Unilever Company has a formal structure which represents the manner in which the organization is established by the stakeholders and those personnel who are responsible for the management of the organization. Under this formal structure the organization is able to meet its objectives. The company's individual organizational structure is a formal composition of responsibilities, tasks and reporting relationships which allow the organization to control coordinate as well as motivating the employees so that a common goal can be realized (Ron, 2002).
Unilever has a hybrid form of formal organization. The company operates with two product segments, three divisional regions, and five functional segments. The company developed and implemented this system of organizational structure for the organization so that it could foster and improve on the communication and also to take advantage of the resources that they could access. Typically this kind of organization is structured in a to-down basis. Once the executive body is satisfied with the system, it flows down to the management of the organization. In other cases the organizational structure of the company may not be clearly established as it is not visible. However, judging it by the actions and the specified reporting protocol the system or rather structure is functional and intact.
This type of formal organization enables the company to take advantage of the existing environmental conditions at given time.
The company has informal structures existing it its systems of working and also in management of the organization. The company's management culture has historically encouraged the utilization of the informal organization within the organization just like is the case in most of other organizations and businesses. The company's informal structure is also crucial and effective. This is more by accident than by design. It is basically due to it being a by-product of a very intensive program of attachments, training and job rotation. All these activities make formidable network. Such a network within the organization helps in the transfer of skills and experiences from one individual to another in the organization. It is the informal exchange of information between and among individuals that facilitate most the exchange and transfer of skills (Ron, 2002). This informal structure of interaction allow for informal exchange of information. Such an exchange has added value to the competitiveness of experts in the organization. The free flow of information in the company encourages a since of competition in the head office where the experts improve their knowledge and skills in the process of competing with the junior employees and personnel.
The transfer of skills between products groups posses a number of issues and events. The most crucial aspect is more often technology. For instance, fat science can be applied in other sectors such as skin cream, in frying fat, in soap making, in bakery materials, in margarine, in oleo-chemicals, in ice cream, as well as in many other of the company's products.
The increasing degree of scientific specialization which is necessary to improve the company's products needs major expenses on research and development. It can be said that the economies of scale in the research and development is a crucial reason for the presence of large companies and organizations. The duty to make use of the existing science base as widely as possible is shared in the company between the product groups and the research director. However, whilst the company has achieved much progress in the past decade in integrating science in the organization, the organization still has some way to go. A main issue is that the prediction of consumer behavior over some period of time becomes notoriously hard once corporate management wants to go over and beyond the usual rather platitudinous trends often mentioned in popular publications.
Informal organizations enhances the sharing of activities which is a potent basis for corporate strategy as sharing always enhances competitive advantage by means of lowering cost or even raising differentiation. In such an informal organization sharing of activities can be attained through the utilization of a central service or rather a system of sharing between operating units.
Generally, informal organization enhances favorable conditions for working where all the employees can work in teams and share ideas among themselves. It enables the formation of a good network where all the stakeholders feel comfortable with each other.
Teams within organizations are formed specifically based on the role or the task for which the teams are formed. Teams are formed with an aim of accomplishing a given task which is crucial for the development and fostering of the organization. For instance...
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