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Organizational standards and objectives are important elements in any business plan because they guide managerial decision-making.

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ISO - International Organization for Standardization

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We're ISO, the International Organization for Standardization. We develop and publish International Standards.

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A company’s standards define its practices, while its objectives define what actions the company needs to take.

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You have personal values, beliefs, and performance benchmarks. Your business also has these characteristics and they are referred to as company standards. Think of standards as your business personality and vision coupled with the rules you live and work by. Your small business standards will likely mirror your personal standards, and your customers, clients, and employees will form an opinion about your business - and your brand - based on these values.

What are standards?

Your standards define how your company acts, which, in turn, builds trust in your brand. They can be guidelines that describe quality, performance, safety, terminology, testing, or management systems, to name a few. They can comply with authoritative agencies or professional organizations and be enforceable by law, such as required medical degrees for doctors or credentials for financial planners. Or they can be voluntary rules you establish to create confidence among your clients that your business operates at a high and consistent quality level, such as a restaurant only using the highest quality, locally-sourced ingredients.

Standards must align with your mission, business objectives, and organizational leadership, and be implemented consistently across your enterprise. Employees need to buy into the value of adhering to standards so everyone is pulling in the same direction and reinforcing your brand.

Controlling and measuring standards

Standards are what your business aspires to, but they don't guarantee performance. You need to create processes to control how your standards are implemented, and measure and evaluate how they help your business grow. Written guidelines, technical specifications, product inspection processes, management and financial audits, and even customer surveys can be effective performance indicators and help you determine if you're meeting your standards, or if the standards need to be tweaked in some way.

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Setting Company Standards for Business Growth | The Hartford

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If your business growth is becoming stagnant, it might be time to set some company standards. Company standards are your business’s personality and vision mixed with rules that guide your work. Learn more about how company standards can help your business in The Hartford Business Owner’s Playbook.

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. Leadership pursues change and challenges the status quo, whereas management seeks to control and provide stability within the existing circumstances.

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Leadership is an oft-used and sometimes nebulous term, particularly in the field of health care. Although leadership is not traditionally taught in medical schools, physicians possess many qualities that are needed to excel at leadership. For example, medicine requires critical thinking skills that are analogous to those required for effective leadership, such as assessing complex problems, formulating diagnoses, and generating action plans.

For leadership to be effective, it must be built on a solid foundation consisting of a clear mission, a vision for the future, a specific strategy, and a culture conducive to success."

As a result, health care organizations are increasingly recognizing the importance of engaging physicians in their leadership teams, and this engagement will become even more important as the health care environment becomes more challenging. For physicians, leadership can provide an opportunity to strengthen their organizations and positively impact the lives of thousands of people. In this context, what does leadership mean, what are its attributes, and what tools do physician leaders have at their disposal?
Foundations of Leadership
A simple definition of leadership is the ability and willingness to take ownership of the organization (or the component of the organization that one is charged with managing), combined with an intrinsic drive to do what is best for the organization. However, for leadership to be effective, it must be built on a solid foundation consisting of a clear mission, a vision for the future, a specific strategy, and a culture conducive to success. New leaders need to understand that these concepts are essential for effectiveness and personal growth.

Mission. Simply put, the mission is the reason that an organization exists. For a hospital, the likely mission is to provide high-quality and compassionate medical care. For an academic health center, the mission may be expanded to include producing new knowledge and training the next generation. Having a clear sense of mission is crucial for guiding leadership decisions and choosing between alternatives.

Vision. Vision is a conceptualization of a future, and hopefully better, state toward which the leader navigates the organization. Vision should be systematically formulated on the basis of an analysis of demographic trends, scientific advances, and technological innovations in the field. For example, in the field of cardiology, an aging population with an increasing prevalence of calcific aortic stenosis, coupled with innovations in transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR), should motivate a prescient leader to prepare for the introduction of this new technology into the practice and to consider its secondary consequences on surgical volumes, staffing needs, and hospital finances and facilities.

Strategy and Tactics. Strategy refers to the plans that the organization follows in order to be successful and competitive, whereas tactics refer to the specific steps that the organization takes to achieve and implement the strategy. In other words, strategy is what an organization will do to succeed and compete in its competitive space. A tertiary care hospital (e.g., the Mayo Clinic) may aspire to be the preferred national referral center for complex diseases. The strategy that it follows to achieve this vision may include developing a team of nationally renowned physicians who work in a multidisciplinary manner and broadly developing its reputation (brand). The tactics it may use to achieve this goal may include providing advanced training for its teams, developing cutting-edge treatments, demonstrating the best quality metrics, improving patient experience, and publishing its outcomes, among others.

Organizational Culture. Organizational culture is a crucial component that leaders must understand to achieve maximum effectiveness. The best leaders positively impact long-term organizational culture and values through self-modeling of behaviors, creating cultural expectations, and formally communicating cultural expectations. For example, an expectation of maintaining and professing mutual respect at all times can be set and demonstrated by leadership, even in difficult situations. Effectively responding to instances of a breakdown in mutual respect, rather than letting them go unaddressed, are critically important in further solidifying a positive organizational culture.

Leadership Skills and Attributes
In addition to cultivating a conducive environment that is built on a strong foundation, effective leaders must exhibit specific skills and attributes to achieve the goals of the organization. These traits include excellent communication skills, empathy and emotional intelligence, team-building skills, an understanding of the competitive landscape, strategic thinking, and courage, although this list is by no means exhaustive.

Communication Skills. The most important (some would argue the only) tool that leaders possess is communication. Effective communication ensures understanding and is not the same as simply sending out messages or emails. Communication is a two-way interaction, and the ability for the leader to listen is critical. Leaders should practice active listening, rather than just being quiet while others speak. A simple but effective way to practice active listening is to take mental notes while others are speaking or communicating. With time, a leader can become very adept at this skill and others will notice that the leader is actually paying attention. Being heard is important to others, even if final decisions are not what was initially requested.

Empathy and Emotional Intelligence. Empathy and emotional intelligence are key leadership traits that frequently are overlooked. Leaders regularly are called upon to deal with challenging and, at times, unpleasant situations (e.g., conflict situations, crucial conversations, and some annual performance reviews). Having a high degree of emotional intelligence will enable the leader to deal with such situations effectively and objectively while not avoiding the underlying issues. It is important to note that emotional intelligence is a skill like any other and can be developed with practice and coaching. Similarly, an empathic leader who can sense how others feel will be a much more effective communicator and team builder and will be more likely to effectively manage change. Interestingly, this same trait is critical to developing the patient-physician relationship.

