Essay: Organisational Development And Change At Coca-Cola.

Principles and Theories of Organisational Development in Contemporary Business Settings

Coca-cola company which is an international manufacturer of beverages has been used as the case study (Pendergrast, 20130). It is an American company that was founded in 1886 that serves in the beverage industry. It serves in 200 countries globally with its unique beverage products that no other company has been able to match against. Its strategic actions have made it deliver best quality products and services to its customers. It also creates a favorable environment for its workers to perform their tasks in.

Organizational development is the principle and practice of strategies and policies that are laid down by an organization (Montgomery et al, 2012). These strategies and policies involve changing employee attitudes, values as well as their beliefs through making and reinforcing of long-term training programs. Organizational development involves taking actions by both the leadership of the organization and the employees of the same organization (Heiko et al,2010). A study of the current state of the organization by a hired consulting company is carried out and future expectations are also laid down. Having these in the organization`s analysis, behavioral sciences are employed which include modeling of employee behavior, training where important and an auditing of its transactions (Keller et al,2011). The aim of this is to ensure the company adopts easily and better to changes in the markets` external environment, sticks to the regulations of the industry and keeps up with the latest technological trends all to improve its processes. Coca-Cola company has set principles that will help it fuel its own growth all through the year 2020.These principles include innovation so as to meet the goals of the company, creativity that helps it deliver the best quality to its customers and focus that will help it create a long-term impact in the marketplace through being relevant and creating value.

Organizational development theories help enhance knowledge as well the effectiveness of how employees can successfully accomplish change and performance in an organization. The concept of theory looks into a company`s climate and culture. The climate of the company includes the mood of the organization., the attitude and the beliefs (Mwanzia & Wong,2011). The general concept is associated with quality of service, the success of new programs implementation and the level of satisfaction to the employees. For, example Coca-cola is dedicated to delivering best quality services to its customers. Its ever-changing strategies to remaining number one competitor in its industry globally have successfully been implemented. The culture of the organization involves elements like artifacts, values, assumptions and behavioral norms. The subjective features like values, norms, and assumptions dominate by reflecting the unconscious thoughts of the employees and what their interpretations are towards the organization.

Nature and Application of Planned Change as a Means of Enhancing Organisational Performance

Planned change refers to any strategies that a company comes up with in order to have improved organizational performance.

Coca-Cola has had the following strategic actions

• It has a major focus on driving revenue as well as creating a bigger profit margin.

Every country that has Coca-cola company in it, has a major role to play in ensuring its growth plans. The company has grouped revenue growth action plans according to different markets and brought up employee incentives into the picture. Where Coca-cola has established new markets, it increased the volume of its sales with affordable prices for beverages creating the foundation of success for its future. In the already developing markets, a balance between the prices and volume was made. In the developed countries and markets, the company relies on price and mix and the need to create more profits by delivering small packages of beverages like glass as well as the aluminum bottles. In the year 2015, Coca-Cola came up with the strategy to segment its markets in order to create more revenue. The result of this strategy was an increase in price/mix by 2%, its sales volume, an overall increase in organic revenue by 4% and an increase in value share in its industry. This totally improved the performance of the company (Pfitzer et al,2013).

• Investing in its brands and the entire business

As it is good for continuous investment by any company, Coca-cola invested more in its brands which led to increased quality and quantity of advertising. More capital was invested in media advertisements to create an impact in the market and increase its customers. Furthermore, the company invested in its own business by expanding its beverage portfolio. It partnered with Monster Beverage Corporation to improve its energy position. It also bought a China plant for protein beverage which was part of investing in its brand improvement. It expanded the distribution of its milk in the U.S. In its process to enhance its performance, Coca-Cola came up with a plan where international marketing of it entire Trademark was done in 2016.This is when Taste the feeling campaign was launched emphasizing the taste, the uplift, the refreshment and the personal connections of which are entirely part of enjoying the ice-cold Coca-Cola. The company through the campaign let consumers know that they can take Coca-Cola beverages with fewer, or no calories and with or without caffeine (Doh & Quigley, 2014).

• Increased efficiency

The aim of Coca-cola was better their financial flexibility while still investing in better marketing. This would result in improved efficiency, productivity and reduced costs. The zero-based work strategy brought about this solution (Upadhaya et al,2014). The company decided to do their budgets annually and justify them. It also cut unnecessary costs of in-promotions and started saving throughout their supply chain globally. In 2015, productivity improved and the company earned extra 600million US dollars that it used to invest in its brands and pay the shareholders.

Internal and External Factors That Influence the Process of Organisational Development and Change

This is a tactical planning to identify the strength, weaknesses. threats and opportunities for a company.

Coca-Cola is known globally for its unique beverages, its logo, its bottles and the taste of its beverages. Every company has both advantages and disadvantages.

Strengths

The company has established itself in 200 countries and it has a far-fetched brand identity. Its name has made it has a strong user loyalty. Its products are hard to substitute and they have a unique taste making them easily identifiable. This company has 80 billion US dollars in its evaluation. It has had a campaign that saw the putting of its name on the bottles. Consumers were encouraged to take pictures next to the bottles and upload them to social media. This helped gain more customers (Pulver,2012).

