Co-operatives – A co-operative business is a company which has been made for and run by the workers or customers. It is a self help company.
There are 2 types of co-operatives:
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A retail co-operative
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A workers co-operatives
Retail co-operatives are business organisations owned by customer shareholders aiming to maximise benefits for the customers rather than maximising profits, as other businesses do, whereas worker co-operatives are business organisations owned and run by the workers within the business who share profits among themselves. Co-operatives also, like limited companies have limited liability.
Franchise - A franchise is a well-known business name (e.g. Mc Donald’s) that is ‘sold’ to someone setting up in a business. A more formal description of a franchise would be that this is the right given by one business to another to sell goods or services in its name.
The 2 people involved in the deal are:
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The franchisor, the person who owns a certain business that has become quite successful and earned a trading name that is very well known.
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The franchisee, the person who buys the rights to trade under the well- known trading name.
As the business is already well known with an equally well-known name, the franchisee can be sure that the business will be successful. However a certain percentage of the franchisees profits will b taken by the franchisor.
Multinational - If a business reaches the peak of its expansion in its country then the only way left for it to grow even further is to increase its market by selling worldwide. Businesses that do this are known as multinationals.
A multinational is a business, which manufactures and/or provides goods and services outside its ‘base’ country.
IDENTIFYING COCA COLA ACCORDING TO OWNERSHIP
Limited companies (Description on previous page) have two main types as I stated before. Most small or medium sized business that decides to become a company become private limited ones. They are usually a family business with shares held by the members of the family. E.g. The Mars family own shares for Mars Chocolates.
Private limited companies cannot sell their shares to the public, so they would be unable to raise as much money as a company that could, being a public limited company. A private limited company can become a public limited company by law, when the company has at least £50,000 in its share capital. It is then given a Trading Certificate given by Companies House and has to have ‘plc’ in its name.
Coca Cola comes under the ownership name of a private limited company. This has its advantages and disadvantages. The business has limited liability unlike sole traders or partnerships, where they have unlimited liability. The shares of the business are held by the shareholders, in Coca Cola’s case it’s the employees. They own 60% of the shares. The company is run by the Directors and they make the decisions. The company is a legal entity distinct from the shareholders and can for example be sued in its own name. An advantage of being a Private Limited Company is that information about the business does not have to be displayed to the public. They also don’t have to comply with the rules of the stock exchange so are eligible to make more profit.
FUNCTIONS OF A BUSINESS
It does not mater what size a business is whether it is as small as a sole proprietorship or as large as a multinational, each has a variety of functions to them.
These will include: -
Production - Using factors of production (resources) to produce manufactured products or services. This is the basic function of any business.
Research and Development (R&D) – Looking at new products and new ways of improving on existing products.
Finance - The control of money and the reporting and recording of money transactions. This is a central function in any business.
Marketing and Sales - Finding out what the customer’s needs and wants are: promoting and selling the products.
Human Resources – The management of people within the business.
Administration (this is also known as facilities management) – Providing all the back up needed for the business, for example catering, office machines and security.
FUNCTIONS WITHIN COCA COLA
Coca Cola have all of these functions within their business and each one helps the company to obtain its objectives.
When Coca Cola manufacture a product, the process is always aimed to be done very well in order to keep the up most quality which is important as one of Coca Cola’s objectives is to provide quality drinks as they wish to be the best.
Coca Cola’s financial section is responsible for financial record keeping. The finance department looks at the amount given in wages and handling of cash by the cashier, but it also manages the businesses accounts. This can be found in the personnel department too (Human resources). These help Coca Cola to see how well the business is performing in terms of income and expenditure. It can then help them to make decisions in advance to help the company make a profit in the future.
The marketing and sales function is quite an important function at Coca Cola.
Marketing involves satisfying the customers’ needs at the right price. Selling is to persuade the customer to buy the already produced products within the business. As Coca Cola will obviously want to be customer’s first choice, and to deliver goods at competitive prices, then the marketing and sales function will help them to reach this, so it is vital for this section to be very efficient.
Coca Cola uses marketing to research what customer’s need and want and they then investigate how the business can satisfy that need and give them their wants.
Coca Cola then use the selling part of this function to persuade customers to buy their products. They use a variety of techniques such as advertising, two-for-one offers and low, competitive prices to attract customers to buy their products.
The human resource department of Coca Cola is responsible for the hiring and firing of employees. This is also a very important function because without it, Coca Cola would not have the work force needed to carry out what they expect to do. Coca Cola make sure that employees are well trained and that they know how to work efficiently in what they are doing.