Team-Building Skills. The most effective teams (e.g., President Lincoln's "team of rivals") include talented individuals with complementary areas of expertise who are comfortable expressing their opinions. It is the responsibility of the leader not to dominate the conversation and to ensure that teams feel safe speaking up. The effective leader trusts the team members, challenges them, and lets them handle difficult situations. When difficult decisions are required, leaders and their teams will require a high degree of emotional intelligence and courage to make the right decisions for the organization, even if doing so presents challenges in the short term. Courage in leadership is yet another skill that can be developed with practice over time. What is required is a commitment to fairness, transparency, and doing the right thing.

Cultivating Leadership Skills Over Time
Leadership skills are grown over time in a progressive fashion. At the start of one's career, an individual typically works in a technical area and distinguishes himself or herself through technical expertise, outcomes, and innovation. For example, a cardiac surgeon may distinguish himself or herself on successful outcomes, a low mortality rate, and the introduction of new procedures.

It is important to recognize that leadership skills, like any other type of skill, can be learned and improved.... More challenging, however, is the development of the personal attributes that are necessary for effective leadership."

The next level of leadership is operational. At that level, the individual (e.g., a hospital echocardiography lab director), will gain financial and operational knowledge and quantitative skills (such as understanding costs) that are relevant to the role. If the individual excels at that level, he or she may be tapped to undertake higher-level roles that are more strategic in nature.

A senior leader will be required to understand the competitive environment, macroeconomic trends affecting the practice of medicine, and upcoming regulatory changes. In addition, a strategic leader will need to keep a constant eye on the competition. Positioning the organization for success in a rapidly changing environment with fast-moving competitors is one of the primary responsibilities of the senior strategic leader.
Learning, Improving, and Practicing Leadership Skills
It is important to recognize that leadership skills, like any other type of skill, can be learned and improved. The knowledge-based components of a skill, such as finance or accounting, can be acquired readily in class, online, or with self-directed learning. More challenging, however, is the development of the personal attributes that are necessary for effective leadership. Feedback is a key tool in the development of these attributes. The most common, but sometimes least effective, form of feedback is the annual performance review. More effective methods are structured 360-degree evaluations (which provide the opportunity for honest and frank feedback) and coaching (which can be used to establish and execute individualized developmental plans).

Practicing leadership is as much an art as it is a discipline."

Practicing leadership is as much an art as it is a discipline. A common mistake is for leaders to get too involved in day-to-day operational issues, thereby taking their eyes off the ball and potentially missing new opportunities or emerging threats to the organization. With a team-based mindset, the goal of the leader should not be to make the best decisions for the organization, but rather to ensure that the best decisions are being made at all levels. A leader who attempts to make all the decisions will inevitably fail as it is impossible for one individual to be correct all the time. A leader with an engaged team will benefit from a more diverse analysis of challenging situations and will be more likely to make the right call. Team-building, empowerment, and trust with a willingness to listen to suggestions with an open mind are signs of prescient leadership.
Leadership During Constant Change
Because organizations and their environments constantly change, one of the core responsibilities of leaders is initiating and managing the internal changes necessary to adapt to changing circumstances. A thorough discussion on managing change is beyond the scope of this essay; however, it is likely true that without initiating change, one is merely managing and not leading. The ability to effectively institute positive change will stretch and challenge even the best leaders. The attributes discussed above are critical to this process.

Great organizations require great leaders, and the best organizations understand that cultivating leadership skills should be intentional and not left to chance.

The Ship Model of Leadership

A ship can be used as a conceptual model to illustrate several concepts related to organizational behavior and leadership. In this model, the organization may be conceived of as a ship carrying its payload (products or services) to its future destination (vision) through waters (the competitive environment) that at times may be still and at other times may be very choppy (uncertainty, decreasing reimbursements) or may even have icebergs (massive changes in the regulatory environment). It is the responsibility of the leader to be aware of the macroeconomic, government, and regulatory trends that can put the organization at risk and to position the organization not just to avoid these icebergs but to thrive in the future environment. Other ships (competitors) will be engaged in the same enterprise and will compete for the same customers and resources. The leader should have a clear view of the future, the competitive environment, and the direct competitors and should have contingency plans in place to deal with unanticipated events (icebergs). Thus, the primary responsibility of the captain is to chart a pathway through the waters to reach the goal.

In this model, the strategy may be for the ship to go faster and be more maneuverable than its competitors. Tactically, the captain or executive officer will have to determine how the oars will be pulled faster, harder, and more efficiently; how its sails will be trimmed for maximum efficiency; and even how to shed deadwood. If the strategy is implemented successfully, the ship will beat its competitors to the goal, will provide value to its customers, and may be able to charge a premium price for that service. It is important to note that the development of a strategy includes defining what an organization will not do. For example, another potential strategy may be for the ship to be a very large, but slower, purveyor of goods and services. This strategy would enable it to charge low prices but still be profitable. This strategy can work, but it is distinct from the strategy of being fast and maneuverable. In business, it is very difficult for an organization to simultaneously be the low-cost provider and the premium provider. Similarly, in health care, it can be extremely difficult for one organization to master community-based population health as well as resource-intensive destination care simultaneously, unless it is extremely intentional about implementation. Finally, for effective strategy development, a comprehensive understanding of the organization's core competencies and capabilities (e.g., how fast and how efficiently the crew can pull the oars) is critical. Internal expertise, talent, and capabilities will determine what type of strategy can be considered.

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The Importance of Leadership Skills to Organizational Success

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Leadership is an oft-used and sometimes nebulous term, particularly in the field of health care. Although leadership is not traditionally taught in medical schools, physicians possess many qualities that are needed to excel at leadership. For example, medicine requires critical thinking skills that are analogous to those required for effective leadership, such as assessing complex problems, formulating diagnoses, and generating action plans.

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Leadership is about establishing a direction and influencing others to follow. Management is about successfully administering the many complex details involved in a business’s operations.

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About Management and Organization at Marshall

The Management and Organization Department teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in the fields of strategy, organization behavior, leadership, strategy formulation, organization design, developing teams, and motivating employees. Many of our faculty members teach you, the student, the importance of learning the management function.

The management function in organizations is concerned with achieving effective performance in meeting the goals and objectives that keep the firm competitive and profitable. In carrying out their responsibilities, managers must utilize human resources to accomplish their goals. Managers are expected to balance the demands in the external environment with the resources and capability inside the organization to achieve a "strategic" fit between goals and accomplishment. These are the goals our faculty and department keep in mind when improving or creating new courses.

