Contemporary Organization Evaluation : Apple

Businesses are facing a dichotomy between wanting to chalk out an all-time structure and strategy for their organization, and recognizing that their world is in a constant state of flux [3]. For most of the 20th century they were largely focused on the static elements of this dichotomy. However, in the last decade changes have become more frequent and more dramatic, so much so that a whole branch of management is now devoted to the subject of change itself.

Apple’s success under Jobs is often cited as evidence that the abusive and just plain weird behavior of a genius CEO should not be held against him if that person is getting results. But as we now know, Apple barely dodged some serious bullets thanks to Jobs’ risky behavior. In a different regulatory climate, the company could have faced a major scandal and government fines for either its anti-trust practices or its backdating of stock options. If American Apparel’s board had moved faster, that company might not have ended

In today's business world, corporations have become more complex and more unpredictable, in fact it is considered almost "healthy" that a corporation experience change and transformation. Companies need to be susceptible and ready to acknowledge the challenges that change presents with and try to overcome these for the benefit of the company as a whole. Due to the ever-changing business and social environments caused strongly by globalizations, this has meant that companies must keep themselves up-to-date, whether it is through using the latest form of technology or through the latest management fad. There are many factors involved with change and the successful management of it which can often be a difficult time for

The purpose of an organizational assessment is to be able to identify the positive attributes of an agency as well as possible methods of enhancing the program further. The agency that was chosen for the purposes of this organizational assessment has two programs available: one that is located in a rural town in Massachusetts, and is called the Stevens Treatment Home and another program located in a city setting called the Transitional Living Program (TLP). The Stevens Treatment Programs is a nonprofit corporation that provides an extensive continuum of services. This program’s population consists of adolescent males from the ages of 11 to 22 who have history of trauma, fire-setting, sexual deviancy, and emotional

Innovation decline and lack of leadership: Charisma was a part of the reason Apple was so successful in the first part of the century. The leadership qualities that Steve Jobs possessed in his time with apple worked as both a marketing and advertising tool in itself. Innovation appears to be taking a backseat to business sense at Apple and the new CEO Tim Cook lacks many of those cutting edge success orientated qualities of his predecessor.3 In the coming years, Apple must address the fact that its best years

Organizational change initiatives trigger anxiety and even fear and panic across an organization’s hierarchy, especially in such a volatile business environment (e.g. 2008’s global economic crisis, the stock market’s fluctuations).

By any objective measure, the amount of important, frequently distressing, change in organizations has grown enormously over the last two decades (Kotter, 1996). Jeffrey M. Hiatt, CEO of Prosci Inc., (as cited by Gibson, Ivancevich, Donnelly & Konopaske, 2009, p. 481) explained, “thirty years ago, a foturne 100 probably had one or two enterprisewide change intitiatives goiong on; today that number is proably between 20 and 25.” The speed of global, economic, and techological development makes change an ineveitable element of organiztional life. Change is a pervasive, perisitent, and permenant condition for all organizations (Gibson, et al., 2009).

Steve Jobs, the co-founder and former CEO of Apple was constantly making sure that Apple incorporated was running at its full potential. Apple today is continuing to grow, even without Jobs, but are lacking in what made the company truly shine brighter than all of its competitors. Jobs found out, through many years of experience, that the way for a company to be successful was to loosen the reins a little bit, and by doing that you gained more power.

Almost a decade later Steve Jobs admitted that “Getting fired from Apple was the best thing that happened to me.”. Without self-reliance Jobs would have never made his own company and brought it from the ground up and made it back into apple as “Chairman of the Board”.

To survive in today?s environment, a company must understand why change is necessary as well as being ready to direct their own change. According to Harvard researchers, ?there are three basic reasons why an organization must be able to effectively respond to change which include the escalating pace and volume of change, dealing with greater complexity and more intense competition.? (Isaksen & Tidd)

This paper describes the key strategic challenges facing Apple Computer. This paper will also describe the dimensions along which company success can be measured. We will also describe the critical external and internal environmental factors that have strategic implications for Apple’s future. This paper will further explain how Apple’s strategy stands up against industry rivalry. In closing we will provide recommendations to enhance the effectiveness of the company’s strategy or to change its strategic approach for better results.

Unfortunately, how organizational change will play out is unknown. Therefore, it is uncertainty which marks the period of transition. What can be affirmed is that successful management of change lies primarily in the users of the adopted change; those who are expected to change as well in a manner that justifies the necessity of new ideas(Kale, 2005). It would not be in any organization’s interest to sacrifice quality or to succumb to avoidable losses during this period.

Apple has and is continuing to experience both internal and external forces contributing to organizational change. Internal forces such as transition in management has caused organizational change throughout Apple (Griffin, 2013). In 2011, Tim Cook became the CEO a few months

There are a number of factors that affect organizational functions and require change; organizations must make the transition from its current state to some desired future state because change is inevitable. New markets, products and services, new production methods, technologies and social values affect the daily environment. Thus, adaptiveness, flexibility, and responsiveness are characteristics that enable organizations to meet the competitive challenges businesses face, today. Nelson & Quick share in Organizational Behavior (2013), “the current environment demands excellence in all areas and vigilant leaders.” Organizational change comes in two forms: planned, when change results from a deliberate decision to alter the organization, or unplanned, change imposed on the organization and is often unforeseen (Nelson & Quick, 2013, p.668). Organizations are pressured and forced into change for several reasons, some are external forces that arise from outside the company, and some may be internal forces that arise from sources within the company. While there are a significant number of external forces that lead to organizational change, a few common considerations like globalization, workforce diversity, and managing ethical behavior should be managed and monitored. Internal forces include a decline on effectiveness, a crisis, or even a change in employee expectations.

Change is unavoidable in the existence of an organization. Nowadays, most of the organizations in the business world are facing changing business environment. There is no way to avoid either change or die. The major forces which make the changes not only desirable but inevitable are technological, economic, political, social, legal, international and labor market environments. The case in this assignment is Nokia, the Finnish company, faced problem because of changing customer tastes, new technology and stronger rivals.