The last function in Coca Cola is the administration function. This function includes maintaining the businesses facilities such as workable conditions, machines, security etc. It is important that Coca Cola have all things in working condition as it makes the whole business body more efficient, which, in effect, helps the business to make more profit, as everyone is happy with the conditions of their working environment and everything is working up to standard.
INFORMATION THAT MEASURES SUCCESS
This will be information that the business uses to measure how successful it is or how it’s doing. This could include financial information e.g. statistics, data, share values etc.
This is a balance sheet for The Coca Cola Company for the year ending December 31st 2003. From this Coca Cola can measure their income and outcome easily and see how well they are doing financially. They can find out if they are making profit or loss on certain things and what is costing too much. They can compare how well they’ve done to previous years so if they need to change anything. This is basically an obvious way to find out if they are being unsuccessful or successful.
For third straight year, Coca-Cola named Ireland’s top retail brand in Checkout magazine survey
For fourth consecutive year, Coca-Cola ranked #1 in BusinessWeek/Interbrand’s annual ranking of the world’s strongest brands, “100 Best Global Brands”
For fifth consecutive year, Coca-Cola achieved platinum status in Reader's Digest SuperBrands Survey of Asia's favorite soft drinks
Bonaqua bottled water voted gold SuperBrand by consumers for third year in a row in Hong Kong
Coca-Cola, 2004 Superbrand of the Year in Denmark -- Coca-Cola was named Superbrand's No. 1 brand for 2004, competing with more than 200 other recognizable brands such as Mercedes-Benz and Nike for the top spot
Coca-Cola voted New Zealand's favorite soft drink (Foodtown Magazine People's Choice Awards, 2004)
Bonaqua mineral water voted most trusted brand in Finland, mineral water category (Readers' Digest, 2004)
Coca-Cola named "Best Brand" by South African consumers (Sunday Times survey)
Coca-Cola.com and CokeMusic.com recognized by the Web Marketing Association: Coca-Cola.com as "Outstanding Web site" and CokeMusic.com as "Best Online Community Web site" (2003)
For the fifth year in a row, Coca-Cola named Most Valuable Global Brand (Interbrand, 2003)
For the fifth year in a row, Coca-Cola voted a "Superbrand" in the soft drink category (2003 Thai and Asian Readers' Digest consumer survey)
For third year in a row, Coca-Cola named People's Favourite Brand in the soft drinks category of the "Narodnaya Marka," or People's Brand Awards (Russia)
France's "Top Com d'or Consumer" for the best 2002 marketing/promotional program by a professional French communication and marketing association
In South Africa, Coca-Cola named the country's most admired brand in the Sunday Times-Markinor Top Brands Survey
Pegasus Award winner for Most Trusted Brand, Soft Drinks category (Reader's Digest, Europe, 2002)
Coca-Cola world's most valuable brand (Interbrand 2002)
Coca-Cola ranked as the strongest, best-known brand in the U.S.(2002)
Coca-Cola named Malaysia's favorite soft drink in the Reader's Digest 2002 Platinum Superbrand content
Coca-Cola named Best Brand overall, SuperBrands Award 2002, Malaysia
Coca-Cola world's best-selling brand (ACNielsen)
Coca-Cola received Brand Marketing magazine's 2001 Hall of Fame Award
Coca-Cola named South Africa soft drink Brand of the Year (Makinor, a local market research company)
Coca-Cola received Superbrand Award (Superbrands Tribute Event 2001, Great Britain)
Coca-Cola most remembered trademark in Colombia (Portafolio magazine)
Coca-Cola named favorite soft drink in Asia (2001 SuperBrands survey)
Coca-Cola named number-one beverage in Korea (consumer survey by Chosun Ilbo newspaper)
These are just some of the awards and achievements Coca Cola have managed to obtain throughout the years. This is just like feedback from customers because they have been nominated as the best. This is a definite measurement of how successful Coca Cola are.
MANAGEMENT STYLES AND CORPORATE CULTURES
The management of business sets objectives like customer care, quality control and environmental responsibilities to satisfy the external stakeholders of the business. There are different types of management structures and styles, which a business could choose from. Some management structures could be: -
Hierarchical - A hierarchy is a series of levels of people, each level controlled by the level above it.
Large organisations such as public limited companies or private limited companies, for example, may have hundreds of employees. They usually have a more complex organisational structure, which has:
- A number of levels of hierarchy
- Division into functional areas such as sales, finance, human resources
Below is the hierarchical chart of the Coca Cola Enterprise: -
Flat - A simple horizontal or ‘flat’ structure hence the name. There are only a few layers in this type of structure. These types of structures would mostly be used by sole-traders for example.
