Organizational Structure of Apple and Wal-Mart

Organizational Structure of Apple and Wal-Mart

Introduction

The structure of an organization defines the company's working in order to achieve the goals. It is the structure of the organization which brings the progress and accomplishment of the company's goals. Resultantly, it will increase the sale which is the sign of profitability. There are three well defined types of organizational structure. The first is Functional Structure which is composed of small departments. In these departments, the employees are assigned some identical tasks. The most common departments are the sales, marketing and operational. Usually, there is lack of coordination and communication. The second is the Divisional Structure. This type of structure is used in large and multinational companies. Like a separate division to handle the affairs of a particular country e.g. Brazil, India, UK. In the same way, there is division on the basis of products. The third type of Structure is Matrix. It is the combination of functional and division structure (Montana, P. and Charnov, B.1993). Here, the same person can be the marketing and country head of product. The main objective of the structure of the organization is to control and coordination. Discussion

Mr. Sam Walton founded the Wal-Mart in 1962. It is an American multinational company which has franchises in 15 countries. It has more than 2 million employees which make it the world's 18th largest public corporation. The culture of Wal-Mart revolves on four points.

The quality products against the low prices.

Respect every single individual

Provide the best service to the customers

Strive hard for the excellence

At the top level, the organizational structure is divisional and at the store level there is matrix organizational structure. These organizational structures specialize the activities of the company. When a company is expanding it s operation or have a variety of products, it introduces divisional structure in the organization. The divisional structure of Wal-Mart is divided into three different categories. In the product structure, the workers and supporting staff of a particular product is grouped together. They are not responsible for any other type of work in the organization. In this way, there is efficiency and output is handsome. In the market structure, the workers are assembled on the basis of market in which the company is selling or providing services. The most relevant example is the Wal-Mart's stores. There consumer support and consumer sales are working together. The consumer support might provide services from the head office, but the market is same. The third and final is the geographical structure. The employees of one region are grouped together to make the region e.g. European division, South Asian division etc. (A REPORT ON WAL-MART: ORGANIZATION STRUCTUREAND STRATEGY 2010).

The divisional structure is bets for the Wal-Mart because it can be adjusted in new a environment. It faces no any problem in the new culture, location or country. The satisfaction of the customer is high because of the availability of product information at nearer distance. It also increases the coordination among different functional ...