A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism, Essay Example

Organizational strategies allow businesses and individuals to achieve their goals. In particular, it is important to consider that strategic planning embodies these organizational strategies. Successful businesses need to incorporate different components of these plans in order to effectively compete with one another (Gomez-Mejia et al., 2008). As a consequence, one organizational strategy is to establish a management hierarchy to maintain control over different positions of the organization. Many corporations utilize this particular organization strategy because it allows them to maintain control over many diverse operations in a manner that continues to contribute to the organization’s success. Having a clear plan of what the organization wishes to achieve an instilling this goal in management at a variety of levels is beneficial to the company’s overall goal.

One well-known organization that utilizes this form of management hierarchy is Walmart. The organization’s highest operational level is at the corporate level, in which the CEO and other executives collaborate to determine how the company will spread its influence and engage in business around the world. On a secondary level there are many regional managers that are responsible for overseeing stores on a local level. These individuals ensure that stores are organized according to company corporate standards. On a lower level, there are individual store levels responsible for the overall management of the store and management of lower level employees. Since Walmart locations have many different departments there are also assistant supervisors in charge of each of these individual components. In this manner, the organization is able to maintain control over employees of a variety of levels and ensure that their work is productive. Establishing a management hierarchy is a useful move in corporate and other large organizations because it helps employees maintain a greater understanding of accountability. Thus, the CEO can ensure that practices are operating according to his or her desires based on their understanding of the corporate organization. Without this type of multi-layer management, it would become too challenging for executives to maintain control over large organizations with many locations across the country and world.

A second important organizational strategy is determining performance measures for employees. It is essential for managers and other leaders to maintain leadership standards in order to motivate workers and contribute to productivity. However, it is also important for employees to understand company expectations so that they are able to contribute to the overall benefit of the company. Organizations operate the most effectively if they set clear standards and provide employees with the means by which to accomplish these goals if they entered their position without the training necessary to accomplish this naturally. Thus, transformational leaders are the individuals that most effectively contribute to the well-being of an organization. Since they aim to foster creativity and development within a company, they are also willing to provide employees with the training necessary to accomplish these goals. Thus, establishing performance measures that could be readily obtained through hard work is an effective way to bolster the productivity of an organization.

An example of an organization that determines defined performance measures is the New York City Board of Education. Many different organizations around the globe enact these principles, but many American cities and towns have become concerned with determining how to effectively rate the performance of teachers. In this manner, skills that appear to be subjective can be rated in a more objective manner (Giddens, 1981). New York City and other large school boards use rubrics to rate their teachers. In doing so, the teacher is able to fully understand how his or her performance is being considered and he or she can use the information in the rubric to determine how to improve work practices. When employees understand how their performance will be rated, they are more able to develop clear goals and objectives that will allow them to make these improvements in practice. Many principals in New York City are considered to be transformational leaders because they provide their teachers with feedback according to the teaching rubric and provide their employees with information about training seminars or with general advice to help them achieve the next level of expertise. Therefore, it is beneficial for employers to provide their employees with information that will help them excel in their positions. This form of organizational strategy helps each individual improve their personal practice, which ultimately contributes to the productivity of the organization.

Accountability is also an important component of organizational strategy (Stroh et al., 2002). While the concept ties into the idea of different levels of management, it is also necessary to ensure that each level of responsibility in the organization could reasonably contribute to accountability as well. For example, the CEO of an organization is considered to be the ultimate power, but this individual is also responsible to the shareholders and the other members of the executive board. In addition, the CEO is accountable to individuals in the lower management levels of the organization because he or she must ensure that these individuals have the skills necessary to succeed in spite of the changing aims of the organization. Thus, he must provide these individuals with training programs so they will be able to provide enhanced training to their employees.

An example of an organization in which accountability is an important part of organizational strategy is CVS/pharmacy. This organization recently showed that it was accountable to its shareholders because it stopped selling cigarettes. It appeared to these individuals that CVS was contradicting its health goals because even though it is a pharmacy focused on selling products to improve the health of its customers, it continued selling products that contradicted this aim. Furthermore, the organization has undergone many mergers in addition to restructuring that has improved its practices in a manner to benefit customers, low level employees, and managers. Since the organization is concerned about the success of its individual employees, it has several systems in place to receive feedback from lower level employees. In addition, there are several levels of managers within one store to help the system of accountability. For example, shift supervisors report to the assistant managers, who report to the store manager. In this way, each employee can remain certain about the power and tasks that they should carry out. Furthermore, store managers are accountable towards regional managers, who are accountable towards individuals in the corporate office. This hierarchy of accountability is valuable because it allows different levels of managers to recognize and understand the different tasks that must be conducted at various levels in the organization. Therefore, this structure helps employees all work in a manner that contributes to the productivity of the overall organization, contributing to the well-being of the company at large.

References

Giddens, Anthony. (1981). A Contemporary Critique of Historical Materialism. Social and Politic Theory from Polity Press, University of California Press.

Gomez-Mejia, Luis R.; David B. Balkin; Robert L. Cardy. (2008). Management: People,  Performance, Change, 3rd edition. New York, New York USA: McGraw-Hill.

Stroh, L. K., Northcraft, G. B., & Neale, M. A. (2002). Organizational behavior: A management challenge. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.