The management style,
Sir Thomas Quinlan followed a paternalistic agenda for his staff. Quinlan’s
were well known for the high level of benefits it offered its staff. Generous
financial bonuses were paid in addition to other non-financial benefits. Management
says that they have never prevented unions from trying to recruit staff and that
their ‘people-centred’ policies have, in essence, made unions unnecessary. The
staff, once they joined, rose slowly but surely through the organization-many
spent their whole careers working for Quinlan’s. On the other hand, the
workforce one day found that the management was dissuaded to sack nearly
one-quarter of the company’s top executives. This act for sure will make them
feel that this could happen to them. They were not used to see this kind of
action before. Shop floor staffs were increasingly given individual targets for
sales performance. The workforce was not familiar with this type of management
because for a long time their organization was considered as a Welfare Organization.
Their performance had never been measured individually. This affects the morale
very much.
Job Security, Quinlan’s was unable to respond to changes in
the retail market, the fragmentation of the middle market that it once
dominated and new powerful global competitors like Gap. It stumbled from crisis
to crisis. Quinlan’s have traditionally been a non-union company. With individual
targets for sales performance, failure to meet these targets would lead to the
various forms of ‘corrective actions’ Given that most staff now have extremely
flexible contracts of employment, they fear that poor performers will have
their hours reduced. Now they are afraid
about their income because if they fail to meet their targets their hours will
be reduced. They start to think about their family as result of reducing their
working hours. Their income was now under threat. Now they have to perform not
like before or they will lose. Some
wonder whether the traditional ‘non-union’ status of the company continues to
be their advantage. If your job security is under threat for sure your morale
will be down.
Tackling these
morale problems needs the strategic approach to HRM; which recognizes three key
elements. After job security the second element is employees are viewed as
assets (10). As a Director of HRM at Quinlan’s I have to make them
understand that the new ‘harsher’ style is for the good of the company.
Implementing a new financial bonus system with other non-financial benefits will
increase the morale of the workforce. As an example of non-financial benefits, AFLAC
has two corporate child-development centres on site which care for the children
of 300 employees. Employee Appreciation Week is the core of the employee
appreciation effort, with daily prizes, giveaways, foods and peer recognition.
The company rewards seniority in the company with gifts on employment
anniversaries (11). There are many motivational programmes that can be used in
order to increase the morale like discounts with local merchants, birthday
greetings with free movies or lunch, an annual holiday party for adults only
with entertainment and babysitting available, and once a month evening
babysitting. Organizing training and development programs for the workforce
will help with their morale. Formal
training will help the work force to show that the management wants them meet
their target and they are helping them to do that. One way to further employee
development is through promotion from within, which can help the company retain
valuable employees. It will also give the workforce a motive to perform well
because it is not like the old time that they used to work with. Before if they
worked hard they will develop slowly but now if they perform well they will be promoted
faster. The workforce needs to get back the feeling that they are assets of the
company.
Conclusion:
I have covered
in my answer to this question the morale problems of the workforce by explaining
the impact of the new management style and comparing the old style with the new
style and how this will affect the staff morale. Does the traditional
‘non-union’ status of the company continue to be their advantage or not with
the new management style. I have discussed some suggestions to tackle the morale
problems.
Q3.One of the problems encountered by Quinlan’s is
that it is faced with competitors who operate more ‘flexibly’. What does this mean
in practice for organizational and management strategy? How do you think that
Quinlan’s should respond to these new challenges?
Introduction:
New forms of
organization are proposed which emphasize flexibility. In my answer to this
question I will try to explain this flexibility and what it means in practice
for the organizational and management strategy. I will discuss how Quinlan’s
should respond to these new challenges.
Main Body:
Contemporary organization and management
theory is preoccupied with complexity of present social and economic
environments. Pressures from the ‘environment’ including increased competition,
more turbulent markets, fragmented consumer demand and new forms of technology
are argued to create major pressures. In this ‘uncertain’ world, precise prediction
and planning is almost impossible. Instead flexible forms of organization and
management are required in order to quickly respond to changes (12). Flexible
specialization is the term given to efforts ‘to convert the traditional
highly integrated, corporate structure into a more supple organizational form
capable of responding quickly to shifting market conditions and product demand’
(Piore, 1986, p.146). Quinlan’s management structure was for a long time
bureaucratic. As a result of this bureaucratic way, Quinlan’s was not able to
respond quickly to the recent changes that have been taking place in the
economic environment. At the time Quinlan’s was reforming its management structure,
its competitors were introducing more radical changes. The key word here is flexibility:
·
The use of
labour and resources in a strategic fashion to enable production systems
to be responsive to market changes
·
The
removal of occupational barriers to the use of labour
·
The
creation of new skills that operate across a range of tasks
Such a level of responsiveness is
regarded as vital in conditions of tough competition and market uncertainty (13)
.There is three types of flexibility:
- Functional flexibility – which refers to flexibility across different kinds of production technology and to worker’s capacity to overlap technical, maintenance and production work.
- Numerical flexibility – refers to employers’ capacity to shed or take on the types of labour they require as market changes dictate.
Both forms of flexibility were combined in a model called the flexible
firm. Atkinson,
(1984; 1985; 1988).
- Financial flexibility – pay and other employment costs are often used to support the objectives of functional and numerical flexibility.
Organizations must be flexible to survive.
This means employees must be able to switch gears and perform differently in
response to change. Both employers and employees need to share a common belief in
the value of flexible work arrangements and the expectation that tasks are
truly being effectively performed. As a result of this argument we can say that
flexibility in practice means a lot for the organization and management
strategy.
Quinlan’s response should be fast to these
new challenges. Quinlan’s bureaucratic way of management
has taken them from crisis to crisis. Their organization must be flexible to
survive. "Britain
Conclusion:
I have explained what
flexibility means in practice for Organizational and Management strategy. I have also explained why I think Quinlan’s
should respond quickly to these new challenges.
Conclusion:
In my answer to
this case I tried to explain the main concepts that I am covering in my answer
by using the available references in order to give my suggestions for the case.
By using the text book and other references I was able to understand the case
and the main problems that I am trying to analyze.
References:
- Management Centre. (2002), Management,
People and Organization,
- Daft, Management, Chapter 3 p.88.
- Management Centre. (2002), Management,
People and Organization,
- Edgar H. Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, 2nd ed. (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1992), 3-27.
- http://www.oup.co.uk/pdf/bt/fincham/Chapter15.pdf
- Management Centre. (2002), Management,
People and Organization,
- John P. Katter and James L. Heskett, Corporate Culture and Performance, (New York: The Free Press, 1992), 51.
- http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/UK-general-election,-1979.
- Robert L. Mathis and John H.
Jackson, Human Resource Management: Essential Perspectives, 2nd
ed., (
- Daft, Management, Chapter 13 p.406.
- "AFLAC's Advantage," Incentive May 2003, p. 26.
- Management Centre. (2002), Management,
People and Organization,
- http://www.oup.co.uk/pdf/bt/fincham/Chapter20.pdf.
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