Matrix - The word ‘matrix’ (as in the movie) means ‘a grid which works in two directions’.
In an organisation it is sometimes needed to take people out of their specific function areas (e.g. finance, human resources, etc.) to form a team to work on a certain projects.
The type of management used is very important for the main everyday running of a business. There are three different types of management styles that most businesses use:
Autocratic Style – The manager makes all decisions and they are obeyed. Employees are usually much less motivated and\or happy with a management style of this sort. This style is more suited to a hierarchical structure rather than any other.
Democratic Style – The manager still makes all decisions but while doing so he\she does ‘consult’ others in the process. Employees tend to be far more motivated as being consulted makes them feel more like part of a team. This style is suited to flatter structures.
‘Laissez Faire’ Style – The manager allows the employee to get on with his\her work at their own pace. Due to this much freedom, employees tend to be unproductive. This is much more suited to team structures such as the Matrix structure.
But there is really not much point in these managements if the work force is not caring about working towards these objectives. This attitude shows that a business either needs a ‘culture’ (otherwise known as a ‘corporate culture’) or needs to improve on it.
‘Corporate’ means ‘belonging to a body’ so in the way we mean it is ‘relaying to a business’. ‘Culture’ means ‘a way of doing things’. So ‘corporate culture can be simply defined as:
‘‘The attitudes, values and beliefs that are shared by the people in the business’’
There are four different types of culture which businesses use: -
Role Culture - best suited to hierarchical structures where all workers have a set ‘role’ and act according to rules and regulations.
Task Culture – a team working on a certain project e.g. a matrix structure.
Power Culture – an organisation based around a central powerful figure.
Person Culture – administrative back up for an individual.
These different types of culture all require different types of organisational structures to work at their best. This is shown in the table below: -
type of culture what it involves what businesses it suits
ROLE CULTURE -reliance on rules and procedures hierarchical structures
-tasks are clearly defined
-a clear chain of command
TASK CULTURE -task or project based matrix structures
-no formal hierarchy (team project work)
POWER CULTURE -strong central figure company with dominant
-decisions taken at the top chairman
PERSON CULTURE -no formal structure at all professionals, e.g. architects,
-back up for an individual entertainment ‘stars’
A common ‘vision’ must be promoted within the people of the company’s beliefs involving:
- The business objectives
- A common code of behaviour for the employees
There are many different influences on culture within a business. These influences can be summarised as:
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Economic: - the need to make a profit and be efficient
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Social: - the need to serve local community and society as a whole
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Environmental: - the need to conserve energy and sustain natural resources
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Ethical: - the need to help and not to exploit developing economies (which may be a major source of supply)
COCA COLA’S MANAGEMENT STYLES AND CORPORATE CULTURES
The way in which a business is structured and managed affects the overall culture of a business. For example if the organisation is based on teamwork then a common culture may be adopted and adapted e.g. Task culture. If the business is run in a ‘top to bottom’ hierarchical style fashion, then the workforce maybe less willing to comply with a culture which it has had dictated to them. Coca Cola could be seen as a cross between the two, as the staff work very well as a team but the company is run in a ‘top to bottom’ style. Coca Cola is run as a hierarchical structure with the managing directors at the top down to the floor workers at the bottom. Their management style is more of an autocratic style than any, sometimes showing slight hints of democracy in certain departments. Whatever a manager says goes and everyone has to obey this without question. But sometimes the managers do seek out other the views of their subordinates, which is where the hint of democracy comes in.
There are also two types of culture running within Coca Cola. Role culture the majority of the time and task culture some of the time. This is because Coca Cola is a business totally run by rules and regulations, with people in all different set ‘roles’. There is usually team working between workers to get a certain job done – task culture. The main influences on these cultures seem to be, economic and social. Coca Cola’s mission statement proves that they wish to serve the local community and society as a whole as they are very much concerned with providing the best possible product. But Coca Cola also obviously want to do all of this while making a profit and being the ‘The best’ drink.
The impact of structure, management style and culture on Coca Cola’s performance as a business is quite positive as well as negative. The structure and management cause Coca Cola to be quite efficient in what it does. Things have to be done at a certain time and in a certain way. Whatever has to be done gets done due to the rules and ways the business is run. This way of managing makes Coca Cola as a business very productive as everything that has to be done is being done. The problem with this style of managing is that it causes workers to be very bored, unhappy, unmotivated and\or even angry with their work. Order after order can become very tedious. Due to this effect on the workers, the performance of the business can sometimes take a down fall as the work maybe done on time but it is not done to an efficient or suitable standard, as workers ‘can’t be bothered’. This type of thinking can be very damaging to Coca Cola. This is where the task culture within the business helps. To counter this type of thinking from workers, Coca Cola can sometimes put people into teams to finish off individual tasks. Working with their colleagues can help raise spirits and therefore get a better standard of work. This, in affect, raises Coca Cola’s performance rate.
