Benchmark State-of-the-art Organizational Process Improvements by Custom Food And Feed Corporation - Research Paper Example

?Running head: BENCHMARK OF-THE-ART ORGANIZATIONAL Benchmark of-the-art Organizational Process Improvements This paper outlines an organizational change strategy that should be implemented by the Custom Food and Feed Corporation (CF&F) so as to help it curb the allegations and challenges that it has been facing for the last 10 years. As the newly hired human resource manager of the tech division I will outline a few methods, plan and recommendations that should be implemented within the division to enable it meet its goals and vision including adhering to the stipulated quality, environmental, safety and production standards. These include implementation of the Triple Bottom Line (TBL), Sustainability and Corporate Responsibility (CSR) and organizational change principles. The plan is to use Prosci’s change management methodology and the recommendations include changing the leadership style, using the Corporate KSAO (knowledge, skills, ability and other characteristics) during the employment process and facilitating learning rather than training for all employees. As a result, CF&F will improve its performance, profit margins, communication strategy, employer to employee relationship and an organizational culture that integrates both individual and organizational change management. Introduction Custom Food and Feed Corporation (CF&F) specializes in the production and marketing of food and ingredients for animal feed. The Corporation faces an array of allegations including mismanagement, failure to adhere to stipulated federal and state regulations on safety, quality and environment, noncompliance with the federal and state labor laws and unfair HR practices. As a result, CF&F has been under investigation for the last 10 years. This has resulted to creation of poor public image, loss of market share, nosedive in its performance and a drastic drop in profits. In order to counteract the negativity associated with the Corporation a new CEO was appointed to oversee it through a change process. The CEO mandated the president to do an analysis of the organization’s culture to detect the source of the allegations. This responsibility was then delegated to the vice president who decided to do the corporate research on the tech division. This is the newest addition in the Corporation. It runs seven lines of production on a daily basis for 24 hours where fermentation process is used to change dextrose (sugar) into a myriad of feed ingredients (if care is not taken microbes especially salmonella which pose grave health concerns can easily grow). The workforce at the tech division comprises of 92 managers and 300 employees. After the analysis, it was detected that the tech division did not adhere to the stipulated quality, safety and environmental standards. It was also determined that there is a poor employer-employee relationship because of the style of leadership used. The managers implemented an authoritarian leadership strategy which had only managed to build barriers between the management and the employees. In fact, the employees were not at all empowered since they worked under pressure and were not free to air their views and concerns. As a result, employees were opting for unionizing. Another source of the allegations was from the fact that the production decisions made by the managers were implemented by supervisors who had been given the promotional rank without consideration of the Corporations KSAO (Knowledge, Skills, Abilities and Other characteristics) guidelines. In fact, it was determined that the tech division was highly infested with nepotism. On the other hand, the promoted employees were not subjected to any training that would nurture their competence and leadership skills. Moreover, it is the duty of the managers to ensure the given directions are appropriately implemented. In addition, the human resource manager oversees all the human resource activities of all the divisions in the Corporation. Therefore, the HR manager is not as effective and efficient as he is supposed to be because of the huge workload and lack of motivation arising from poor performance and the plethora of allegations filed against the organization. Every division that runs a big workforce for instance the tech division should have an independent HR manager. Therefore, as the newly hired HR manager for the tech department I am supposed to formulate and implement an effective strategy for organizational change. To be successful I will have to change the tech division organizational culture first. However, to do this I will have to withstand a plethora of challenges and strong resistance especially from the managers in different hierarchical levels since their desire is to maintain the established culture. Benchmark State-of-the-art Organizational Process Improvements After meeting with the departmental managers I came to the conclusion that a benchmark state-of-the-art organizational process improvement strategy would be best suited to use when researching for methods, options and recommendations for implementation of organizational change in the tech division such as the safety and quality improvement process (PIP). This is because the tech division needed an organizational change strategy that would enable it to improve its performance by continuously identifying and adapting top­notch practices. The benchmark state-of-the-art organizational process improvements strategy has all the elements of enabling the tech division to improve its productivity, products quality and profit margins. This is because it will be easier to determine the firm’s weaknesses, strengths and prioritize needs including improving the morale of employees as well as horizontal and vertical communication (Clegg, Kornberger & Pitsis, 2008). Moreover, it will promote a learning culture within the management and the subordinate staff thereby enabling them to have a competitive edge of adapting new ideas that will enable them to improve their performance. As a result, all the unnecessary waste and frustrations within the tech division will be reduced since the quality of the manufactured products will improve leading to customer satisfaction. Conversely, the benchmark state-of-the-art organizational process improvements have been proven for years to be innovative and low cost for attaining immediate effectiveness and performance improvement. Furthermore, the benchmark state-of-the-art organizational process improvements strategy helps organizations to recognize opportunities, concerns and deep-seated problems in a constructive manner thereby effectively applying priority in areas that will maximize on returns (Clegg, Kornberger & Pitsis, 2008). Organizational Change Methods to be Implemented The tech department should implement a Triple Bottom Line (TBL) organizational change principle into its culture. This is because TBL displays a clear cut concept of ensuring that stakeholders take some responsibility of the organization into their hands. This is in contrast to the traditional organizational principle where most of the organization’s responsibilities were left in the hands of the shareholders. The stakeholders comprise of any individual who is directly or indirectly impacted by the actions of the organization for example both the subordinate and executive staff. With this in mind the interests of the stakeholders will be taken care of first before focusing all the efforts towards the interest of the shareholders which is profit maximization and maintenance market control. By focusing on the interests of the stakeholders a good