Organisational Behaviour For Marketing Of Meat Products

Describe about the Organisational Behaviour for Marketing of Meat Products.

MeatPack based in Sydney, Australia operates as a family owned firm specialising in the generation and marketing of meat products, freshly prepared soups and prepared meal products. MeatPack manufactures the above food products through its manufacturing plants located in New South Wales and Queensland. The client group of MeatPack are essentially the different retail chains and other food service companies based along both the regional Australian market and also in international countries. The company is chaired by Derek Bison as the fourth generation of the family that had set up the meat business in the Australian market. The company’s performance during 2013 was quite well off with group sales amounting to around AUD $300 Million. Derek Bison had set up a strategic goal for MeatPack to become a 1 billion dollar business enterprise by the close of the 2020 period. The report essentially focuses on analysing problems faced by MeatPack based along two strategic segments like changes in senor leadership positions and also changes in the cultural and performance dimensions for meeting the strategic goal envisioned for 2020 (HARVEY, 2016).

Hands-Off and Hands-On Approach

The hands-off and hands-on managerial approaches in meeting the objectives and responsibilities of the firm and the business are outlined as follows.

The hands-off managerial style is identified as such where the manager focuses on empowering the subordinate members in a business institution to take key part in business decisions and in being accountable and responsible in meeting both departmental and business or organisational objectives. The manager’s interference in the day-to-day activities of the firm is identified to be less in the hands-off approach thereby encouraging the subordinates to take decisions and perform in an independent fashion. The business or organisational managers needs to effectively train and enhance the skills and potentials of the organisational members in that they can accomplish the group and business objectives in an efficient and productive manner. The evaluation of the efficiency and effectiveness level of the employees and other subordinate members are carried out by the organisational managers through identification of the goals met and the numbers achieved by them  (Nasermoadeli, Ling, & Severi, 2013).

The hands-on management approach and style is identified as such where the business or organisational manager continually intervenes and directs the day-to-day activities of the subordinate people operating across different levels and departments in the firm. The hands-on management approach earns needed significance in that it encourages the business manager to take a proactive part in the day-to-day dealings of the company. The business manager in terms of acting in a proactive fashion can essentially focus on motivating, encouraging and supporting the subordinate members to achieve both functional and business objectives with due efficiency and expertise. Further, the hands-on approach also contributes in helping the employees gain the benefit of hands-on or on-the-job training support generated by the organisational managers and employers. However, the hands-on approach featuring the continual interference of the business and organisational managers in the day-to-day business functions tends to affect the efficiency and productivity levels of the staffs in that they feel a lack of trust by the managers on their potentials and efficiencies (Evanschitzky, Ramaseshan, Woisetschläger, Richelsen, Blut, & Backhaus, 2012).

Bison’s Approach to Business

The study of the case reflects that Derek’s existing approach to the business of MeatPack is hands-on in nature. Derek focuses on sustaining the mode of continual interference in the day-to-day activities of the business institution and also work based on close monitoring and supervision standards for getting the work done. However, the present requirement of making the subordinates and managers work in a responsible and accountable fashion potentially requires Derek to incorporate the hands-off approach. Operating based on the hands-off approach also requires Derek to focus on continually mentoring the subordinate members for enhancing their knowledge and skill base in meeting of departmental and business objectives in an effective manner. The use of the hands-off approach would encourage the subordinates to work in a committed and responsible fashion in the firm.