Your faculty and doctoral students are involved in the study of these aspects of business administration. The department is comprised of more than 40 full and part-time faculty members, and 20 doctoral students. Their research interests cover a broad range of topics and disciplines, and they are dedicated to teaching students the skills they will need to succeed in management careers.

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About Management and Organization at Marshall The Management and Organization Department teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in the fields of strategy, organization behavior, leadership, strategy formulation, organization design, developing teams, and motivating employees. Many of our faculty members teach you, the student, the importance of learning the management function.

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. Communication requires a sender, a message, and a recipient, although the receiver may not be present or aware of the sender’s intent to communicate at the time of communication.

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It's all about the bottom line.

Have you ever heard that expression?

It's at the heart of every business. The "bottom line" is a company's net income after all expenses have been paid out of its earnings. The bottom line determines whether or not you stay in business. And without effective communication, you won't. Whether you're running your own business, or just starting out on your business career, you'll need to be a great communicator!

According to a recent study, companies with good communication practices are three and a half times more likely to outperform their competitors. ¹ A business's ability to compete may be the number one reason to promote effective communication, but it's not the only one.

Good communication builds good teams. When team leaders are effective communicators, they inspire workers to reach for a common goal. They make sure everyone knows their responsibilities and how to perform them. With an open dialogue, employees pitch in when others in the organization need their help, and know when to ask for help, in return.

You can prevent misunderstandings with good communication. Rumors and bad will can derail an organization. Someone says something, and someone else takes offense. But when there's open and honest communication, everyone's on the same page. Sure, there may be disagreements, but they're less likely to turn into problems when differences of opinion are given the outlet and respect they deserve.

Customer service relies on good communication. If you don't know what your customers want, how can you give it to them? Whether you sell products or services, you need to listen to the needs of your customers, answer their questions, and provide answers that make sense to them. And when customers turn to social media to communicate, you need to be quick, attentive, and polite.

Good communication skills will help you achieve. Become an effective communicator and you'll not only help your company; you'll help yourself. Being able to communicate well-in writing and in speech-will set you apart from your peers. It will help you excel at work and be recognized for your accomplishments, and give you a competitive edge in the job market.

At Charter College, we provide real world business skills that go beyond just classroom instruction. We also teach you the art of effective business communication. Check out all our business programs to find out more now. If you're ready for a new career in 2017, we're ready to help you get started.
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Why is Effective Communication so Important in Business?

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It's all about the bottom line. Have you ever heard that expression? It's at the heart of every business. The "bottom line" is a company's net income after all expenses have been paid out of its earnings. The bottom line determines whether or not you stay in business.

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Communication is conveying messages by exchanging thoughts and information via speech, visuals, signals, writing, or behavior.

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Effective Communication is significant for managers in the organizations so as to perform the basic functions of management, i.e., Planning, Organizing, Leading and Controlling.

Communication helps managers to perform their jobs and responsibilities. Communication serves as a foundation for planning. All the essential information must be communicated to the managers who in-turn must communicate the plans so as to implement them. Organizing also requires effective communication with others about their job task. Similarly leaders as managers must communicate effectively with their subordinates so as to achieve the team goals. Controlling is not possible without written and oral communication.

Managers devote a great part of their time in communication. They generally devote approximately 6 hours per day in communicating. They spend great time on face to face or telephonic communication with their superiors, subordinates, colleagues, customers or suppliers. Managers also use Written Communication in form of letters, reports or memos wherever oral communication is not feasible.

Thus, we can say that " effective communication is a building block of successful organizations ". In other words, communication acts as organizational blood.
The importance of communication in an organization can be summarized as follows:

1. Communication promotes motivation by informing and clarifying the employees about the task to be done, the manner they are performing the task, and how to improve their performance if it is not up to the mark.

2. Communication is a source of information to the organizational members for decision-making process as it helps identifying and assessing alternative course of actions.

3. Communication also plays a crucial role in altering individual's attitudes, i.e., a well informed individual will have better attitude than a less-informed individual. Organizational magazines, journals, meetings and various other forms of oral and written communication help in moulding employee's attitudes.

4. Communication also helps in socializing. In todays life the only presence of another individual fosters communication. It is also said that one cannot survive without communication.

5. As discussed earlier, communication also assists in controlling process. It helps controlling organizational member's behaviour in various ways. There are various levels of hierarchy and certain principles and guidelines that employees must follow in an organization. They must comply with organizational policies, perform their job role efficiently and communicate any work problem and grievance to their superiors. Thus, communication helps in controlling function of management.

An effective and efficient communication system requires managerial proficiency in delivering and receiving messages. A manager must discover various barriers to communication, analyze the reasons for their occurrence and take preventive steps to avoid those barriers. Thus, the primary responsibility of a manager is to develop and maintain an effective communication system in the organization.

Authorship/Referencing - About the Author(s)

The article is Written By "Prachi Juneja" and Reviewed By Management Study Guide Content Team. MSG Content Team comprises experienced Faculty Member, Professionals and Subject Matter Experts. We are a ISO 2001:2015 Certified Education Provider. To Know more, click on About Us. The use of this material is free for learning and education purpose. Please reference authorship of content used, including link(s) to ManagementStudyGuide.com and the content page url.

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importance of communication in an organization

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Importance of Communication in an Organization

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Effective Communication is significant for managers in the organizations so as to perform the basic functions of management, i.e., Planning, Organizing, Leading and Controlling. Communication helps managers to perform their jobs and responsibilities. Communication serves as a foundation for planning.

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Managers leverage the employees’ skill sets, experience, and personalities in a way that consistently adds value.

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In two related articles, " What Does a Manager Do?" and " Why It's Time to Change Our Views on Management and the Job of the Manager, " we explore this changing and important role in-depth. In this article, we take a step back and focus on the fundamentals of the job of manager and why it is both critical to success in today's organizations and why it represents a viable career option.

The Manager's Role Inside the Organization

Organizations are hierarchies of titles.

The organizational chart or the structure of the company and the relationships of the jobs and responsibilities, from the top down, maybe CEO, Vice President, Director, then Manager, each of whom perform separate and critical functions, enabling the organization to function, meet its obligations and turn a profit.

The higher you climb in the organization's ranks, the further away you move from the day-to-day operations and work of the firm's employees. While the CEO and Vice-Presidents focus more of their efforts on issues of strategy, investment, and overall coordination, managers are directly involved with the individuals serving customers, producing and selling the firm's goods or services, and providing internal support to other groups.

