Open Systems Perspective and Walmart’s Organizational Behaviour

Organizational Behaviour (OB) primarily entails development of associations purposing at achieving social, human and organizational objectives. Organisational Behaviour (OB) assists in inspiring innovation and change. Employees are likely to act as obstacles or an instrument of change. It is organisational behaviour which tends to cultivate ideas as well as skills in order to promote innovation and modification by improving employees’ creativeness. In examining the Organizational Behaviour of Walmart, Morgeson, Mitchell and Liu (2015) have noted that effective communication is fundamental to the organization as it tends to foster communication with and between the management. Reports of Chang and Lin (2015) have revealed that Walmart constitutes strong culture which all new employees are incorporated into. Meanwhile, Feeley (2017) has noted that the management of Walmart further strives to successfully motivate employees through proficient mentorship. The paper will evaluate three primary perspectives of OB Open Systems, Learning Perspective, and Stakeholder Perspective and further reflect on its workplace culture to understand the organizational behaviour of Walmart. 

Open Systems Perspective

At certain points, the organisations tend to face ethical dilemma whereby they have to characterize right and wrong functions. However, it is Organisational Behaviour which facilitates an imperative role by serving the organization to generate such an environment which exhibits ethics, positivity and increases work efficiency, job contentment in addition to organisational citizenship behaviour. One of the key OB perspectives, Open Systems theory primarily proposes that organizations are recognized as social systems which show high reliance on the environment where they exist for inputs. According to Chadwick and Raver (2015), the Open System Theory can be highly relevant to the organizational behaviour of Walmart. Reports of Schnackenberg and Tomlinson (2016) have stated that Walmart owes its achievements significantly to its employee base. The environment setting of Walmart has been inundated with overpriced commodities which align well with the company’s goals and objectives in order to safeguard people and advance them in leading improved lives. Through Open System perspective, organizations have been focusing on the response and feedback among the various significant parts as well as processes in the organization and between the organization and its environment. Abdelkafi and Täuscher (2016) have noted that organizations tend to examine organizational concerns not only by shedding light on areas which appears to be segregated parts but relies greatly on the more significant patterns of interactions within the parts. Organizations such as Walmart through the Open System perspective primarily focus on structures which aggravate behavioural patterns that verify events instead of acting in response to events as been done previously. Walmart has been proficiently maintaining open system perspective on performance by focusing on the outcomes desired by the organization itself chiefly in its external environment (Walmart.com, 2019). 

Learning Perspective and Walmart’s Organizational Behaviour

Learning Perspective

Rae and Wang (2015) focusing on organizational behaviour focus on parallel learning structures which tend to promote innovation, creativity as well as organizational development. Through learning perspective of OB, groups representing diverse levels operate in harmoniously in order to create new channels of communication in alignment to the standardized hierarchical structure. Parallel learning structures aims to help in obtaining the company’s collective proficiency and expertise. At this juncture, Walmart must intend in implementing a parallel learning structure in order to help progress its operations and smoothen the development of organizational restructuring. For Walmart, becoming a learning organization has been an oft-discussed goal for organizations since the end of the 20th century, but Walmart has always been a learning company (Walmart.com, 2019). Rae and Wang (2015) have noted that “knowledge culture” is identified as a specific variety of organizational culture representing an approach of organizational life which further facilitates as well as stimulate employees to create, share as well as utilize knowledge for the advantage and continuing achievement of the organization. Furthermore, ‘value supply chain’ inter-organizational networks have been universally implemented in order to facilitate retailers like Walmart to proficiently interact with suppliers in order to ensure that suppliers tend to be positioned at the preferred levels on retail shelves, in retail stockrooms as well as in warehouses and that deliveries are executed in accordance to prearranged schedule. Reports of Schnackenberg and Tomlinson (2016) have mentioned that Walmart has usually considered the concept of continuous development through organizational learning. Walmart has been learning from its previous errors as well as from achievement, from competitors and from associates in addition to from statistics. Such an explicit organizational learning has led the company to be open to revolutionize and attain the competence of learning as well as applying it in ways that direct to development and expansion (Abdelkafi & Täuscher, 2016). 

