The management of an organization is the heart and pillar to the success of the organization. In general, management can be defined as the coordination of all activities in an organization aimed at achieving set goals and objectives. The managers of an organization engage in strategic planning and their effectiveness leads to the achievement of the set goals and objectives. Effective and efficient management creates a conducive work environment in an organization and their initiative has a greater impact on the performance of the company. This paper will discuss the organizational culture of King Company. Moreover, effective modern management approaches depicted in King Digital entertainment limited will be discussed. It is also important to focus on culture and innovative strategic management objectives in King Company to ensure that all aspects of management in an organization are understood as they are presented in our case.
Task 1
King digital entertainment limited
Entertainment is a crucial aspect of life for any human being. The increased need for entertainment has attracted talented organizations to invest in generating and distributing games on multiple platforms. This paper focuses on one prominent gaming company King Digital Entertainment. King Company is an interactive entertainment company that produces and distributes digital games in the United States. King provides games such as candy crush soda saga, candy crush saga, pet rescue saga, farm Heroes saga and Bubble with two saga games. King organization operates in the digital entertainment industry that design and distribute social games. King was founded in 2003 in Sweden by Morris who acted as the chairman and it was also led by Ricardo Zacconi and Rowland. The three co-founders had worked together before in failed dot-com web. The Company invested $110.5 million on development and research. Initially, the company was struggling financially and nearly went bankrupt until Morris infused cash in the organization. The company grew from browser-based video games.
Task 2
King Digital entertainment organizational structures
Organizational structure defines the system and the components of an organization and gives a framework of the relationships established in an organization for the purposes of accountability and lines of authority. The organizational structure is tailored to fit the organizational goals and objectives. Organizational structures can also be defined as the way an organization divides, coordinate and organize its activities. Effective organization structure clarifies relationships and facilitates management, roles, and levels of authority, responsibilities and supervisory lines. The review of the structure guides the manager in determining the available financial, human and technical resources available and also aids in identifying lacking resources. King Digital entertainment organizational culture is headed by the chief executive Riccardo. He played an important role in the organization and he is the overall leader of the organization. There is a chief creative officer who deals with the features of the games. Chief financial officers in the company deal with all matter of micro-transactions and the financial issues of the organization. Rob Miller is the chief legal officer who oversees the legal issues of the organization. Alex Dale is the marketing officer in charge of marketing the digital games.
Task 3
Modern management approaches
Management is the art used to achieve goals through people. Managers have to ensure continuous improvement by ensuring everyone in an organization does what is supposed to be done. Management design an environment that builds a relationship between people working together to achieve selected goals (Morrison, 1998). Management theories or approaches account for the changes and nature of the organizational environment. Management approaches are models use to expound on the aspect of management where people make sense of their world of experience. The approaches better help people to understand the abstract meaning of management and the application of management in various situations (Jensen, 1995). The approaches give a better understanding of the organizations. The system approach describes the collection of parts of an organization joined together to realize an overall goal. In this case, if one part of the system is removed, the whole system fails and the organization cannot attain the selected goals. A system can consist of inputs (technologies, money, people, and raw materials), processes, (e.g., controlling, motivation, organizing, and planning), outputs, (e.g. productivity and enhancement of quality of life for the clients). This approach help managers to look at the organization more broadly.
The contingency theory affirms that the managers must make decisions on the account of the current situations and their actions must be deliberated on solving the situation at hand. Therefore the current situation in an organization directs the actions of the managers. The managers are not confined to acting in a certain way but rather they respond to situations as per the requirements of the current situation. Tom Peters (1942) advocates for Chaos theory of management. This theory a cert that management systems are exposed to the complexity and therefore more energy is required to maintain stability in an organization. Team building is a modern management approach that stands for better practices, quality circles, and continuous improvement.
I suggest that King Digital entertainment should follow the contingency approach for management. King management should deal with the current matter and the situations at hand. It is crystal clear that technological advancements are increasing the competitiveness in the gaming industry. Considering that King Digital aims at providing customers with a differentiated and engaging entertainment experience, the company must solve problems as they arise. The decisions made by King Managers must be confined to the current situation of the organization.
Pros of contingency approach
Pros of contingency approach
1. This theory takes account of exceptional circumstances and hence the decisions made by the management are effective.
1. It is difficult to verify and validate a modeled system. Moreover, the theory is expressed in a very general way and therefore it is difficult to give it definite applicative value.
2. Moreover, this theory motivates the managers to think about bout a situation requiring intense focus
2. It is difficult to capture the reality in a leader-led situation because the identification of situations is highly subjective.
Task 5
Organizational culture
Organizational culture is a set of beliefs, norms, and assumptions that define the character of an organization. The culture incorporates the shared values within an organization that distinguishes what is acceptable and what is unacceptable behavior in that organization (Barney, 1986). Understanding organizational culture leads to effective leadership because leaders are placed in a better position to execute the strategic plans and achievement of the selected goals. The organization culture is simply the way things are done in an organization. The organization culture affects the performance of an organization because it comprises of the processes and organizational structure. The relationship between the employees and the managers affects the productivity and the performance of the employees. For instance, an organizational culture that rewards the employees for successfully completed tasks motivates the employees and the productivity of the employees improves. Charles Handy model links organizational culture with organizational structure.
Handy’s model defines four different classes of culture namely power, Task, Role and person. Power culture is a culture where power is held by a few individuals who are the sole decision makers. The decisions made in this culture are quick but they aren’t the best decisions. Role culture assigns duties and responsibilities to all members and they know what is expected of them. Power, in this case, is determined by the position an individual holds in the organizational structure. Task culture encourages teamwork and people in an organization are divided into manageable teams to address specific problems. Organizations with person culture, individuals are superior to the organization and they do not prioritize the success of the organization. King Digital entertainment limited apply task and role culture.
Task 5
Strategic management
Strategic management is a set of the strategies that managers can use to achieve better performance and a competitive advantage for an organization. Basically, the aim of engaging in business is making a profit. Referring to this statement, an organization with a competitive advantage is more profitable. Moreover, strategic management can be defined as the actions and decisions are taken by managers to enhance the performance of an organization. The manager of an organization has the role of developing strategic plans to be used to achieve specified goals of the organization. King strategic objective is to broaden and strengthen their unique game development models. Moreover, King has a strategic objective to expand to new geographies and platforms. The SWORT analysis is a strategic framework used to plan for predictable contingencies. In addition, the SWORT analysis can be used to predict the unfeasible contingencies King strengths lays on its financial capacity. The organization can implement the strategic objectives because they have the financial capability to fund projects and researches aiming at developing unique game models. The weakness of King Digital entertainment is developing games and they cannot guarantee maintaining their growth. The opportunity evident in Kings' strategic objectives is their provision of free games that attract more players in the demographics. The risk that King company face with the strategic objectives is that the company must develop new games so that players can buy them and continue to play their existing ones. Competition from other game developers is a threat to the company.
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