Additionally, the manager acts as a bridge between senior management for translating higher-level strategies and goals into operating plans that drive the business.

The challenging role of the manager is accountable to senior executives for performance and to front-line employees for guidance, motivation, and support. It is common for managers to feel as if they are pulled between the demands of top leaders and the needs of the individuals performing the work of the firm.

The Work of the Manager

Have you ever witnessed the "plate spinner" at the circus? This is the individual who places a breakable dinner plate on a stick and starts it spinning. The entertainer repeats this task a dozen or more times, and then runs around and striving to keep all of the plates spinning without letting any crash to the floor. On many occasions, the role of manager feels a great deal like this "plate spinner." The manager's functions are many and varied, including:

Hiring and staffing.

Training new employees.

Coaching and developing existing employees.

Dealing with performance problems and terminations.

Supporting problem resolution and decision-making.

Conducting timely performance evaluations.

Translating corporate goals into functional and individual goals.

Monitoring performance and initiating action to strengthen results.

Monitoring and controlling expenses and budgets.

Tracking and reporting scorecard results to senior management.

Planning and goal-setting for future periods.

The daily work of the manager is filled with one-on-one or group interactions focused on operations. Many managers use early mornings or later evenings to complete their reports, catch-up on e-mail and update their task lists.

There is never a dull moment much less time for quiet contemplation in the lives of most managers.

Types of Managers

Managers are most often responsible for a particular function or department within the organization. From accounting to marketing, to sales, customer support, engineering, quality, and all other groups, a manager either lead a team directly or leads a group of supervisors who lead the teams.

In addition to the traditional role of departmental or functional manager, there are also product and project managers who are responsible for a set of activities or initiatives, often without any people reporting to them. These informal managers work across functions and recruit team members from the various groups for temporary and unique initiatives.

Span of Control

The phrase "span of control" relates to the number of individuals who report directly to any particular manager.

One of the trends of recent years has been to reduce the number of managers in an organization and increase the number of direct reports working for remaining managers.

A manager optimally has no more than six to eight direct reports, although many have ten or even twenty individuals they are responsible for on a daily basis. A smaller span of control enables increased support for training, coaching, and development. The larger span reduces the manager's effectiveness for supporting her direct reports.

Authority of the Manager

A manager may have the power to hire or fire employees or to promote them. In larger companies, a manager may only recommend such action to the next level of management. The manager has the authority to change the work assignments of team members.

Essential Skills of the Manager

Managers need to develop and hone the following skills:

Leadership-You've got to be able to set priorities and motivate your team members. This involves self-awareness, self-management, social awareness and relationship management. Be a source of energy, empathy, and trust. And remember that effective leaders work daily to develop team members through positive feedback, constructive feedback, and coaching.

Communication-Become a student of effective communication in all its applications, including one-on-one, small group, large group, email and social media. Realize that the most important aspect of communicating is listening.

Collaboration-Serve as a role model for working together. Support cross-functional efforts and model collaborative behaviors to set the example for your team members.

Critical Thinking-Strive to understand where and how your projects fit into the bigger picture to enhance your effectiveness. Review priorities in light of larger goals. Translate this understanding into meaningful goals and objectives for your team members.

Finance-Learn the language of numbers. Managers must strive to understand how company funds are invested and to ensure that these investments earn a good return for the firm. While you do not need to be an accountant to be a manager, it is imperative that you learn and apply the basics.

Project Management-Everything that we do that is new in an organization is created in the form of projects. Today's managers understand and leverage formal project management practices to ensure timely completion and proper control of initiatives.

The Bottom Line-A Career in Management

The work of management is divided into the activities around planning, leading, organizing and controlling, and the work of a manager encompasses all of these areas. Anyone aspiring to move into management as a career should develop and display strong technical and functional skills-become an expert in your discipline, and have a strong liking of interacting with, supporting and guiding others.

The best managers understand their role is about their team and their team's performance and not about themselves. They work hard to develop the skills identified above and they take great satisfaction in the successes of their team members. Do this effectively at a lower level and others will recognize your value and abilities and strive to increase your responsibilities over time. Management as a career is simultaneously challenging and exciting.

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Here Is a Look at the Role and Responsibilities of Today's Manager

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In two related articles, " What Does a Manager Do?" and " Why It's Time to Change Our Views on Management and the Job of the Manager, " we explore this changing and important role in-depth.

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identified four key elements of an organization’s structure: common purpose, coordinated effort, division of labor, and hierarchy of authority.

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The Purpose of an organization is the fundamental reason why the organization exists.

The Purpose of an organization is not the answer to the question "What do you do?" which typically focuses on products, services and customers, but rather the answer to the question "Why is the work you do important?" Employees should find the Purpose inspirational and motivational. To sum up, it is the cause that defines their contribution to society through work. Businesses exist to make a profit, but they also exist to make a difference. Through work, individuals can make a difference and be part of a meaningful legacy.

In the words of Andrew Mason, the former CEO of Groupon,

"When our customers started telling us, 'I love Groupon because it's getting me out of the house, making me live my life,' is when we realized the full impact of what we were doing." He continues, "We're not in it for making money. We're in it for the passion we have for big ideas, making an impact and making the world better."

Work should be purposeful and meaningful. It should contribute to making the world a better place.

Work should be more than a job. To clarify, it should be a cause that's making a difference in people's lives.

Above all, a Purpose statement should be brief in length yet broad in scope. Make it brief so employees can remember it and use it to guide their daily actions. The Purpose should also be broad in scope to allow the organization to adapt over time to a changing world while its central focus remains constant. Products and services may change, but the organization must endure. To sum up, organizations are living entities; they are vehicles for improving life and the world we live in.

The Six Criteria for a Purpose Statement

Is it a contribution to society - not a product or service?

Does it answer the question - Why is this work important?

Is it inspirational and motivational?

Does it use powerful words?

Is it brief in length so employees will remember it?

Is it broad in scope to allow for future opportunities and change?

Download this worksheet to use when evaluating Purpose Statement options: Purpose Statement Options To Be Evaluated

Key Points about Purpose

Purpose:

Is central and enduring to the culture of the organization.

Is the cause that defines one's contribution to society.

Unites efforts and inspires action.

Is the answer to the question: Why is this work important?

Is a statement that is brief in length and broad in scope.

