Stafford Hospital update

Julie Bailey from the "Cure the NHS" campaign group

This report in the Guardian brings the Stafford Hospital story up to date. Criminal charges could be the end result:  http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2013/jun/10/mid-staffordshire-trust-police-inquiry

Royal Mail: Problems of changing culture

A nice update on trade union opposition to privatisation at Royal Mail. Especially useful for bullet point 5 (problems of changing organisational culture).

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/may/22/roayl-mail-workers-ballot-privatisation

The Save Our Royal Mail campaign, supported by the trade union, suggests that the trade union is "in a different place" to senior management on how the organisation needs to respond to the changed competitive environment it is faced with.

http://www.cwu.org/save-our-royal-mail.html

As you know the current leadership, including MD Moya Greene, are very keen on the privatisation of the business.

Bankers - BBC2 Wed 15 May 9pm

Worth catching this programme on BBC2. Tells the story of two recent multi-billion pound trading disasters. Suggests that the culture of the banks won't change easily.

Essay: Ways of changing culture

The essay which you will do in class on Wednesday or Friday this week is this

"Changing the leaders at the top of the organisation is the most effective way of changing organisational culture". With reference to the item above (on Barclays) and your own research to what extent do you agree with this statement?

The companies you will use in your essay are Barclays Bank, Royal Mail and British Airways

Barclays

Antony Jenkins to staff: adopt new values or leave Barclays (Telegraph article)

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/banksandfinance/9808042/Antony-Jenkins-to-staff-adopt-new-values-or-leave-Barclays.html

Can Antony Jenkins get rid of Bob Diamond's legacy at Barclays?(Independent article)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/can-antony-jenkins-get-rid-of-bob-diamonds-legacy-at-barclays-8456614.html


Royal Mail

(Moya Greene interview on culture change)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuC-G_cyu6E

Moya Greene's internal communications approach

http://www.myroyalmail.com/blogs

British Airways

Colin Marshall obituary

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/lord-marshall-executive-who-turned-british-airways-from-a-sleeping-giant-into-a-world-leader-7920614.html

Apple's culture

Excellent documentary on Steve Jobs

 

 

http://touch.dailymotion.com/video/xn3fbz_steve-jobs-billion-dollar-hippy-2011-bbc_lifestyle

Google culture: impact on strategy & performance

Thanks to Time2Resources for this

In April 2011 Google co-founder Larry Page also became their CEO. He believes that employees should take risks in order to innovate and that world changing ideas can attract the most intelligent people.  Many of the company’s best researchers have remained at the business because of Page’s approach to new product development.

Under Page’s leadership, Google has dramatically increased spending on R&D from $3.76bn in 2010 to $6.79bn in 2012.  The share price rose by 12% in 2012 and investors are optimistic regarding new product developments such as a self-driving car and Google Glass, a visual computer that is worn over the eyes. The business has already diversified into Internet video (YouTube) and smart devices (Motorola and Nexus).

Page believes that ‘My job as a leader is to make sure everybody in the company has great opportunities, and that they feel they're having a meaningful impact and are contributing to the good of society. As a world, we're doing a better job of that. My goal is for Google to lead, not follow that’.  Many analysts suggest that Page’s leadership sets the tone for the whole of Google’s innovative culture.

Daily Mail article on Google glasses

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2295004/Google-Glass-Googles-sinister-glasses-turn-world-search-giants-spies.html

Link to great documentary on RBS  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=st40Gps08KI

Use this film to build up a "wow paragraph" on how the culture at RBS affected that company's strategies and how those strategies affected the bank's performance

Kraft and Cadbury: cultural differences

The hostile takeover of Cadbury by Kraft in 2010 and its immediate aftermath is another case where companies who have grown by integration have some cultural differences to resolve, certainly in the early days of integration. The issues here are less of national characteristics producing cultural clashes than the very different historical backgrounds/ways of working of the two companies. The articles below give you some infomration you could work into a wow paragraph

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/7873510/Kraft-cuts-majority-of-Cadbury-HQs-senior-staff.html

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/71a34530-2019-11e0-a6fb-00144feab49a.html#axzz2NPwuswZM

Daimler and Chrysler

This article is courtesy of time2resources. GLW

In 1998 Robert Eaton CEO of Chrysler (from the US) and Jurgen Schrempp CEO of Daimler-Benz (Germany) agreed to a merger.  Daimler paid $36bn for a 58% share of Chrysler. Shareholders in both companies approved of what was called a ‘merger of equals’ where both would benefit from the other’s strengths. However, Daimler was labour intensive and Schrempp saw economies of scale in the merger.  Eaton saw the benefits of a merger in terms of new markets and an increased global presence. 

