Organizational Behavioral Forces

Organizational Behavioral Forces

There are many forces that dictate the organizational behavior within an organization. The organizational behavior will tend to shift based upon the different demands both internally and externally. Internal and external factors have an equal importance within organizations and will have different effects and outcomes on an organization. In this paper we will compare four very different organizations and demonstrate the effect four factors have on the organizational behavior within the organization. The four factors we will explore are: restructuring, competition, customer demands, and organizational mission. These four forces have a great impact on the organizations we have evaluated and although they are very different the impact is very similar.

There comes a time in almost every organization when restructuring is needed. Sometimes this is a result of internal factors, such as reassignment of job responsibilities, due to promotions within the organization, or people leaving to pursue other opportunities. Recently the senior management group at Meritage Homes of Northern California experienced both of these situations. Due to an expansion of the division the existing management group decided to pursue other opportunities with a different new home builder. Therefore the remaining management group had to restructure both the management group, hiring externally as well as promoting internally, as well as the business to effectively embrace and efficiently grow at the new pace of the expansion.

Or restructuring is caused by the external environment, as was the recent case with the Rocketdyne division of The Boeing Company. On August 2, 2005, United Technologies Corporation (UTC) completed its acquisition of Rocketdyne Propulsion & Power from The Boeing Company. (PWR 2005). The result of this acquisition was the restructuring or combining of Pratt & Whitney, another UTC company with Rocketdyne Propulsion and Power, to form one organization with a common goal of providing world-class space propulsion systems and services.

A local Ford dealership restructures their selling teams on a monthly basis. Sales people in an eight hour shift are divided among four floor managers. At the end of the month the team of lowest producers are either fired or again divided among the four sales managers and four of the top sales people are divided among the four teams. The mid level sales people are divided equally. Sales and finance managers are traded with or transferred from different ford dealerships. Employees, sales people and services techs sometimes follow their preferred management to the different dealerships. This restructuring is in place to effectively run the business and the outcome involves both internal and external factors.

At the University of Phoenix Online International, subdivision of University of Phoenix Online was created as a result of a restructuring process of University of Phoenix. The growing demand from International students urged the need for the Apollo Group to create an International department, where enrollment counselors, academic advisors and finance specialist could actually have a knowledge and experience of the global environment, and would be familiar with foreign education systems and immigration laws.

Another major factor in the way a corporation runs their business is competition. At Meritage Homes there are many different competitors they must keep their eye on in all areas of the building aspect. First of all there are many other new home builders and contractors, some are production and some are custome, plus there is also the “resale market” which is the used home sector. Aside from just the price of the home Meritage Homes also must remain competitive in the price of their upgrades offered at the new home design studio.

Competition was always fierce between Rocketdyne and Pratt & Whitney, both companies wanted the same business. They marketed the same types of products, and both companies had supported the same contracts or in some cases had stolen work away from the other. For example on the Space Shuttle Program, for years Rocketdyne was the sole provider of the Turbo pumps for the Shuttle Main Engines, when the pump contract came up for re-bid, NASA awarded the new contract to Pratt & Whitney. This decision dealt a hard blow to Rocketdyne, as a result many that support the design, and manufacturing efforts were laid off. The combining of Rocketdyne with Pratt & Whitney eliminated the competition between the two companies, opening up new markets, and new opportunities in the exploration of space.

At the Ford dealership competitors are in the same auto center, have competitive rates and pricing, try to out do or under bid Ford for business, run service specials, free oil changes to get customers in, we have to have