Examples of Purpose Statements

Bank

We help people achieve their dreams

Beverage Company

We benefit and refresh

Bread Company

We nourish life

Communications Company

We enhance image

Entertainment Company

We make people happy

Food Company

We nurture health and well-being

Internet Company

We connect people to power and possibilities

Medical Group

We preserve and improve human life

Non-profit

We reduce poverty

In addition to the examples above, here are a few more examples of Purpose Statements:

Chemical company: to improve living environments

Library: to connect people and information

Financial company: to build value

Insurance company: to provide peace of mind

Consumer products company: to make life fun and easy

Go to these links for more information:

To discover how to view Purpose more broadly, go to this post.

To read about what leaders are saying about the importance of Purpose and being a Purpose-driven company, go to this post.

Contact Sheila to uncover your contribution to society.

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Purpose of an organization - Sheila Margolis

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The Purpose of an organization is the fundamental reason why the organization exists. The Purpose of an organization is not the answer to the question "What do you do?" which typically focuses on products, services and customers, but rather the answer to the question "Why is the work you do important?"

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Goals are derived from vision and mission statements, but these statements describe what the organization wants to achieve, not necessarily what it can achieve.

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Walt Disney’s Mission Statement & Vision Statement (An Analysis) - Panmore Institute

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Walt Disney’s corporate mission statement & corporate vision statement are analyzed in this entertainment business purpose & aims case study.

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I have learned that Planning is the process of setting goals and defining the actions required to achieve the goals. Planning begins with goals.

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Many people quickly assume that being a good leader means you're a good manager and vice versa. The two concepts are actually quite distinct and understanding that distinction can help you understand what it means to be good at either or good at ...

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What is organizational planning? definition and meaning

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Many people quickly assume that being a good leader means you're a good manager and vice versa. The two concepts are actually quite distinct and understanding that distinction can help you understand what it means to be good at either or good at ...

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I have learned about Corporate social responsibility (CSR), also known as corporate citizenship, is a business concept in which social and environmental concerns are integrated into a company’s operations.

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What is the role and responsibility of a for-profit, public company? We have always believed Starbucks can - and should - have a positive social impact on the communities we serve. One person, one cup and one neighborhood at a time.

As we have grown to more than 28,000 stores in more than 75 countries, so too has our commitment to creating a positive global social impact.

It is our vision that we will help inspire our partners, customers, suppliers and neighbors to create positive change. To be innovators, leaders and contributors to an inclusive society and a healthy environment so that Starbucks and everyone we touch can endure and thrive.

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As we have grown to more than 28,000 stores in more than 75 countries, so too has our commitment to creating a positive global social impact. It is our vision that we will help inspire our partners, customers, suppliers and neighbors to create positive change.

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globalization also opens domestic markets to new competitors, decreasing demand for local products.

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I have learned that global organization is any organization that competes outside its native country. Globalization is the process by which the exchange of goods, services, capital, technology, and knowledge across international borders becomes increasingly interconnected. Globalization creates new

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Consider if you will the following quotations, each from executives at Philips, the global technology company-one in the late 1970s and one quite recently:

1. "We typically lose out when a market commoditizes and we no longer differentiate, further aggravated by us being too slow or expensive."

2. "The matrix is too slow-we are in a very turbulent market with great potential, and we have far too many low-cost competitors. We need very short communication lines, quick decisions, alertness-we've got to be able to adapt fast."

The first statement, from current chairman and CEO Frans van Houten, is the new one; it appeared in a 2013 working paper from the MIT Center for Information Systems Research. The second, older statement, from a Philips product manager, initially appeared in a 1978 Management Today article and was quoted by Tom Peters in his first McKinsey Quarterly piece, " Beyond the matrix organization."

The similarity of these statements, from thoughtful leaders at a well-run company, speaks to the difficulty of the global corporation's perennial challenge: how to capture scale across borders while differentiating products and services to suit the needs of local customers-all without letting complexity get in the way of speed and agility.

Aspects of this persistent challenge have played out over the years in recurring fashion in major corporations, in the marketplace for management ideas, and in the Quarterly. Surveying the range of heroic efforts by great practitioners and thinkers to solve these challenges once and for all, you come away convinced that there is no silver bullet to the global company's challenge. Indeed, faith in one-dimensional solutions-redrawing organizational boundaries, constructing matrices, winning the war for local talent, reengineering business processes, moving the global headquarters-is arguably dangerous. The fact is that solutions need to combine changes across organizational structures, people, and processes.

We recognize that the absence of a simple solution may not be entirely satisfying and defies the impulse to fix everything at once through a single "big bang" change to one of these elements. But we think that's more realistic, too. We also believe that, within this mix, a focus on processes is taking on greater importance-not in place of people and structure but as a means of influencing them. Thanks to digital technologies, the growing connectivity between knowledge workers, and the more collaborative organizational behavior this connectivity supports, ours is a time of significant process innovation both inside and across corporate boundaries. These process innovations may provide new ways forward in dealing with the persistent difficulties of managing complex global organizations and meeting the urgent need for greater efficiency in the face of rising global competition.

The evolving organizational challenge: A brief tour

In 1959, five years before the birth of McKinsey Quarterly, an ambitiously titled article appeared in the Harvard Business Review: "Creating a world enterprise." Written by McKinsey's Gilbert H. Clee and Alfred di Scipio, it made the radical proposal (radical, at least, for its day) that expansionist American corporations, instead of treating international activities as subdivisions of their domestic businesses, should turn the US organization into a subdivision of the wider global one.

The Clee and di Scipio article, calling as it did for "major revisions in business thinking," was pertinent as well as provocative. In the late 1950s, after all-with the reconstruction of Europe well under way after World War II and new industrial forces stirring in Asia-growing numbers of North American executives were eyeing overseas pastures for the first time. Faced with economic pressures and foreign competition at home, and lured by bright prospects abroad, a majority of representative executives questioned in a McKinsey survey of the time (and cited by Clee and di Scipio) reported that these companies were actively stepping up the ratio of their foreign-to-domestic investments.

Opening such profit opportunities beyond their borders, though, created new planning, resource-allocation, and management-control issues, as well as unprecedented organizational strains. Old structures and relationships that had worked smoothly for an export-oriented domestic company were no longer appropriate as global engagement increased.

In many ways, that organizational response is the story of multinational enterprises over the past 50 and more years. In a 1965 article featured in the Quarterly 's third-ever issue, Clee and McKinsey consultant Wilbur Sachtjen set out some evolving organizational patterns for global companies. There were several such models. The traditional international-division structure and its variants (Exhibit 1) all involved a shift in responsibility for policy and worldwide strategic planning to the corporate center. Then the international division was replaced by subsidiaries in assigned geographic areas, run by locally based senior line managers bearing full operating responsibility, notably in production and sales. Next, product-based and business-based structures replaced the international division with units run by senior line managers bearing worldwide responsibility for the P&L of their divisions.