Almost immediately problems arose. One area of concern related to the different brands.  Daimler’s Mercedes brand was seen as sophisticated, conservative and high quality.  Chrysler’s Jeep was brash, risk-taking and down market.  Daimler had great engineering skills and used advanced technology; Chrysler was renowned for its innovation and the speed of new product development. There were also a number of redundancies at Chrysler, something which had not been anticipated.

The main cause of the problems, however, was believed to be the differences in culture. Daimler had a hierarchical structure and management style.  Employees showed some signs of individualism but Hofstede’s collectivist culture was apparent throughout.  Every employee knew their position within the hierarchy and decision-making was centralised, methodical and based scientifically on data.  Jobs were undertaken for the benefit of the company.

Chrysler had a more informal, relaxed approach. Creativity and team-working was at the heart of the business and employees were empowered. Hofstede’s individualistic culture was paramount. Chrysler employees believed that Daimler was trying to impose its culture on them. Core workers at Chrysler, including senior executives and engineers, left the company. One analyst said ‘You had two companies from different countries with different languages and different styles come together’.  Perhaps it was inevitable that there would be a clash of cultures.

You can read another good article about this mismatch here

http://www.apexinstitute.ac.in/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=35&Itemid=29

When culture goes rotten: the failings of Mid Staffs NHS Trust

After studying it today in class, here is my attempt at a  "wow" paragraph based around the Stafford Hospital scandal and bullet point one ("factors affecting culture..")


The widely reported failures of Stafford Hospital and the Mid Staffs NHS Trust show that leadership plays a key role in determining organisational culture. Certainly inadequate leadership played a part in the scandal, as was identified in the damning report by Robert Francis QC. In the presentation of his report, Francis described the hospital failings as "a lack of care, compassion, humanity and leadership". The key leadership shortcomings included the failure to listen to patients and frontline staff and the tolerance of poor standards of care. The local NHS leaders were culpable in developing the culture of patient neglect, as they placed greater emphasis on cost control and the gaining of foundation trust status than the care given to patients. However, there were other factors at play which were affected the culture which are wider than Stafford Hospital and apply to other parts of the NHS. In terms of Charles Handy's classification of culture the  NHS would exhibit some aspects of "role culture", i.e. it is inward-looking and bureaucratic with many layers of hierarchy. This contrasts with Total Quality companies and more customer-focused organisations where the frontline staff who interact with customers are viewed as the most important employees and the role of more senior management is to support them. For instance, companies such as South-West Airlines claim they are organised in an "upside-down pyramid" with frontline staff and the customer determining the priorities and behaviours within the organisation. This is a million miles from the culture of Stafford Hospital described in the Francis report where the customer (i.e. the patient) was neglected. So as well as leadership being a key factor in the culture of the Stafford Hospital, the organisational structure of the NHS and its occasional tendency to place the interests of senior employees above those of customers  played a part in the disastrous failings that occurred there.

Essay on bullet point one: research

Here are some links which may help you in your research for the essay on bullet point one

Amazon

http://www.tutor2u.net/blog/index.php/business-studies/comments/amazon-work-hard-and-...-er-work-hard#extended

Branson

http://www.hrmagazine.co.uk/hro/features/1018119/exclusive-sir-richard-branson-talks-hr-magazine-leadership

O’Leary

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/sep/12/ryanair-move-away-from-low-fares

http://www.ashridge-people.org.uk/the-leadership-style-of-michael-oleary/

Barclays

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/analysis-and-features/can-antony-jenkins-get-rid-of-bob-diamonds-legacy-at-barclays-8456614.html

Culture: the 5 bullet points

The 5 bullet points for the 2013 research topic are these:

● factors influencing the culture of an organisation and cultural differences within an organisation
● the impact of organisational culture on business strategies and performance
● reasons for changes in organisational culture
● ways of changing organisational culture
● problems of changing organisational culture.