Management Leading and Collaborating in a Competitive World

Bank of America: Organizing Function of Management

Bank of America is the leading commercial financial institution of the United States. Founded in 1874, the bank has a long history of offering financial services to large and small businesses and individuals in America and abroad. Bank of America couldn't possibly have been where it is today without an efficient Human resource management system and good and effective use of technology. The company places great emphasis on human resource development right from the start. For starters it has a good hiring policy that ignores differences of race, sex, color and creed. The bank has truly been an equal opportunity employer. BoA has also been focusing on appropriate job design by offering job rotation and enlargement so each individual can get the best out of the position at which he/she is serving. It has been trying to improve its job design so every employee can grow as well while serving the bank. For this reason job rotation and enlargement are implemented so that work doesn't become monotonous and also offers a chance of personal and professional growth.

The bank also understands the importance of right compensation plan and hence apart from monetary benefits, it also offers retirement plans, voluntary saving options, medical and dental healthcare insurance and other such benefits. Bank also allows its employees to maintain good work-life balance by extending good fringe benefits. Childcare reimbursement plans are available so employees can provide good care to their children when returning to work. Similarly vacation and other recreation opportunities are also available for bank of America employees.

"At Bank of America, there is a wide portfolio of health/wellness and retirement benefits to encourage employees to stick around. But the big news is in work/life benefits, which include things like flex-time, telecommuting, select-time or reduced work week and commuter benefits when office buildings are outside downtown areas. "Clearly, we have a workforce that looks for striking that right balance, so we are doing is a number of things to deliver that. We regularly undertake company-wide surveys of our associates, trying to understand their definition of work/life balance and work/life benefits because it varies among individuals," says Parsons." (HRM Report) The company also has an effective reward program in place for its employees. There are currently five recognition and reward programs that the bank offers to all its associates.

The company has also been using technology effective to make customer banking experience smoother and more convenient. The services like ATM locations and online chat services make life easier for its customers. The facility to deposit checks through ATM is unique in its ability to allow customers to deposit checks at any time of the day and get instant $100 deposit while the check is cleared the next day. Apart from that the company has been investing in green technology to save energy costs and this is another good step in utilizing of technology to maximize profits and minimize costs.

Similarly the company has been involved in merger and acquisitions of technology firms through Merrill Lynch. The use and promotion of technology at Bank of America takes at various levels. At one level, technology adoption is done for making banking experience smoother for customers. At another, it is used to save energy and other costs and yet at one more level, technology is adopted to make operations easier for the bank itself.