Culture Analysis of Apple Incorporation - Paper Example

Introduction

Every corporation has its own unique culture that is associated with the organization. In ideal terms, every organization has an influential culture, which makes it better for individuals to work at the company. Furthermore, organizational culture is meant to enhance the performance of both an individual employee and the organization at large. Apple Incorporated, as one of the most iconic corporations in the United States, has a unique organizational culture which is incorporated among the workforce and helps to improve the individual and group performance, the relationship between the employees, customers and the management as well as the overall performance of the company. Therefore, to understand the relationship between the workforce that makes the corporation to perform well, it is imperative to identify the organizational culture of Apple Incorporation.

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Definition of Organizational Culture

Watkins (2013) defined organizational culture as a system of shared meaning that is held by the members and distinguished one organization from another. He also recognizes culture as to how organizations do things or a product of compensation. Organizational culture can be identified as a system which defines the corporations as a unique organization and differentiates one company from another. There are numerous organizations have different cultures as well as climates. Unlike climate, a company's culture provides a sense of stability to the organization.

Culture is a consistent, observable behavior pattern in corporations that are shaped by incentives. Incentives can be translated to mean both monetary and non-monetary rewards. As a result, culture helps to make sense of the activities and behaviors of the employees in the organization (Watkins, 2013). Therefore, organizational culture recognizes a description of the organization that is jointly shared by the employees in the organization.

Characteristics of Good Organizational Cultures

Although culture is meant to be positive, some behaviors contribute to a negative culture in the workplace. A company that has a unique organizational culture is often identified through its high performance and high level of job satisfaction of the employees. According to Newton Institute (2017), a good corporate culture promotes innovation and risk-taking. The culture encourages employees to innovate and take the risk of investments and innovation. Furthermore, a good culture pays attention to details in such a way that employees pay careful attention to every tiny detail in their work. A good company is also outcome oriented in the sense that the management focuses more on outcomes or results instead of the process used to achieve the outcome.

An organization with a good culture will be more people-oriented such that the management pays more attention to the considerations of the outcomes of their decisions on the people within the corporation. Moreover, a good culture is team oriented in that tasks are organized around teams instead of individuals. Good cultures also facilitate aggressiveness such that people are more competitive instead of easy going. Finally, a good culture promotes stability such that the activities carried out in the organization highlight the importance of the status quo in contrast to growth (Newton Institute, 2017).

How to Observe Current Company Culture

Heathfield (2019) explained that to change, improve, and benefit from corporate culture, there is a need to observe and understand the current culture. The first step to observing culture is becoming an impartial observer of the culture in action. This observation implies that the researcher should act as an outsider when watching the interaction of the other employees within the organization. Furthermore, inquiries such as how do the people in the organization interact with each other, or how are conflicts resolved, help to identify the relationship between the employees.

The next step in observing corporate culture would be to watch for emotions. Heathfield (2019) noted that emotions are some of the indicators of value such that people never get excited or angry about factors that are not important to them. Feelings can primarily be obtained from examining conflicts closely. The researcher can also observe the employees' emotions as they interact with each other. Presence of emotion means that the employees value the interactions while an indifferent feeling may be an indicator of dissatisfaction.

The final step would be to observe the artifacts and objects that are placed on desks or walls. The arrangement of the common area in the organization should also be observed to identify whether the furniture facilitates interaction or whether they are sterile. For employees who value their jobs, their offices are decorated with memorable ornaments such as family pictures, desk accessories or even plants and toys. The final observation step would be to observe the things that are not there. The absence of certain vital factors such as the customers or information on the expected sales growth may help understand the culture of the organization.

Company Background

The Apple Incorporation is an iconic US-based Consumer Electronics Company. The company was founded in 1976 by Steve Jobs and his companion, Steve Wozniak in the cellar of Job's home (Narayan and Ramu, 2018). From there onwards, Apple Inc. grew to become one of the largest electronic companies in the United States. The corporation creates, designs, and produce electronic products and systems that are world-changing and path-breaking. An example of the products produced by Apple includes iPhone, iPad, Macintosh computers, as well as the OS X operating system. Aside from these products, the company also sells hardware and software products to its customers worldwide. The goals of Apple Inc. are to provide customer satisfaction through reaching their high expectation to develop the product that suits their needs and customer wants.

