Organizations can be said to be a system or combination of systems which is dependent on the structure of the organization, the people working inside the organization and behaviour, the technology that is being used inside an organization, etc.

1. Organization and Behaviour
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2. Introduction
Organizations can be said to be a system or combination of systems which is dependent on the
structure of the organization, the people working inside the organization and behaviour, the
technology that is being used inside an organization, etc. Since, the behaviour of the people working
inside the organization is highly unpredictable, it makes it difficult to manage the day to day working
of an organization. Thus, it makes it important to understand the various theories and approaches that
are followed by various type of organization, to get a fair idea about the behaviour of various
organizations. This report is a case study of company ASDA. The report will look into how the
organization is structured and what type of culture prevails in ASDA. Then it will focus on the
various leadership style that are available and what type of leadership style is being followed in
ASDA and why. This report, will further drill on the various organization and motivational theories
and which theories are adopted inside ASDA. In the last section, the discussion will be related to the
importance of group, the advantage and disadvantages of working in a team and the impact of
technology on ASDA.
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3. Brief Introduction about Business Organization Learning outcomes:
LO 1- Relationship between organizational structure and culture
LO 2- Different approaches to management and leadership
LO 3- Motivational theories in organizations
LO 4 –Teamwork in organizations
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4. LO 1- P 1.1 Organization structure and culture of ASDA of British
Airlines
An organizational structure can be termed as arrangement of different groups of people
according to their level of authority based on the roles and authorities of different
people. An organizational structure decides how information should flow across the
organizations and is dependent on the strategy and goal of an organization. Based on
the span of control here are two types of organizational structure: Hierarchical and Flat
organization structure. A hierarchical organization structure is the one which has many
layers of management. In hierarchical type of organization structure the lower group of
people does not play much role in management related activities, their tasks are
assigned by their managers and they are expected to complete those tasks and report it
to their managers. The main decision making tasks are handled by the people who are
at the top of the hierarchy. All employees involved in making a particular type of
product are grouped as one. This type of structure helps British airlines in quick
decision making and active supervision by the managers as their common objective is
customer care.
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5. LO 1- P1.2- Relationship between ASDA’s structure and culture impact on
performance
The performance of any organization is dependent on the how the structure
of organisations and behaviour is? It has been observed by many researchers that it
essential to form a well structure within an organization for smooth functioning of
it. An unstructured organization will only lead to confusion and chaos across the
organization. Moreover, behaviour of employee also plays an important role. The
satisfaction level of any employee plays an important role in improving the
performance of the organization. Thus it can be seen that both organization
structure and its’ culture are essential to improve company’s performance.
Any organization which is well organized and works on the same principle and
values creates confidence and provides great level of security and satisfaction
among its organization. Any organization which is confused and unorganized will
increase uncertainty and will develop insecurity in the minds of its employees. All
this plays a big role in improving the performance of the company.
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6. LO 1- P1.3- The factors which influence the behaviour of
ASDA’s employees
 Communication:
 Culture:
 Leadership:
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7. LO2-P2.1- Compare the effectiveness of the leadership styles used by the CEO
in ASDA
 Leadership can be considered as a quality through which the attitude and
behaviour of others can be influenced. Based on various types of theories,
leadership style has been classified into various types. According to Michigan
and Ohio theory, leadership was classified into task oriented, relationship
oriented and participative leadership style.
 A task oriented leadership style is one where leaders are more focused on
doing and getting the task done rather than having an effective relationship
with his or her team. The leader provides its team with the necessary resources
required to complete the task.
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8.  Relationship-oriented leadership style is one where leaders also focus on maintaining good
relationship with its employees, along with getting the work done. As discussed above, ASDA follows
relationship-oriented leadership style, where it effective measures were taken by the leaders to
maintain healthy relations with their subordinate members.
 Participative leadership style: The main feature of this type of leadership style is it involves the whole
team while taking decision and the decision is taken after complete discussion, suggestions and
feedback from the whole team.
 A transactional leadership style is one in which the leaders used to motivate their subordinated by
giving them rewards and used to punish the employees who fails to deliver quality product on time.
Willie Walsh believed that Salary of an employee is sufficient to get the work done, hence British
airlines used to follow transactional leadership style.
 Transformational leadership: In this leadership style, as seen in ASDA, the morale and motivation of
an employee was not just defined by rewards and punishments. Transformational leadership doesn’t
believe in give and take business but focused on bringing the change through leadership. A leader
should set an example through his belief in the work, his ability and skill. The employees will follow
him eventually.
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9. LO2-P2.2– Identify any organizational theories practiced at ASDA PLC
and explain how organizational theory underpins the practice of
management
 An organization theories are models that explains how an organization is working
and how is it related to external environments. It is essential to understand the
organizational theory of an organization for better management. Management
related activities require theory, which can be used by managers to refer while
performing these activities.
 It was in 2000, when ASDA for merged with Wal-Mart, that leads to confusion in
the minds of many employees working in ASDA. Since, the merger resulted in new
rules and regulations, the employees of ASDA were not comfortable and felt
insecure. At this point of time, the higher management took the initiative of
explaining the new business activities to its workers which help them build trust
and made the employees felt more secure. Though, the two organization had
similar kind of structure, still the organizational theory acted as the base for the
management team to take crucial decisions in favour of the employees and the
company as a whole.