Wanting to help the community through being environmentally friendly and also serving the community also help Coca Cola to achieve their goals as people have started to trust the company more as they seem to want to help out in other aspects other than just selling their products to customers. This much wanted trust helps Coca Cola to gain more customers and in effect help them to gradually achieve their objectives. The structure of the business also has an impact on the business, it makes it much easier to organise due to the size of Coca Cola. As this is a much more efficient form of organisation within the business then obviously the businesses overall efficiency increase also.
COMMUNICATION SKILLS WITHIN BUSINESSES
People involved with a business need a sufficient amount of information in order to do their job effectively and efficiently to achieve the objectives of that business – for example maximise sales potential.
If things within the business are supposed to happen at certain times then good communication will definitely be needed.
People obviously cannot do their jobs without the relevant information. And it is not the case of ‘the more, the better’ as too much information could become too complex but it is more on ‘the more straight, correct, and to the point, the better’. To get information right is one of the most important things within an organisation.
What is communicating? Well this could actual come under a number of answers:
‘’Passing on the message.’’
‘’Phoning someone or sending an email.’’
‘’Getting the message across.’’
‘’Making sure that they understand me.’’
The first two responses show that the message is sent, whereas the second two show that the message has been received and understood.
There are many different reasons for a business to communicate:
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Providing Information: - Every successful company is one that has employees and customers who can access up-to-date relevant and correct information. Successful information means getting the correct message across.
- Giving Instructions: - Communication in a business sometimes requires instructions to be given from one person or department to another.
- Making Checks and Receiving Feedback: - Management staffs at nearly all levels need to keep an eye on and check on areas of work for which they are responsible. Feedback from the needed areas will be sent back to managers so they can make relevant decisions for future.
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Negotiations: - The human resource managers need to negotiate job descriptions with staff. Sales staff might want to discuss the sales target or the rate of commission they are given. This will require a face-to-face, as that is probably the best suitable way.
- Confirmation: - In a few cases replies will need to be sent in response so the originator knows that the message has been received and is being carried out.
Communication within a business can be internal (to those who work within the business) or external (those outside the business e.g. customers) There are many different types of communication. It can consist of verbal communication such as discussions and meetings and also presentations. Modern technological communication is also a ‘must have’ in the businesses of today if they wish to succeed. This could be using web technology and the internet especially e-mails as messages can be sent and checked at a time that suits the individual. Mailing lists could be set up for example, so that certain messages get sent to all sales team in a particular area. Another use could be the world-wide web. This is a huge collection of millions of pages of information store on hundreds of thousands of computer servers. There is also something within business used for communication called the intranet. This is the companies own private internal internet, with their own websites and so on. It can be customised to suit the businesses own interests, and can be a very large help as it could show employees, for example, how to perform a particular task efficiently.
The channels of communication within a business are:
Internal communications – Confidential information that is solely for inside the business. This is typically carried out by means of face to face contact, memos, internal telephone calls or internal e-mail.
External communications – When the organisation needs to interact with other organisations or individuals. This could be done in a typical letter, sales broche or invoice, or an advert in the local paper.
Vertical and lateral communication – This works on a hierarchical based structure is an important part of how communication works
Downwards communication – The most important role of downwards communication is that of management providing information and giving instructions about decisions that have already been made. This downward communication in an autocratic culture would be orders.
Upwards communication – This type of communication is mainly feedback, ideas and complaints so it is very crucial to the management so he can monitor to what extent business objectives are being achieved.
Lateral communication – Departments and functions within a business must communicate together and co-ordinate their activities to ensure that the business works effectively. For example the human resources department providing the finance department with payroll details for a new employee.
COMMUNICATION WITHIN COCA COLA
Coca Cola works on a hierarchy based structure. This means that it is very hard to keep good communication, as this is the largest or ‘tallest’ of all the management structures. In order to overcome this problem, Coca Cola uses certain forms of communication so as not to let any one get confused. Meetings are usually held with all the managers of each department, and information and tasks are given directly from senior managers to normal managers. There are also previously printed briefs on what is to be done, given out too. Managers then go back and relay this information to their subordinates. It is quite hard to confuse anything said as it is said directly to their faces.
Within the business the use of computers are also made. Coca Cola use this to store things such as wages and how certain things should be done. It also has a section with all the rules and ‘must do’s’ of the business that can be accessed and given to those who ask for it.