Derek Bison reflected that different changes introduced in the existing human resources setup of the organisation, incorporation of an effective leadership development program within the firm and also the generation of consultation and coaching support to the team members generated positive impacts on the productivity and efficiency styles of the employees. Bison has also encouraged the growth of needed transparency within the firm based on increasing the levels of communication between the organisational members both on a one-to-one basis and also during the conducting of meetings. The conducting of one-to-one communication between the organisational members ideally contributes in gaining effective feedback, ideas and solutions for emerging organisational problems (‘Phil’ Klaus & Maklan, 2013). Further, changes in senior leadership are also reflected to contribute in the emergence of different teams like senior strategy and senior leadership teams. The senior leadership team is evaluated to be more powerful in nature owing to it being encompassed by both the senior strategic team members and also the senior line managers of the firm. However, the effectiveness of the impacts of changes in the senior leadership positions of MeatPack was largely offset owing to emergence of conflict in the mind of CFO as to choosing the senior strategy team or Bison accountable for meeting the organisational and departmental objectives (Hollebeek, 2011). Further, the increase in the level of personality conflicts between Bison and other managerial leaders owing to Bison’s increased interference in the activities of managers had made the managers quit the organisation although they were observed to be quite productive in maintaining effective liaison with the suppliers and customers. Again, Bison’s decision of moving over to the position of the Chairman for MeatPack in the light of generation of structural changes in the organisation also was observed to create problems concerning reporting relationships between functional and administrative heads in the firm. Derek Bison has also focused on generating changes in the organisation’s functions through the mode of incorporating ERP software that rightly helps in engaging and involving different departments like finance, production, human resources and marketing and distribution for meeting of organisational and business objectives. The same also requires the functional heads to communicate with other functional heads and employees in an effective fashion  (Hollebeek, 2011).

Effectiveness of Change in Senior Leadership

The senior leaders in the first case are required to identify the productive and performance elements associated with the existing culture of the firm and thereby to draw the attention of the employees to the highlighted elements of the organisation’s culture. Further, the senior leadership of MeatPack is required to initiate the change process from the top level through the generation of new vision and mission elements. The senior leadership of the firm is also required to integrate the different levels of the organisation right front the frontline level to the middle and also the ground and support level staffs for helping in meeting the changed mission and vision objectives in an effective fashion (Richard & Zhang, 2012). The change leaders are also required to potentially appeal to the emotional and rationalistic mindset of the individuals for meeting the departmental and business objectives in an effective fashion. Similarly, the senior leadership of MeatPack is required to potentially engage and empower the individual employees along different levels to focus on incorporating the elements of creativity and innovation such that the same contributes in enhancing the aspect of productivity and efficiency at the workplace. Further, the senior leaders apart from generating needed support associated with the redesigning of the organisational structure and also incorporation of mentoring and coaching programs is also required to involve different motivation and positive reinforcement tools that would encourage and influence the employees for generating greater performance (Richard & Zhang, 2012).

The generation of a flatter organisational structure in MeatPack by Derek Bison on his return from the Harvard Business School is taken to considerably help in empowering the managers and supervisors in the firm to act in a responsible and accountable fashion in meeting the objectives both at the functional and organisational level. In terms of development of a flatter organisational structure, Bison has effectively encouraged its line managers to take more responsible roles concerning the meeting of objectives of recruitment and performance appraisal functions in an effective fashion. The development of flatter organisational structure in MeatPack ideally contributed in the growth of communication along different levels of the organisation thereby helping in the formulation of effective decisions and also in increasing the level of collaboration and cooperation between organisational members in meeting of group and business objectives. The growth of internal communication between subordinate groups with the business managers effectively contribute in enhancing the productivity and skills of the employees and subordinates. Again, the level of success generated regarding the meeting of departmental and firm’s objectives further boosts the responsibility and accountability skills of the employees in addressing the customer servicing functions  (Agrawal, Gaur, & Narayanan, 2012). Further, the generation of a flatter organisational structure in the firm also contributes in reduction of the number of managers in MeatPack thereby helping in reducing the manpower costs of the firm. The decrease in the level of manpower costs for the organisation would effectively contribute in enhancing the profit and productivity margins of MeatPack in the long run. Flatter organisational structures are also featured in encouraging and promoting growth and career development in the firm. The generation of promotions to employees based on their performances rather than on the experiences or duration within the organisation potentially helps in creating a productivity culture in the firm. Again, the development of a flatter organisational structures also contribute in outsourcing of support functions that in turn help in reducing the level of operational expenses for the firm. MeatPack based on the development of its flatter organisational structure can effectively focus on outsourcing of its finance and information technology or IT functions such that the same would help in reducing its operational expenditure  (Beuder, 2013).