employee to employer relationship will be built since employees will be empowered. As a result they will respect the assets and activities of the Corporation and focus their efforts towards improving its performance and profit margins (Savitz & Weber, 2006). Moreover, there will be effective communication flowing in both directions upwards and downwards i.e. in both vertical and horizontal manner. On the other hand, employees will be at liberty to air their views, concerns and complaints with the aim of improving the firm. Conversely, due to implementation of a benchmark state-of-the-art organizational process improvement strategy all the staff will display hard work, willingness to learn and innovativeness. This is because TBL establishes three distinct bottom lines: profit account, people account and planet account. This is also three Ps; people, profit and planet. The Corporation will thus be able to appropriately factor in the loss and profit opportunities, its social responsibility and sustainable maintenance of the environment respectively. Therefore, with time the corporation will be able to determine the full cost of doing business and thus perfectly implement cost cutting strategies (Savitz & Weber, 2006). Secondly, the tech division and CF&F Corporation as a whole should adapt the Corporate Social Responsibility organizational principle as it will help the corporation to self regulate. CSR establishes an inbuilt mechanism that is used to monitor and regulate the efforts of the organization by actively adhering to stipulated ethical standards, norms and government regulations. This will ensure the tech division and the corporation as a whole take control of all the activities of the organization to ensure they have a positive impact on consumers, environment, community and stakeholders. Implementation of CSR will go hand in hand with implementation of TBL as CSR emphasizes on recognition and honor of the planet, people and profit. With this in mind, the CF&F Corporation will rarely be subjected to allegations accusing it of abusing its right of being a corporation because of failing to comply with stipulated ethical, employment, production and governmental regulations and standards (Kotter, 2008). The two organizational change principles can also be integrated with sustainable development. This will help the tech division to meet its current needs and effectively plan for its future needs. On the other hand, sustainability also enables organizations to cater for the societal, environmental and economic needs before laying the interests of the shareholders as the first priority (Kotter, 2006). Plan To be able to achieve the above the Prosci’s change management methodology should be implemented. This is because it will define a holistic as well as an easy to implement organizational change strategy. This methodology will enable the tech division to achieve its goals and vision by building on its own internal management skills for organizational change. The plan will entail efforts to first understand how each employee will contribute towards making the process of organizational change successfully and understanding the tools that are available to facilitate the change process. This is because usually organizations do not undergo changes it their stakeholders’ structure. The next step is to implement the ADKAR model which ensures that each individual understands the need for change, has the desire of participate in the change, the knowledge of how to implement change and the ability, skills and required behavior of implementing. This will effectively counteract any resistance and challenges within the change process (Sun, 2010). Recommendations Going by the findings of the employee survey it is quite clear that the CF&F Corporation does not follow a stringent approach of employing staff. They are rather employed in accordance with the interest of the human resource and departmental managers. Moreover, once employed they are not subjected to appropriate induction processes to enable them familiarize themselves with the goals, vision and mission statement of the corporation. In addition, they are not given enough time to effectively learn the production processes, regulations and standards such as on safety and health standards (Clegg, Kornberger & Pitsis, 2008). To curb this problem in future and enable divisions to increase their performance qualified staff that is adequately competent and experienced should be employed. They should be subjected to induction which should be a continuous process. This implies that all the staff should undergo departmental training to ensure their knowledge and skills are constantly improved and to comply with the current requirements and demands of the market, society and environment. For instance, the tech division should undergo through numerous production changes and review of safety, environmental and production standards Therefore, to achieve emotional maturity, compassion and integrity, growth from the employees the CF&F Corporation should focus on facilitating learning rather than training employees. This can be achieved by offering the employees various development opportunities to enable them explore their potential and strengths in different ways. The tech division should emphasize on this since it deals with quite a delicate process that can lead to development of a plethora of health and environmental related concerns. Competent staff results in an increase in the quality of production and efficiency. Moreover, the stipulated federal and state regulations on safety, environment and quality will be perfectly understood and adhered to. Conversely, the federal and state labor laws and equal employment opportunity guidelines will be observed during the employment process (Clegg, Kornberger & Pitsis, 2008). Conclusion Organizational change entails the implementation of a structured approach towards changing the current state of an organization, department or individuals to attain the desired future transitional state. It enables employees to embrace the changes in the work environment. The CF&F Corporation should plan for organizational change so as to curb all the problems it is facing. The tech division in particular should implement visionary, strategic, operational, structural, technological and behavioral changes so as to accomplish the stipulated goals and objectives of the Corporation as well as observe the production, safety and environmental guidelines. As a result, the tech division will observe appropriate leadership styles which are beneficial to both the management and subordinate staff. This is because there will be a systematic diagnosis of the current organizational culture and structure. There will also be effective communication between all the stakeholders of the corporation and implementation of a continuous upgrading scheme since the organizational change will focus on integrating individual change management into organizational change management. References Clegg, S., Kornberger, M., & Pitsis, T. (2008). managing & organizations - an introduction to theory & practice. 2nd Ed. London, England: SAGE. Kotter, P. J. (2006). Force for change: How leadership differs from management. 3rd Ed. New York: Free Press. Kotter, P. J. (2008). Corporate culture and performance. (7th Ed.). New York: Free Press. Savitz, A.W. & Weber, K. (2006). The triple bottom line: How today’s best-run companies are achieving economic, social and environmental success and how you can too. San Francisco, CA: Jossey-Bass. Sun, W. (2010). How to govern corporations so they serve the public good: A theory of corporate governance Emergence. New York: Edwin Mellen. Read More