Some of these approaches, particularly the last one, contained the seeds of the matrix organization, which gained favor in the 1970s as a solution for large organizations struggling to coordinate decision making and activities that cut across functional and business-unit lines. The theory was strong, but when Tom Peters appraised the scene, in the late 1970s, "the matrix 'solution' had brought with it problems at least as knotty as those it was supposed to cure."

The quest for an alternative led Peters, Julien Phillips, and Bob Waterman to assert that "Structure is not organization" (as another of their Quarterly articles in that period was titled) and McKinsey to develop the 7-S framework of organizational effectiveness and change. Interestingly, four of the seven (skills, staff, style, and shared values) pertain to people, one (systems) to processes, and one to structure. The seventh, strategy, spoke to the important and still-relevant idea, first articulated by Alfred Chandler in his 1962 book, Strategy and Structure, that the structure of an organization can be designed only after it has formed its strategy. The underlying focus of the 7-S framework on structure, people, and processes still represents a useful summary of the challenges in global organizational design today. In our experience, corporate leaders devote most attention to the first two and probably not enough to the third-even though processes can greatly influence both structure and talent.

Processes admittedly came to the fore during the business-process reengineering movement of the 1990s, which involved "rethinking and, if necessary, fundamentally reengineering how a company delivers value to its customers." Such a rethinking, according to a 1993 Quarterly article, "inevitably runs up against the company's entrenched business system and organizational structure," requiring process redesign to "help managers break through these barriers." For large, complex organizations, taking a clean-sheet approach to processes rather than automating existing ones as information technology advanced was a sensible step. But it was far from sufficient to ensure a smoothly humming, healthy organization.

Continued advances in technology and connectivity have allowed companies to push well past process reengineering to new forms of engagement within and across organizational boundaries. Social networks are an obvious element of this development. But even before the full flowering of Facebook (and its equivalents behind corporate firewalls), McKinsey's Lowell Bryan, in a 2007 Quarterly article, asserted that "in the digital age, there is no better use of a CEO's time and energy than making organizations work better." In his view, that involved "remaking the organization to mobilize the mind power of the workforce and tap into its underutilized talents, knowledge, relationships, and skills." Companies have begun realizing this vision by crowdsourcing ideas and holding "values jams," as IBM famously did. They have even been throwing open the strategy process "to enhance the quality of dialogue, improve decision making, and boost organizational alignment," as Arne Gast and Michele Zanini wrote in a 2012 Quarterly article.

As the world turns

We survey this scene with respect both for the continually shifting nature of organizational opportunities and challenges and for the relentless efforts of leading companies and management minds to respond to them. Large global companies are often beset by complex structures and country-specific processes that proliferated over years of geographic expansion, not to mention cultural differences that can undermine smooth operations. By necessity, these companies have been at the forefront of formulating those responses, even if, at times, only by assimilating the innovations of smaller, more swiftly moving companies. Despite these efforts, high-performing global companies consistently score lower than more locally focused ones on several critical dimensions of organizational health, according to a decade-long study-of hundreds of businesses-that we highlighted in a 2011 Quarterly article. These critical dimensions include direction setting, coordination and control, innovation, and external orientation.

Our research and experience suggest that the existence and persistence of a "globalization penalty" isn't just a function of today's context, typified by rapid growth in emerging markets and technological change. It also reflects the continuation of a journey that global organizations have been on for many years. Continually remaking the organization to embrace change is a messy endeavor-and one that's likely, at any given time, to be accompanied by growing pains.

If that's true, there's no substitute for fairly regular soul searching to adapt structures, people, and processes to create the most effective organizational designs (Exhibit 2). Experimentation continues along each of these dimensions. L'Oréal has emphasized its people credentials by establishing itself as the top employer for female sales and marketing talent in South Korea through a conscious emphasis on empowerment, communication style, and manageable working hours. Philips has recently identified three core processes-idea to market, market to order, and order to cash-it uses to create standard models for the products, services, software, and systems that flow through most of its global operations. Although standardization has been imposed on these core processes, exceptions are permitted, and the idea is to drive greater speed and flexibility, more localization, and higher efficiency simultaneously.

Experiments like Philips's point toward more process-oriented structures, which are likely to become increasingly useful given the power of technology and connectivity to transcend traditional boundaries both within and across companies. Process improvements today can go beyond the cost-oriented "denominator" of corporate productivity to embrace the "numerator" of learning-based performance-enhancement networks and spaces where innovation and growth occur.

The possibilities are particularly alluring for large global organizations, where these process-oriented structures can help harness the specialized capabilities of a distributed network of business partners. In the apparel industry, for instance, Li & Fung has organized and coordinated a fully fledged supply network of more than 10,000 business partners. The flexible scalability of this network, which uses processes to address the structural aspects of organizational design, speaks to the global corporation's long-standing difficulty in coordinating complex and far-flung production operations.

These distributed process structures are proving powerful inside companies, as well-for instance, by bringing diverse participants into the strategy-creation process. For example, in 2009, 3M reinvigorated its Markets of the Future process, which provides critical input to its strategic planning. The company's crowdsourcing of the strategy process to more than 1,200 employees in 40 countries helped energize creative talent-the people side of the organizational-design conundrum-while identifying nine new future markets with an aggregate revenue potential in the tens of billions of dollars.

Similarly, learning environments where teams of participants interact with other teams around sets of processes designed to enhance performance not only help solve difficult operational challenges but also enable employees to continue the learning and development that create meaning in their professional lives. Consider, for example, how the software company SAP drew together participants from a wide range of otherwise unrelated companies, in 2003, to help speed the adoption of its new NetWeaver technology architecture. The processes in this network structure supported peer-to-peer collaboration and learning among customers, systems integrators, and independent service vendors, while helping SAP to achieve its own strategic objectives. These newfangled process-oriented solutions to the structure and people part of the perennial organizational challenges contrast-and yet coexist-nicely with the more traditionally standardized routines, which remain suitable for wringing scale-based cost efficiencies from less varying (and often industrial) processes. The trick is to recognize which process-based structure is best for which objective and then to proceed accordingly.

We're starting to see glimmers of global organizational redesign reflecting these new realities. One international engineering company, for example, has restructured to put its commercial-project process (including decisions about whether to bid on a contract and then the preparation of the offer) at the heart of the organizational structure. This model enables more effective team-based problem solving that transcends organizational silos and geographic boundaries, in part through the use of collaborative technologies.