Research Method

The study used a descriptive or illustrative design. The research method used for this study included mixed methods whereby a combination of both primary and secondary sources are used to generate comprehensive results and draw a reasonable conclusion in regards to the company culture of Apple Incorporated. The primary sources used in this research include observation and case studies, while the secondary sources include web information and mass media products. In addition, mixed methods facilitate the most explanation of error variance as well as greater depth in the elaboration of culture as a construct.

Results

Apple focuses on creating an environment that is friendly to the employees. This technique is essential since it facilitates the development of a culture that is innovative, collaborative, as well as motivative to the employees (Dudovski, 2019). In addition, the competitive nature of employees at Apple also serves to provide a steady culture. The cultural change that was incorporated with the appointment of the new CEO, Tim Cook, has ensured that the previous culture of combativeness has been replaced with a culture of collaboration and motivation among the employees. The culture can also be assessed in terms of the three cultural dimensions; artifacts espoused values and underlying assumptions.

The first dimension is the artifacts. According to Reiman & Oedewald (2002), artifacts are visible organizational processes such as the dress code and general tidiness of the workplace that say something about the culture of the organization. These objects are obviously displayed by the employees and represent the overt behavior of the members. For instance, the employees at Apple Inc wear a name tag or a badge identification that enables them to access the premises. An individual cannot be allowed to access the organization without a name tag or a badge ID.

The second dimension is the espoused values. Bennett (2015) noted that espoused values are simply the values of the organization. For any organization, the values are often found in the mission statement since the mission statement defines the long-term direction to the company (Denison Consulting, 2017). In the case of Apple Inc, the mission statement states that "Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers across the globe, along with OS X, iWork, iLife, and professional software. Furthermore, Apple leads the digital music revolution with its iTunes online store and iPods. Apple has revolutionized the mobile phone with its reinvented iPhone and App Store, and is determining the future of the mobile media as well as computing devices with iPad." Therefore, the corporation believes in thus making up the values of the corporation (Bennet, 2015).

The final dimension is the underlying assumptions. The underlying assumptions are the beliefs that are rarely articulated as they are a natural part of the way things are done. These assumptions are deeply rooted in the organization that they are accepted as the unconscious behavior of the staff (Bennett, 2015). For Apple, the underlying premise for employees at Apple lies with how they are employed, trained, taught and motivated to communicate with the customers in a way that they create a new experience for them. Another underlying assumption that is present in Apple is the competitive nature of the employees as they all seek to develop innovations that are in line with achieving the goals of the company. As a result, many customers feel loyalty towards the Apple brand since they feel empowered, happy and engaged.

Conclusion

Apple Inc has developed an organization culture that is rich in values, assumptions, beliefs, as well as norms that are shared by all the members. In addition, the company has developed artifacts that are obvious in explaining the culture of the organization, such as name tags and badge IDs. The assumptions that are incorporated into the company culture such as communication with the customers has further served to increase the performance of the company as it increases customer loyalty towards their products and services.

Even though Apple is an organization whose culture is evolving, it is essential to ensure that the culture fits with the demands of the organization's environment. Currently, Apple's shared values are proper for its context as a high technology industry since the culture encourages innovation and adaptability. Apple should also avoid a culture where they pay high respect for tradition, stability and a strong preference for upholding rules and procedures as it deters the company from advancing and taking risks.

References

Bennett, T. (2015, September 28). Three Levels of Apple's Culture. Retrieved from https://medium.com/@tenayab/three-levels-of-apple-s-culture-2f31baaf5d22

Denison Consulting. (2017, December 7). Creating a high performance organisational culture[Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vdddf3NhIs8

Dudovskiy, J. (2019, April 21). Apple Organizational Culture - Secrecy and Maximum Benefit from Human Resources. Retrieved from https://research-methodology.net/apple-organizational-culture/

Heathfield, S. M. (2019, May 9). How to Understand Your Current Company Culture. Retrieved from https://www.thebalancecareers.com/how-to-understand-your-current-culture-1918811

Narayan, S. V., & Ramu, M. (2018). A Study on Organisation Culture of Apple Company. International Journal of Pure and Applied Mathematics, 120(5), 3797-3808. Retrieved from https://acadpubl.eu/hub/2018-120-5/4/316.pdf

Newton Institute. (2017, November 1). 6 Characteristics of a High Performance Culture [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0kkPmppKm_4