Coca-Cola has a major competitor who happens to Pepsi. Pepsi has several businesses under one roof like developing foods and snacks. This has put Coca-Cola second in place to Pepsi its competitor. Coca-Cola beverages also happen to be carbonated which is a major concern to people with diabetes and obesity. This is a key issue in health that it has not yet addressed.

Opportunities

Coca-Cola company has the ability to come up with new products and also diversify and improve their brands. It has its brand identity, existing customers, its manufacturing operations and the evaluation done by the company to support their capability. Since this company is established in many countries, it should now focus on acquiring markets in the developing nations where temperatures are humid. In these countries, Coca-Cola beverages can be enjoyed a lot (Ad et al,2012).

Threats

There was once a claim that Coca-Cola uses pesticides in its water (Sadraoui et al,2010). Water levels have become low, yet it’s one of Coca-Cola’s main ingredients in its products. Coca-cola does not have other products that it creates as compared to Pepsi that would still be operating even if there was a shortage of water. Cafes are a threat to Coca-Cola as they serve things like tea, smoothies and health tonics which are not dangerous to the health of persons. People are becoming interested in products with less sugar. This would risk Coca-Cola losing a lot if it does not come up with new ways to deal with sugar levels in its products (Albert et al,2014).

Strategies organizations employ to effect change, development and necessary interventions. It is the priority of Coca-cola to treat its employees properly, develop the training and reward them when necessary. It creates a favorable working environment where employees can work best, develop their abilities and work towards the attainment of organizational goals. Its employees are trained and developed through on-job training, through coaching and exchange of feedbacks from the resources they have to ensure that their employees can learn and build careers. It has also created an environment where employees are motivated and inspired to work best through (Briscoe et al,2012).

• Employee engagement

Strategies Organisations Employ to Affect Change and Development

Employees should feel important as they help meet organizational goals. For them to feel so, they should be motivated. There are also dialogues held between the representatives of different employee groups that help measure the level of engagement from the employees to the businesses and their level of satisfaction (García-Morales et al,2012).

• A conducive working environment

Coca-Cola ensures that its employees enjoy all their working time where it is fulfilling, fun as well as rewarding. For example, it gives it employees discounted gym memberships, free beverages, and fruits, summer hours, flexible working hours, healthy food options from their restaurants and learning allowances.

• Training as well as the development

Coca-Cola invests in training its employees so that it can retain them once they have acquired the best skills. It has placed great importance on employee development, talent management, managers` leadership development programs and management of employee performance (Zheng et al,2010).

• Pay with reward

A competitive pay with benefits attracts best-skilled employees who help drive a company forward. Coca-Cola gives pensions, holidays and healthcare insurances in addition to the salaries paid to its employees. These are all compensation and benefits to its employees. It benchmarks its reward programs against those of its competitors in the market (Masterman,2014).

• Open as well as inclusive

It has created an environment where its employees are treated fairly this is because it has attracted employees from different backgrounds, with various life experiences and numerous talents. Employee guidelines and practices have been formulated to protect employees against discrimination as well as ensuring equal opportunity regardless of gender, age or background (Danish & Usman,2010).

Organizational structure and design is a process that ensures the alignment of an organization`s structure to its goals and objectives with the aim of improving efficiency together with effectiveness. The need to improve a product, service or business processes triggers work to be done. Other than designing an organizational structure, comprehending the working environment is necessary. These include the working process, roles, and responsibilities of each employee, the resources, and analysis of activities in the company. There is also the need to design and test the structures formulated. The final results should be monitored.

Coca-Cola’s design involves the is a decentralization of the company with two main operating groups which include bottling investments and the company itself. The operating groups are split according to geographical locations and due to this, everyone in the world can access Coca-cola (Daft,2010)

Its structure revolves around the combination of mechanistic and the organic model that work together. The mechanistic model enables easy coordination of the organization internationally in line with ensuring goals of the organization are met. This model has also enabled quick responsiveness by the management to any issue. This has resulted in satisfaction to the employees and increased volume of sales (Jones & Jones,2010)

Role of Structure and Design in Organisational Development and Change

Conclusion

Coca-Cola company has very good practices when it comes to Organizational Development. Employee engagement is one of its key strategies to ensure total development of its employee`s capabilities and skills. A good communication between the leadership of a company and the employees also creates a positive motivation for the employee because they feel that they are being listened to and that they are appreciated. Coca-cola has also invested in campaigns that have helped it the market is a brand in the markets and it is through these campaigns that it has been able to capture a large market share for its product globally. Coca-Cola’s product is difficult to imitate and is refreshingly good hence customer loyalty. The strategies of Coca-cola to create more revenue and save more have enabled it to have more capital to expand its company and improve its operations as well as invest in marketing its brand.

Coca-Cola has a major weakness concerning its beverages that are carbonated. These are a major threat to the health of its product users. It should come up with better ingredients for its manufacturing operations so that its product does not affect its customers negatively. The company also has not invested in other products. It should do so in the face of the upcoming competition from the cafes that offer services and products that are sugar-free. This will ensure that it does not lose markets share, instead, it gains more. Coca-cola competitors like Pepsi should come up with better market and product strategies in order to compete against Coca-Cola.

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