It's still too early to paint a definitive picture of what the global organization of the future will look like as efforts like these become more commonplace. What we're confident about is that "process-centric" thinking will be a more prominent feature of organization design than it has been in the past, even if the peculiarities of culture suggest that each process-based structure is likely to be a custom fit. Leaders should bear in mind these principles as they pursue their own solutions:

Tomorrow's answer will be different from today's. As markets, competitors, and strategies evolve, so will the structural, people, and process elements of a coherent design system.

The specification of globally consistent roles and processes should be kept to a minimum. The most effective companies allow business units to tailor their organizations to local conditions so as to better achieve their wider commercial goals.

Technology has made location less important than it used to be-but it still matters. While videoconferencing and social media keep far-flung executives connected, co-location brings additional benefits. Companies should always seek ways to bring people physically together.

If the last 50 years are any guide, the most important organizational structure, process, and people issues will continue to ebb and flow as the environment evolves and organizations respond. But new opportunities for organizational innovation will present themselves, and those companies able to recognize and willing to embrace them will gain huge competitive advantage by doing so.

About the author(s)

Wouter Aghina is a principal in McKinsey's Amsterdam office, Aaron De Smet is a principal in the Houston office, and Suzanne Heywood is a director in the London office.

The authors would like to thank Vidushi Sharma and David Turnbull for their contributions to this article.

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The past and future of global organizations

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Consider if you will the following quotations, each from executives at Philips, the global technology company-one in the late 1970s and one quite recently: "We typically lose out when a market commoditizes and we no longer differentiate, further aggravated by us being too slow or expensive."

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also I learned, more than ever, private enterprise is being called upon to exercise social responsibility, especially when it comes to the environment.

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Sections of This Topic Include

Social Responsibility
Boards and Corporate Social Responsibility
General Resources for Social Responsibility

Learn More in the Library's Blogs Related to Ethics and Social Responsibility

In addition to the articles on this current page, also see the following blog that has posts related to Ethics and Social Responsibility. Scan down the blog's page to see various posts. Also see the section "Recent Blog Posts" in the sidebar of the blog or click on "next" near the bottom of a post in the blog. The blog also links to numerous free related resources.

Library's Business Ethics Blog

About Ethics, Principles and Moral Values

See a video about managing ethical and legal risks and boundaries, and what to do if you encounter ethical or legal issues. (The video is in the context of consulting, but applies to leading, as well.) From theConsultants Development Institute.

Simply put, ethics involves learning what is right or wrong, and then doing the right thing -- but "the right thing" is not nearly as straightforward as conveyed in a great deal of business ethics literature. Most ethical dilemmas in the workplace are not simply a matter of "Should Bob steal from Jack?" or "Should Jack lie to his boss?"

(Many ethicists assert there's always a right thing to do based on moral principle, and others believe the right thing to do depends on the situation -- ultimately it's up to the individual.) Many philosophers consider ethics to be the "science of conduct." Twin Cities consultants Doug Wallace and John Pekel (of the Twin Cities-based Fulcrum Group; 651-714-9033; e-mail at jonpekel@atti.com) explain that ethics includes the fundamental ground rules by which we live our lives. Philosophers have been discussing ethics for at least 2500 years, since the time of Socrates and Plato. Many ethicists consider emerging ethical beliefs to be "state of the art" legal matters, i.e., what becomes an ethical guideline today is often translated to a law, regulation or rule tomorrow. Values which guide how we ought to behave are considered moral values, e.g., values such as respect, honesty, fairness, responsibility, etc. Statements around how these values are applied are sometimes called moral or ethical principles. (Extracted from Complete (Practical) Guide to Managing Ethics in the Workplace.)

Value at Work ... and at Play
Why Integrity Is Never Easy
What are Values, Morals, and Ethics?

What is Business Ethics?

The concept has come to mean various things to various people, but generally it's coming to know what it right or wrong in the workplace and doing what's right -- this is in regard to effects of products/services and in relationships with stakeholders. Wallace and Pekel explain that attention to business ethics is critical during times of fundamental change -- times much like those faced now by businesses, both nonprofit or for-profit. In times of fundamental change, values that were previously taken for granted are now strongly questioned. Many of these values are no longer followed. Consequently, there is no clear moral compass to guide leaders through complex dilemmas about what is right or wrong. Attention to ethics in the workplace sensitizes leaders and staff to how they should act. Perhaps most important, attention to ethics in the workplaces helps ensure that when leaders and managers are struggling in times of crises and confusion, they retain a strong moral compass. However, attention to business ethics provides numerous other benefits, as well (these benefits are listed later in this document).

Note that many people react that business ethics, with its continuing attention to "doing the right thing," only asserts the obvious ("be good," "don't lie," etc.), and so these people don't take business ethics seriously. For many of us, these principles of the obvious can go right out the door during times of stress. Consequently, business ethics can be strong preventative medicine. Anyway, there are many other benefits of managing ethics in the workplace. These benefits are explained later in this document. (Extracted from Complete (Practical) Guide to Managing Ethics in the Workplace.)

Managing Ethics in the Workplace

Managing Ethics Programs in the Workplace

Organizations can manage ethics in their workplaces by establishing an ethics management program. Brian Schrag, Executive Secretary of the Association for Practical and Professional Ethics, clarifies. "Typically, ethics programs convey corporate values, often using codes and policies to guide decisions and behavior, and can include extensive training and evaluating, depending on the organization. They provide guidance in ethical dilemmas." Rarely are two programs alike.

"All organizations have ethics programs, but most do not know that they do," wrote business ethics professor Stephen Brenner in the Journal of Business Ethics (1992, V11, pp. 391-399). "A corporate ethics program is made up of values, policies and activities which impact the propriety of organization behaviors."

Bob Dunn, President and CEO of San Francisco-based Business for Social Responsibility, adds: "Balancing competing values and reconciling them is a basic purpose of an ethics management program. Business people need more practical tools and information to understand their values and how to manage them." (Extracted from Complete (Practical) Guide to Managing Ethics in the Workplace.)

