Deck 8: Control,change,and Entrepreneurship

Question 1

At what levels does control takes place in this organization?

Answer 1

Control refers to the power to influence people and make them do their work as per an organization's need. A manager's crucial role is to control. An organization's success depends on the controlled behavior of its employees.
Here, I will analyze the control system of a real organization, a hospital. Control can take place at different levels of the organization.
As per my observations, the control takes place in a hospital, at the following levels-
•Control system can be for the hospital as a whole.
•Also, can be for different wings of the hospital such as departments (like orthopedic, x-ray department, blood bank department etc.).
•Unit or functional levels also need control to be in a controlled behavior.
•Employee to employee or at the Individual level.

Question 2

What kind of outputs controls will best facilitate positive interactions both within the teams and between the teams?

Answer 2

Organizational controls need to be in place to check the efficiency and effectiveness of the strategies applied and then how employees respond to it.
The output controls which will best facilitate positive interactions within the teams and among it are as follows-
Performance- Performance refers to how an individual or team reacts to certain things and what are they heading towards in an attempt to achieve organizational objectives. It helps to evaluate the performance of an individual and team levels to determine how effectively the work is carried out.
Organizational goals - Keeping a check on how things are going with respect to the organization's mission is a good way to measure performance. It helps to keep a check on distractions and diversions in the path, if any.
Operating budget- Operating budget remains one of the most important controls to maintain profit and sales margin and it needs to be meticulously planned.

Question 3

Why is customer service or "customer experience" so important to Amazon.com?

Answer 3

Case summary:
Online retailer firm Company AAM gives umpteen focus to customer service. The firm leaves no stone unturned when it has to provide excellent customer service to its customers around the world. Once products are ordered at the firm's site, the various sellers that sell across using AAM's platform ships the product to AAM's warehouses spread across the country, and then the product is packed and shipped again to the customer's address. This way the firm not only serves to the customers but also provides platform for the retailers to sell their products.
In Company AAM, customer service or "customer experience" is so important because the firm values its customers and gives them a top priority. The firm's CEO and founder Person JB believes that when customers are satisfied, they become loyal towards the brand, and if the customers will get desired satisfaction from the products as well as the services offered by AAM, then they will not look for other sites or source of obtaining goods.
The firm believes that it is not only about the product that the company sells to its customers, instead, it is the service that the firm wants to deliver to its customers making them loyal towards the firm. It is important for the firm to understand that once the customer is not given the desired services or shopping experience, it is very much likely that the customer would not return to the seller again and will also provide a negative feedback about the seller. Thus, to retain the customers and to offer them quality products, customer service or "customer experience" is so important in Company AAM.

Question 4

Either by yourself or in a group, think about the ethical implications of organizations monitoring and collecting information about their subordinates. What kind of information is it ethical to collect or not to collect? Why? Should managers and organizations inform subordinates they are collecting such information?

Question 5

Design the control system that you think will best motivate salespeople to achieve these goals.

Question 6

What is the relationship between organizing and controlling?

Question 7

Which output performance standards (such as financial measures and organizational goals) do managers use most often to evaluate performance at each level?

Question 8

What kind of behavior controls will best facilitate positive interactions both within the teams and between the teams?

Question 9

In what ways does Amazon try to increase the level of customer service over time?

Question 10

Similarly, some organizational cultures like those of Arthur Andersen, the accounting firm and Enron seem to have developed norms and values that caused their members to behave in unethical ways. When and why does a strong norm that encourages high performance become one that can cause people to act unethically? How can organizations prevent their values and norms from becoming too strong?

Question 11

What relative importance do you put on (1) output control, (2) behavior control, and (3) organizational culture in this design?

Question 12

How do output control and behavior control differ?

Question 13

Does the organization have a management by objectives system in place? If it does, describe it. If it does not, speculate about why not.

Question 14

How would you go about helping managers develop a culture to promote high team performance?

Question 15

In what ways has studying customer complaints helped Amazon to increase the quality of the customer experience and boost sales?

Question 16

Why is it important for managers to involve subordinates in the control process?

Question 17

How important is behavior control in this organization? For example, how much of managers' time is spent directly supervising employees? How formalized is the organization? Do employees receive a book of rules to instruct them about how to perform their jobs?

Question 18

What is organizational culture and how does it affect the way employees behave?

Question 19

What kind of culture does the organization have? What are the values and norms? Do employees tell any particular stories that reveal the organization's norms and values? What effect does the organizational culture have on the way employees behave or treat customers?

Question 20

What kind of controls would you expect to find most used in (a) a hospital, (b) the Navy, (c) a city police force? Why?

Question 21

Based on this analysis, do you think there is a fit between the organization's control systems and its culture? What is the nature of this fit? How could it be improved?

Question 22

Ask a manager to list the main performance measures that he or she uses to evaluate how well the organization is achieving its goals.

Question 23

Interview some employees of an organization, and ask them about the organization's values, norms, socialization practices, ceremonies and rites, and special language and stories. Referring to this information, describe the organization's culture.