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10. LO2-P2.3– Evaluate the different approaches to management used by
ASDA to that used by British Airways
The difference between the approach in the management of the two companies
ASDA and British Airways comes from the difference in the organizational
structure. As discussed above, ASDA follows functional organizational structure
while British Airways follows divisional organizational structure. Thus, in case of
ASDA, the management focuses on how to maintain effective relationship with
their employees and make them understand their goals and objectives so that they
can perform to the best of their ability to have competitive advantage over other
companies in UK. The management also focused more on maintaining good
relationship with their employees during the merger process with Wal-Mart. On
the other hand, British Airways, being a divisional type of organizational structure,
focuses more on training its employees so that the employees are aware of the
complete process rather than just knowing what is expected from them.
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11. LO 3- P 3.1 What type of changes could ASDA have
engaged in, Discuss the impact that different leadership
styles may have on motivation of ASDA’s staff in periods
of changes
Any organization keeps on changing from time to time. The structure, the culture,
the values, everything that is been followed inside an organization is subjected to
changes. As already discussed above, ASDA follows hierarchical type of
organizational structure, thus it has the top level or the senior people which takes
most of the decision, while the lower level people do not contribute in any part of
decision making. Their goals and objectives are defined by their manager, and
they are expected to meet their targets on time. However, it has been observed in
recent times, that most of the organizations have changed their structure from
hierarchical to flat. Thus, it is possible that in near future, ASDA also changes its
structure to a Flat structure. The main advantage of a Flat organization structure is
that it gives all the employees equal chance to give their suggestions and
feedbacks are taken are considered while taking the decision.
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12. A group is collection of people who work together to attain a common objective.
Group behaviour is how a team or group behaves with each member of the team within
the team. Group inside an organization can be classified as two types: Formal and
Informal Groups. Formals Groups are generally formed by the leaders keeping in mind
various skills that are required to do a particular job. On the other hand informal
groups are formed by the employees themselves. Formal groups are more organized
and compared to informal groups. It has been observed that working in a team leads to
better results when compared to the sum of output of each individual inside the group
working alone. ASDA faces the issues in group behaviour during the early phase of
their merger with Wal-Mart. The main reason was because; a cordial relationship in a
group can only be maintained when each individual working in the group has a
common objective. Since, the merger means new set of rules and new set of objectives,
this lead to initial problems and conflicts in the groups. However, the management of
ASDA was proactive in identifying the employees with common skills and objectives,
thus formed new formal groups which solved the problem of conflict and increased the
relationship between the employees.
P 4.1 Explain the nature of the various groups that may
exist among ASDA’s staff and how they may influence the
behaviour of staff
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13. LO 4 – P 4.2 Discuss the factors that may promote or inhibit the
development of effective teamwork among the employees of ASDA PLC
As discussed in ASDA, communication plays a vital role. Communication is one
of the most important factors that contribute to have an effective teamwork.
Leaders are specially trained so that they can connect with their team members in
a better way. It is important for a leader to be proactive in understanding the
problems of his team members, listening and helping or giving advice, helps in
building good relationship and results in effective teamwork.
Another important factor that affects the teamwork is recognition and reward. The
organization provides bonuses and salary hikes to those employees who have
shown great results and good performance consistently. Money and rewards,
always keeps the employees interested and motivated and thus, helps in
developing an effective teamwork.
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14. LO 4 – P 4.3 Evaluate the impact of technology on team
functioning within ASDA PLC
The recent advancements in the field of communication and information
technology has been a contributing factor in impacting the proper functioning of
the team within the organization. With the introduction of mobile phones and
internet, it has become easy for employees to stay connected and help other
employees during emergencies. However, these advancements also have their
negative affects too. Since, these days’ computers have become prime source to
store data and confidential information of an organization; these are subjected to
various malicious threats such as virus and Trojan. As we know, ASDA is a retail
company who has many supermarket and stores across UK, it is important for
managers to interact and keep track of day to day activities. Thus, ASDA follows
an effective communication system, since it is not possible for managers to
physically visit each store.
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15. Conclusion
It can be concluded from the above report, that understanding organizational
behaviour is an important aspect of management. The rules and regulations, the
structure and the culture should be such that they complement each other, so that
the company can perform better. It is important to have effective leaders in any
organization that can motivate the team and defines their goals so that the team as
a whole can work effectively. The report also bring out the importance of
different organizational theories and motivational theory that acts as the
theoretical aspect, which the management can refer in order to take better
decision within the organization. The report has studied the organizational
behaviour of the two companies and have shed light on the various aspects of
both and also compared them to show that each organization has different
structure, different culture and follows different approaches depending upon the
main objective of the company.
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16. Reference
 Dionne, S. D., Yammarino, F. J., Atwater, L. E., & Spangler, W. D.
2004. Transformation leadership and team performance. Journal of
organizational change management, 17(2), 177-193.
 Graen, G. B., & Uhl-Bien, M. 1995. Relationship-based approach to
leadership: Development of leader-member exchange (LMX) theory of
leadership over 25 years: Applying a multi-level multi-domain perspective. The
leadership quarterly, 6(2), 219-247.
 Hall, D. T., & Nougaim, K. E. 1968. An examination of Maslow’s need
hierarchy in an organizational setting. Organizational behaviour and human
performance, 3(1), 12-35.
 Katz, D., & Kahn, R. L. 1978. The social psychology of organizations.
 Kumar, S., & Zahn, C. 2003. Mobile communications: evolution and impact on
business operations. Technovation, 23(6), 515-520.
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