Ethics Management Programs: An Overview
A Guide to Business Ethics: How to Navigate Ethical Issues in Small Business Business
Is It Time for a Unified Approach to Business Ethics?
10 Benefits of Managing Ethics in the Workplace
8 Guidelines for Managing Ethics in the Workplace
6 Key Roles and Responsibilities in Ethics Management
Organizational Character and Leadership Development

Developing Codes of Ethics

According to Wallace, "A credo generally describes the highest values to which the company aspires to operate. It contains the `thou shalts.' A code of ethics specifies the ethical rules of operation. It's the `thou shalt nots." In the latter 1980s, The Conference Board, a leading business membership organization, found that 76% of corporations surveyed had codes of ethics.

Some business ethicists disagree that codes have any value. Usually they explain that too much focus is put on the codes themselves, and that codes themselves are not influential in managing ethics in the workplace. Many ethicists note that it's the developing and continuing dialogue around the code's values that is most important. (Extracted from Complete (Practical) Guide to Managing Ethics in the Workplace.)

How to Write a Code of Ethics for Your Business
10 Tips for Writing an Amazing Code of Ethics
How to Write a Code of Ethics for Business

Developing Codes of Conduct

If your organization is quite large, e.g., includes several large programs or departments, you may want to develop an overall corporate code of ethics and then a separate code to guide each of your programs or departments. Codes should not be developed out of the Human Resource or Legal departments alone, as is too often done. Codes are insufficient if intended only to ensure that policies are legal. All staff must see the ethics program being driven by top management.

Note that codes of ethics and codes of conduct may be the same in some organizations, depending on the organization's culture and operations and on the ultimate level of specificity in the code(s). (Extracted from Complete (Practical) Guide to Managing Ethics in the Workplace.)

Effective Methods of Employee Code of Conduct Training
Rethinking Codes of Conduct
Establishing a Code of Business Ethics
Codes of Conduct in Light of Sarbanes-Oxley
7 Rules for Avoiding Conflicts of Interest in a Family Business

Resolving Ethical Dilemmas and Making Ethical Decisions

Perhaps too often, business ethics is portrayed as a matter of resolving conflicts in which one option appears to be the clear choice. For example, case studies are often presented in which an employee is faced with whether or not to lie, steal, cheat, abuse another, break terms of a contract, etc. However, ethical dilemmas faced by managers are often more real-to-life and highly complex with no clear guidelines, whether in law or often in religion.

As noted earlier in this document, Doug Wallace, Twin Cities-based consultant, explains that one knows when they have a significant ethical conflict when there is presence of a) significant value conflicts among differing interests, b) real alternatives that are equality justifiable, and c) significant consequences on "stakeholders" in the situation. An ethical dilemma exists when one is faced with having to make a choice among these alternatives.

What's an Ethical Dilemma?
Some Contemporary (Arguably) Ethical Issues
General Resources Regarding Managing Ethics in the Workplace
Social Responsibility (social responsibility is but one aspect of overall business ethics)
General Resources Regarding Social Responsibility
Lessons in Ethics from Richard Branson

Assessing and Cultivating Ethical Culture

Culture is comprised of the values, norms, folkways and behaviors of an organization. Ethics is about moral values, or values regarding right and wrong. Therefore, cultural assessments can be extremely valuable when assessing the moral values in an organization.

Assessing Corporate Culture - Part 1
Assessing Corporate Culture - Part 2
How to Create An Ethical Work Environment
How a Company Develops & Maintains an Ethical Environment
Culture Saves Lives
Combating the Hero Worship Culture at Penn State: the NCAA Got It Exactly Right

Ethics Training

The ethics program is essentially useless unless all staff members are trained about what it is, how it works and their roles in it. The nature of the system may invite suspicion if not handled openly and honestly. In addition, no matter how fair and up-to-date is a set of policies, the legal system will often interpret employee behavior (rather than written policies) as de facto policy. Therefore, all staff must be aware of and act in full accordance with policies and procedures (this is true, whether policies and procedures are for ethics programs or personnel management). This full accordance requires training about policies and procedures.

Do the Right Thing -- Ethics Training Programs Help Employees Deal With Ethical Dilemmas
Ethics Training and Development in the Military
Does Your Ethics and Compliance Training Meet the Standard?
Teaching Right and Wrong
Ethics Training: New Needs, New Times

Some Contemporary (Arguably) Ethical Issues

General Resources Regarding Managing Ethics in the Workplace

Social Responsibility

Social responsibility and business ethics are often regarding as the same concepts. However, the social responsibility movement is but one aspect of the overall discipline of business ethics. The social responsibility movement arose particularly during the 1960s with increased public consciousness about the role of business in helping to cultivate and maintain highly ethical practices in society and particularly in the natural environment.

Business for Social Responsibility (click on "Intro to Corporate Social Responsibility")
Business of Social Responsibility
"Winning with Integrity" - Business Impact Task Force Report Launched
Profit Versus Social Responsibility
Debate Social Responsibility -- a newsletter
Corporate Social Responsibility: An Insider's View
Responding to "The Case Against Social Responsibility"
Mother Theresa- An Inspiration For Social Responsibility
Corporate Social Responsibility: How Can Learning Contribute?
Four CSR Trends to Watch in 2011
Investing in Corporate Social Responsibility to Enhance Customer Value
Strategy and Society: The Link Between Competitive Advantage and Corporate Social Responsibility

Boards and Corporate Social Responsibility

The Business Case for Corporate Social Responsibility
The Corporate Responsibility to Respect Human Rights
Investing in Corporate Social Responsibility to Enhance Customer Value
Organizing for Corporate Responsibility and Sustainability
Sustainability in the Boardroom
Deconstructing Sustainability
6 Criteria for Selecting a CSR Consultant

General Resources Regarding Social Responsibility

There are many online resources in regard to social responsibility. The following will help to get your started.

Business for Social Responsibility
Educators for Social Responsibility
Behaviorists for Social Responsibility

For the Category of Ethics:

To round out your knowledge of this Library topic, you may want to review some related topics, available from the link below. Each of the related topics includes free, online resources.

Also, scan the Recommended Books listed below. They have been selected for their relevance and highly practical nature.
Related Library Topics Recommended Books

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Business Ethics and Social Responsibility

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Social Responsibility Boards and Corporate Social Responsibility General Resources for Social Responsibility In addition to the articles on this current page, also see the following blog that has posts related to Ethics and Social Responsibility. Scan down the blog's page to see various posts.

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Management is the process of planning, organizing, leading, and controlling people in the organization to effectively use resources to meet organizational goals.

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I have learned about management and how it can be defined.

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No cost, self-service portal for on-demand access to AWS' compliance reports. AWS Artifact is your go-to, central resource for compliance-related information that matters to you. It provides on-demand access to AWS' security and compliance reports and select online agreements.