Coca Cola also uses appraisal systems where managers are communicating one-on-one with their subordinates. They discuss all good and bad points and then decide on what could be done for them to work harder and produce better.
Coca Cola is very well known to be a helpful company. They have a website for customers to visit. There are also other parts for customers to read such as the origin of Coca Cola. It is very noticeable that communication between the floor- workers is very good, as they work so well as a team. Being floor-workers, the communication and instruction sent from ‘above’ must also be efficient and correct too for them to work to this standard.
The use of ICT has a large impact on the internal as well as the external communications of the business. As stated above, the use of computers can keep detailed information, such as when employees have clocked into and out of work, how long they have worked for, how much and when they are to be paid, etc. It can even keep information on how well the business is doing such as profit and loss accounts and break even charts. This use of technology is very helpful and much more reliable than hand done work, but only to an extent. For example, if the system fails and all the computers crash, then there is a chance that all information stored on them would be lost which would quite simply cause chaos. But on the whole the standards and efficiency of the business’s success is raised due to the use of this type of technology. Coca Cola have worked hard at using ICT to also have an impact on external communications. They have a site on the internet of which they have devoted a lot of their time to perfect for customers. They can find information about the business’s origins and there are games, downloadable wallpapers etc, and information about the product itself
QUALITY ASSURANCE/CONTROL WITHIN COCA COLA
Not all businesses were able to guarantee quality in the past; there were always bound to be some mistakes. In the recent years however customers have come to expect quality, as defects are no longer acceptable. So business started to adopt very rigorous and aggressive methods of inspection to make sure that everything was up to standard. This is what quality control is all about.
Alongside quality control, there is also quality assurance. This is based on the idea that quality is everyone’s responsibility. The main aim is on trying to ensure that goods and services are made free of faults. Quality Assurance is based on the belief that if everybody involved with the making of that product is committed to destroying all faults, they can. So you don’t try to find faults, you make sure they are not there in the first place.
Coca Cola is well known for the amount of effort put into their products and services. They try to give you the best possible products with an equally high level of quality and service. First of all, before Coca Cola even mention quality goods and services, they will have to be thinking about who will be producing the quality goods and services, being the employee. Knowing this, Coca Cola has put a lot of money into various training courses for employees so that they will have the sufficient amount of knowledge to do things at high quality rather than mediocre. There is an easy step-by-step training course helping staff to learn the basic skills needed to work in a factory and produce the highest quality work. Department manager would even teach some of this to you also within your first four weeks just to enforce your training. There are other subjects covered that teach skills that are particular to your own department.
Coca Cola ensure that there are no products distributed have passed their sell by date by setting an inspection every morning to take note of all the items. This type of inspection will always guarantee that the products are up-to-date. Coca Cola have added a large amount of value to all their products. For example they have now taken up recyclable bottles to be environmentally friendly. Coca Cola have spent a lot of money on the ingredients that they use to produce their drinks. As one of Coca Cola’s main objectives is to be the best, I believe that they are fulfilling this objective very well indeed. They have used a lot of money in trying to get the best quality and spend a lot of Coca Cola can give the best possible services.
An alternative way to this form of quality control is TQM and teamwork. With this, workers on production processes have a personal responsibility for passing on only those products that are perfect. For example, for each stage of Coca Cola’s production, each part has to be up to perfect standards before it goes along to the next stage. Using this method, there will always be quality straight from the start, and then will be passed down the ‘chain of quality’. Each work team self-checks the quality of the product. So operations have to be capable of carrying out and understanding quality analyses.
The advantages of this is that if everyone is committed to improving the quality of the goods, then it can possibly result in high levels of involvement, leading to better quality standards, lower levels of waste and generally, higher productivity which will obviously be a major gain for Coca Cola.
CONCLUSION
Coca Cola can be said to be quite a successful company which is achieving the goals that it set out to achieve, refresh everyone everyday, be as efficient as possible, be honest, fair, determined and to be the best. With the various things such as mixed cultures quality assurance employee training etc. it can be seen that Coca Cola is determined to be ‘The very best’. As a whole, Coca Cola do not only want to make profit and be the No.1 dinks company, but they also wish to help the community and environment to the best of their ability. With the amount of money that they have put into doing this, they push themselves to become even more successful by gaining more and more trust from customer.
BLIOGRAOPHY
Advanced Business: Michael Fardon
Frank Adcock
Ian Birth
David Cox
Michael Matchan
Sean O’Byrne
John Prokopiw
Internet
Coca-cola.com cokecce.com coca-cola.co.uk
Cocacola.com coke.com
