Analyzing orgnaizational performance

Organizational Analysis

Models of organizational performance

Organizational performance relates to how successfully an organized group of people with a particular purpose perform a function. It comprises an actual output of an organization measured against its intended outputs. It encompasses three areas of firm outcomes which include; financial performance, product market performance and shareholder return (Charles, Hill and Jones, 2004). There are various models of organizational performance which include strategic Triangle Model, SWOT model, rational model, Natural System Model, Cognitive model and many others. However, in this case, only two models of organizational performance will be discussed as well as, comparing and contrasting them by evaluating their differences and similarities. The two models to be discussed include strategic Triangle model and SWOT model.

The differences between Triangle model and SWOT model is that, Strategic Triangle Model relies on three major key calculations to determine the efficiency along with the effectiveness of an organization while SWOT model is used to evaluate the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities as well as, threats involved in a business venture. The similarities of the two models above are that, both models help in sorting out the information as well as making it easier to draw connections.

Performance measurement provides a stage for managers and performance of its employees. Customers' satisfaction is always the company's ability to generate teamwork in the organizations. As a result, the organizations are finding that teams are a way to improve communication and servicing customers more effectively. The key premise in customers' satisfaction is by understanding the needs or the expectations of customers. Conversely, managers may opt to measure performance in organization by determining the quality of services, highlighting potential quality concerns as well as, identifying areas that need further investigation. Other examples of quality indicators include reliability and validity, implementation and cost and feasibility.

Part two: Operations Strategy

Federal Express (FedEx) is a global shipping corporation which provides services to businesses worldwide while United Parcel Service Inc. (UPS) is a package delivering company that provides transportation, logistics and financial services in the United States and internationally. Both FedEx and UPS are competitors in the package delivery industry. Studying on the two, their competitive relationship gives a good insight for the companies' future (Barr, 2013).

Professor Hill's Strategy Development Framework includes operation design choices and infrastructure. The framework helps the managers to understand various ways in which competitive advantage can be achieved in any organization. For example, operation design choices are decisions management make as to what type of process structure is best suited to produce goods while infrastructure mainly focuses on the non-process features and capabilities of the organization, these include workforce, quality control, organizational structure and support services.

For many years, FedEx have been of a great benefit to its customers. Not only the customers are confronted with the choice of carrier, but they are also confronted with the way the company does its shipment making the competition in the package delivery service to be very global. However, UPS uses similar zones for domestic ground delivery services. One similarity about these two sectors is that they both set their fees according to zones which correspond to the distance the packages have to travel (Barr, 2013).

Part three: Good and Service Design

Good and service design has strategic implications for the success of an organization. Therefore, organizations should design goods and services in such a way that they can be created effectively. Research has shown that there are some products which are most overrated on the market today; these products include apple iPad mini and iPhone. These products have changed the cellular phone business from modern day necessity to a pretentious status symbol. There are various steps involved in goods and services designing. These include; concept generation, concept screening, preliminary design, evaluation and improvement as well as, prototyping and final design.

In concept generation, managers ensure that they listen to their customers on a day-to-day basis as well as, gather ideas from research and development. The organizations should also have ideas from customers formally through marketing activities. Concept screening is significant in reducing a large number of conceptual ideas. The criteria for screening concepts include feasibility, acceptability and vulnerability (the risks the organization may run if things go wrong). Preliminary design phase also known as conceptual or architectural design is where an organization creates a design that will correctly implement the requirements. The main goal here is to map out how organization will perform functions that are specified in the requirements before implementations. In design evaluation and improvement, preliminary designs are evaluated through quality function deployment and value engineering. Conversely, prototyping and final design is a significant step in product and service designing in that prototypes are needed to help in the testing of products and services. Various changes to process design phase which may lead to improvement in operation include development of learning process and performance test. These changes are significant in process designing phase because it helps managers in organization to perform activities to standard hence improvement in operation management.

Part four: Service Positioning vs. Product Process

Product process matrix analyzes the relationship of product life cycle and technological life cycle whereas service positioning matrix shows how desired nature of customer's service encounter activity into a recommended service system design. Service positioning matrix helps the managers to think about marketing as well as, operation linkages. Product process matrix facilitates understanding of strategic options which is available to an organization. The tool was created with manufacturing in mind; however, most companies still use it to their own tasks and projects. Each matrix is unique in the way it addresses the needs of the customers.