Senior Leadership Initiatives for Influencing Future Changes

In terms of cultural factors, employees operating in firms with flatter organisational structures are observed to be adaptable or flexible to the changes in the external environment. The adaptability or flexibility of the employees in the flatter organisational structures is enhanced owing to the existence of reduced bureaucracy and small organisational hierarchies. The existence of flatter organisational structure contributes in enhancing the productivity of the frontline employees and managers in both scheduling production operations and also in generating effective customer services functions. In the case of MeatPack the existence of flatter organisational structure is observed to help the line managers in taking active part in making production schedules and also for helping in recruiting fresh talents in the firm. The line managers thus tend to feel being an integral part of the organisational workforce. Existence of flatter organisational structures ideally contributes in generation of an innovative and collaborative work culture such that the same helps in generation of a creative work environment within the organisation enabling greater productivity  (Podi, 2013).

Three essential barriers are identified that hinder the change process in the existing organisational culture. Firstly, the established rules concerning power distribution within the internal environment of the business institution encompassing the managerial and non-managerial teams and also along its allied bodies like suppliers and vendor firms and also within the different client groups tend to potentially hinder and deter changes in the existing organisational culture. The rules regarding power distribution between the different internal and external stakeholders considerably influence the managerial culture of the firm (Clatworthy, 2009). Secondly, different agendas fixed by the organisational managers and also by managers and owners of its different network firms also tend to influence and deter changes in the organisational culture. Thirdly, the business and non-business institutions like individuals tend to reflect diverse modes of communication habits, behavioural approaches, cognitive tendencies and conceptualisation potentials and practices. The above parameters increasingly contribute in development of different types of cultural and traditional norms that tend to differ from firm to firm. These parameters thus holistically contribute in acting as potential barriers to the changes introduced in the cultural paradigm of the organisation  (Palm, 2013).

Combined influence exerted by the above three barriers is termed as ‘expressive hegemony’ that is employed by the management community for restraining the changes introduced along the cultural front of the organisation. Similarly, ‘expressive hegemony’ also gains influence and thereby supports the stakes of elite stakeholders of the organisation that is being subjected to cultural change in that changes brought about in the organisation’s culture would affect the level of benefits gained by them. The above aspects thus make it quite harder for changes to be introduced in the existing cultural standpoint of an organisation (McCalman & Potter, 2015).

Relating to the case of MeatPack it is observed that the changes introduced in the cultural framework by Derek Bison failed to deliver essential results owing to emergent of some specific constraints identified as follows. The managers being required to lead the different teams rather than to manage them observed that the line managers were more involved in only studying the data through the use of computing and digital devices rather than to focus on delivering and meeting the production targets. The second challenge relates to the cultural differences between the two shifts, morning and afternoon shift in MeatPack. It is observed that employees involved in the first shift ranging from 5:30AM to 2:30PM rendered priority in generating higher yields and productivity based on selection of easy production lines that would help them in accomplishing the targets offered to them in an easy fashion. The employees involved in the afternoon shift potentially complained of two hurdle periods like 3PM and 3:30PM owing to the arrival of Lorries for taking specific products in large batches to the different supermarkets. The above issue created a new cultural aspect for the employees involved in the afternoon shift making them time driven in nature for addressing the requirement of lorry pick-ups. The same increases the pressure of the afternoon shift people for not being able to meet the objectives of productivity yields. Further, the differences in the cultural understandings of the morning and afternoon shift teams also created a problem associated with the sharing of personal and professional information for their work during the two different shifts.

References

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