MEMORANDUM
DATE:May 31, 2013
TO:Prof. Rajiv Krishnan Kozhikode
FROM:Team 6 - BUS 374 D100
Nicole Bralic
Nicky Cheung
Yifan Lin
Yikai Yao
Yi Zheng
SUBJECT:Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms
Introduction
There has been increasing interestin the use of organizational identity to categorize the diverse organizational forms. In“Identities, Genres, and Organizational Forms”,Hsu and Hannan(2005)argue that the organizational identity perspective is more meaningful than the population based perspective through explaining the idea and application of organizational identity. Wefurther examine the key assumptions that Hsu and Hannan (2005) propose: Organizational identity creates social codes that bilaterally interacts with agents of the organization, the differentdimensional forms (i.e. Simplicity, specificity, sharpness, resonance and authenticity) depends on identities, and properties of identities can, and do change, over time (Hsu & Hannan, 2005). Subsequently, we apply the key assumptions to current world organizational phenomenon and provide novel theoretical insights applicable to this topic.
Evaluations of Key Assumptions
Social codes dynamically affect agents within the organization (i.e. employees, managers) as well as agents who are externally involved (i.e. investors, government, interest groups, etc.) and vice versa. Agents may develop new attitudes toward the social code and social codes may change the agents’ view towards the organization. We believe that the interaction between agents and social codes, rapidly and simultaneously, affects them both in various ways. The degree to which the interaction differswill depend on the agents’ personal and professional experience in their interaction with the organization based on their individual roles. At times, the collective attitudes of one or different groups of agentstowards the firm may change the actual social code of the organization; with or without reflecting the change on the written social code. Other times, social codes may shape the agents’ view into compliance.These create a challenge for anyone to track the interaction of the two.
Using simplicity, specificity, sharpness, resonance and authenticity, as dimensional tools, help us tocreate and assess organizational form. While these dimensions may help us, we also need to consider internal factors of the organization (i.e. goals, beliefs and culture) as well as external factors (i.e. industry, politics, economics, and environment) before using these dimensions. The result is that organizational membership depends on what form it takes. The form thus frames the interaction between social codes and agents.The challenge here is if the dimensions presented by Hsu and Hannan are sufficient to account for the diverse types of organizational forms out there.
It is expected for an organization’s identity to change over time, across social, technological and economic structures, the organization’s ecology changes through interacting with internal and external factors. This could lead to the progressive evolution of an organization’s identity, or its fatality. When organizations go through change, tradeoffs between the levels of dimensions is inevitable. The challenge here, is finding the best balance of dimension for the given ecology in that time.
We acknowledge that organizations need to learn how to adapt to changes in the market. With technological innovations and the global economy affecting the market, organizations can only survive if they can compete effectively with their competitors. Although change within organizations may be needed to compete, change may also increase the likelihood of the failure of an organization (Hsu & Hannan, 2005). Specifically, an organization’s identity may result in failure through “core changes, CEO succession, location shifts, changes in legal forms, product addition and changes, and technological innovations,” as well as a lack of uniformity within the population (Hsu & Hannan, 2005).In approaching change, organizations should take an incremental or phased approach when making changes to avoid the risk of failure.
Current real world organizational phenomenon
Identity, formand social code areimportant for any organization to function efficiently in society, and this can be seen by Tesco, an international and grocery and general merchandise retailer.According to“We’ve learnt how to be local”(Coe & Lee, 2012), when Tesco came to South Korea, it chose to cooperate with Samsung. Since then, Tesco has become one of South Korea’s most successful retailers. The mainelement of thisstrategywas tocreateidentities and forms thatsatisfiedtheir South Korean customers through localization; Tesco’s success depends on their customers’ satisfaction.Tesco primarily employs local workers and managersto run the business andorganizes their goods according to customers’ preferences. This process progressively generates feelings that Tesco is a more convenient and comfortable place for customersto shop in. Instead of continuing to hold the typical image of a corporation by their audiences, Tesco decided to achieve a customer-oriented approach that proved to their advantage.To support this, Tesco abides by three central values: “No one tries harder for customers”, “We treat everyone how we like to be treated” and “We use our scale for good”(TESCOPLC).This type of convenient and comfortable atmosphere, as well as the act of holding quality and care as an importance,contributes to Tesco’s identity,and eventually brings success to the organization.
This phenomenon also provides us insights into how an organization should change to deal withdifferent environments. Since Tesco is an international grocery company and has subsidiaries all over the world,each subsidiary has its own identity to satisfy their local customers, (TESCOPLC). In order to achieve certain goals, organizations create and develop their social codes and specific images for themselves, and these images are then later processed by audiences to create identities. With a process such as this, itdemonstrates that the idea of identities can range from simplistic to complex, all depending on the type of environment the organization is situated in.
New Development
From this real world phenomenon, there should be more research on how to train and/or structure integration to influence the adaptability of social codes. Perhaps having an intensive program that goes through the organization’s goals, current position in the market, the impact of their responsibilities, the flexibility and autonomy of their agents, the norms of the company, and finally,the simulation programs,will give a firsthand experience of the organization’s likely work place.
In addition, there should be more research on how these organizations interact with other populations, and how these interactions influence other aspects of society. As the environment changes, organizations need to ensure that their forms are able to function alongside these external factors, As well, for an organization to operate successfully, it needs to keep in mind that changes of other organizations may have an influence on the organization’s goals, ranging from minor to major, depending on the dynamics. Coe and Lee (2012) argue that properties of identities can, and do, change over time, and that form identity can exert a powerful influence on competitive dynamics by constraining the type of competitive strategy that organizations can legitimately pursue. Additionally, we can further extend that the properties of identities of an organization should change according to social trends and technology innovations. For example, concerninga current social trend, environmental-friendly consumerism, grocery companiessuch asTesco should ensure the process of distribution being energy-efficient and material decentralizing. In addition, Tesco should continue to be innovative with technology in order to keep up with competition. The social identity perspective is beneficial through providing an applicable framework to categorize organizations, guidelines to track identity changes, as well as a way to manage change that is needed to compete within an industry. Theories in the article can be developed more through influencing the adaptability of social codesand applying the change of organizationsaccording to social trends and technology innovations.
References
Coe, N. M. & Lee, Y.-S. (2012). “We’ve learnt how to be local”: The deepening territorial embeddedness of Samsung–Tesco in South Korea. Journal of Economic Geography. Retrieved from
Hsu, G. & Hannan, M. T. (2005). Identities, genres, and organizational forms.Organization Science, 16(5): 474–490.
TESCOPLC.Core Purpose and Values. Retrieved from