Stakeholder Perspective

While Wal-Mart has emerged as the leading retailer in the United States, their business model does not show any proper sustainability as they show inclination towards a specific group of their stakeholders which their consumer base.  However, on the other hand, Walmart must take into account the connections between the private difficulties and public issues to efficiently produce a harmonious stability between stakeholders. According to stakeholder theory of OB, the key responsibility of management is to supervise the health of its corporation. Feeley (2017) has noted that Wal-Mart does not have the ability to analyse its stakeholders strictly as per economic terms. Moreover, authors have argued that the key focus of Walmart lies on its business strategy specifically within the context of the traditional stakeholder theory that is maximizing earnings and revenues. Even though Walmart initially started as a small organization, it has emerged as a leading retailer due to its focus on stakeholder perspective.

Stakeholder Perspective and Walmart’s Organizational Behaviour

Workplace Culture of Walmart

Chadwick and Raver (2015) have noted that the economical workplace culture of Walmart has been developed efficiently by Walton which contributes to the success of the company. Even though Walmart has been highly criticized for considerably meagre wages as well as healthcare plans which provides to its employee base, Walmart further calls for hourly employees who have been positioned in overtime with no pay. Reports of Schnackenberg & Tomlinson (2016) have mentioned that the primary objective of Walmart is to maintain its retail prices at an economical rate which has led the organization to be successful in attaining its goals and objectives. Research of Chang and Lin (2015) has mentioned that Walmart has been efficiently serving its customer base of over 25% on a usual cart of groceries. Technology and corporate have been positioned into the ultimate objective of delivering the most economical price. Furthermore, Abdelkafi and Täuscher (2016) have noted that Walmart emphasizes its distributors as well as suppliers in order to reduce on are product prices. On the other hand, it is highly crucial for large corporations like Walmart to strategically cultivate employee motivation as well as contentment. According to Shin and Konrad (2017), motivated employees tend to develop greater degree of appreciation and function efficiently in order to attain the organizational goals and purposes to the increased efficiency. However, although Walmart customers have exhibited high contentment, its employees have been encountering substantial level of challenges. Morgeson, Mitchell and Liu (2015) have claimed that majority of Walmart employees recently have been facing critical challenges of low remuneration along with little or no additional incentives. With such low employee compensation, it is easier for the company to raise greater amount of revenues and earnings in comparison to its competitors. Although Walmart has the competence to motivate its employees by providing stock incentives and making them to attain a significant sense of ownership along with a successful prospective future in the market where they operate. Furthermore, the primary disparity between Walmart and other companies is that other organizations have been proficiently delivering low prices in a highly stainable approach, by focusing on satisfying all stakeholders, rather than specifically inclining towards one group of stakeholders such as Walmart (Walmart.com, 2019).  

Conclusion

Therefore, from the above discussion it can be concluded that Walmart’s success has come with their ability to proficiently acquire businesses at a rapid pace. It has been noted that the company has been identified as a leading organization because of rapid competitive growth and benefit in the U.S by acquiring businesses which necessitate no start-up expenses and thus have been successful within their economy. Walmart has gained all total regulation which has led them the power to make proficient decision making. 

References

Abdelkafi, N., & Täuscher, K. (2016). Business models for sustainability from a system dynamics perspective. Organization & Environment, 29(1), 74-96.

Chadwick, I. C., & Raver, J. L. (2015). Motivating organizations to learn: Goal orientation and its influence on organizational learning. Journal of management, 41(3), 957-986.

Chang, C. L. H., & Lin, T. C. (2015). The role of organizational culture in the knowledge management process. Journal of Knowledge management, 19(3), 433-455.

Feeley, M. (2017). Two models of the criminal justice system: An organizational perspective. In Crime, Law and Society (pp. 119-137). Routledge.

Morgeson, F. P., Mitchell, T. R., & Liu, D. (2015). Event system theory: An event-oriented approach to the organizational sciences. Academy of Management Review, 40(4), 515-537.

Rae, D., & Wang, C. L. (2015). Entrepreneurial learning: past research and future challenges. In Entrepreneurial learning(pp. 25-58). Routledge.

Schnackenberg, A. K., & Tomlinson, E. C. (2016). Organizational transparency: A new perspective on managing trust in organization-stakeholder relationships. Journal of Management, 42(7), 1784-1810.

Shin, D., & Konrad, A. M. (2017). Causality between high-performance work systems and organizational performance. Journal of Management, 43(4), 973-997.

Walmart.com. (2019). Walmart.com | Save Money. Live Better. Retrieved from https://www.walmart.com/