Assignment 1: LASA-Organizational Design and Culture

Many companies find they are forced to remodel their traditional hierarchical structures, which were originally built around functional specialization and centralized authority, to compete in today's marketplace. Companies often draw on the following five tools of organizational design to make their organizations leaner, flatter, and more responsive to change. The five tools are:

• Empower managers and workers
• Reengineer work processes
• Implementing self-directed work teams
• Rapid incorporation of Internet technology applications
• Networking with outsiders to improve existing capabilities and create new ones

In addition, there are many managerial tasks that shape corporate culture and the leadership skills needed to engage the full organization to produce great results. Examine the dynamics of the elements that must be brought together to create a corporate culture, such as core values and business principles, operating practices and behaviors, ethical standards and attitudes, and work climate and people management practices.

Considering the five tools of organizational design, managerial tasks and leadership skills, examine the practices followed by your selected organization and include the following in a 8-10 page APA formatted paper in MS Word:

Describe which of the five tools of organizational design your selected organization uses to maintain and improve productivity while achieving cost savings. Use detailed examples in your response.

Explain how work groups are utilized in your organization to accomplish the stated goals of the company.

Describe the motivational practices used by the organization to promote better strategy execution. Include some illustrative examples in your response.

Explain how, if at all, the reward system in the organization ties incentives directly to achieving higher productivity and performance targets.

Explain the evaluation and feedback process used in your company to assess employee performance.

Identify the elements in the organization that affect how cultural change is implemented.

Describe the ethical model being used by the company.

Present your overall opinion of the organization's corporate strategy approach. Is the strategy execution effort delivering the expected results? Explain and illustrate your conclusions.

Describe what specific actions have been taken to delegate authority to middle and junior managers and to create a sense of empowerment among employees. Explain and illustrate your answers.

Avoid plagiarism: Using someone else's words or ideas in your paper without proper acknowledgement constitutes plagiarism and is unacceptable in any situation. Make sure you have properly documented the source of original facts, ideas, and interpretations that you use in your paper. This must be done whether you summarize information or paraphrase what you learned from a particular source.

Assignment 2: Discussion: Corporate Culture, Strategy, and Leadership

Your local small business association is organizing a workshop centered upon the impact of corporate culture on leadership and corporate strategy. They are seeking to differentiate their workshop from similar workshops by requiring their presenters to demonstrate non-traditional methods of aligning culture, strategy and leadership. You have been selected by the small business association to serve as a presenter at this workshop. They have asked you to provide a 2-3 paragraph proposal outlining your idea for a non-traditional method of aligning culture, strategy and leadership for small, local businesses in your area.