Management and Operations: A Case Study of Apple's Leadership and Management

Management and Operations

Introduction

Apple is considered as one of the main industries that are performance-driven with providing continuous innovations in the world of computing to its customers. This study helps in better understanding the managerial qualities and leadership qualities of the Steve Jobs and Tim Cook along with theories that are implemented within its organisational structure.

Task 1, Part A

1(a): Examine specific situations in the history of Apple, where various managerial skills and leadership qualities (or lack of them) were demonstrated by the company’s top managers.

The emergence of iPhone back in 2007 has led to an immediate impact on the people worldwide making its one of the successful products of Apple till today. Making it sleek and full screen a few decades back with internet access and browsing led in transforming the perception of the mobile business along with targeting the economy as a whole. This innovation was accessed under the supervision of Steve Jobs exhibiting artistic flair and innovative ideas (apple.com, 2021). Showcasing the complex culture of autocratic,transformational, and transactional leadership qualities in taking decisions individually with clear communication outlining the vision made the company what it is today. The leadership traits helped in the workforce in excluding the complexities and pressure in taking prior decisions with complete focus on the assigned tasks. Ensuring increased productivity and providing direction to its employees in bringing effectiveness were done by Steve Jobs. However, the leader who demanded perfection from its worker was also considered to be ruthless believing in ushing its employees further. Depending on all the leadership traits Steve jobs helped in exercising increased market gains along with the innovation of new products along with the iPhone, namely iPad and iPod. Making significant changes within the organisation structure Steve presented in house rules and regulations that were strictly followed to gain priorities in the functioning fundamentals (Liu, 2020).

1(b): Your analysis should focus on the actions and achievements of Steve Jobs, and his successor (the current CEO), Tim Cook.

Steve Jobs

According to a journal “Comparison of Strategic Leadership: Steve Jobs and Tim Cook”, one of the instances takes place in China where most of the raw materials are sourced, were being continuously exploited in terms of wage difference. The exploitation led to suicides in the line of control. In addition to this issue, transactional leadership qualities by Steve Jobs worked well. The leadership traits that simplified the structure along with following the vision of the company. Another example of at the time he entered the company after NeXT, taking decisions of declutching all the products while focusing on simplicity by separating the structure into divisions namely, design, software, and hardware. However, this autoreactive decision failed in imparting knowledge from the employees in terms of meeting market demands (Kim, 2020).

Tim Cook

After losing Steve Jobs, Tim Cook had to face issues that were both internally and externally downsizing the market profits at the time of 2011, almost losing 6 per cent of the share price. With the experience of working in IBM, he headed the company towards global scales, supply chain and improved services. Making decisions that meant collaboration in the product division with leniency in the functional hierocracy made the in increased encouraging and self-engagement of the employers. Transformational leadership qualities of Tim Cook helped in ensuring the protection of the products in terms of data encrypts along with upliftment in both social and economic reforms. The situational factors that uncooked the sustainability of the company along with environmental concerns which exhibit increased Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) were encouraged by the transformational leadership of Tim Cook. However, still believing in the quality of the products the company servers along with increased productivity, the organisational structure was still rigid (Kim, 2020).

2(a): You should identify and analyse the specific strengths and weaknesses of the respective leaders in various situations, which should include examples of managing complexity and leading change.

The distinct study of that shows the strengths and weakness of the leadership qualities of both the leaders in support of accessing various situations are covered through a few examples. Overseas management implemented by Steve Jobs led to the failure of the concerned business structure in China leading to cases of suicides as mention before, showcasing the acknowledgement of transactional leadership that was not impacted by the firm’s production. However, this led to overseeing the loss of moral support from the man himself along with the inability to see the effect it could have brought in the wrong run. Whereas, the leadership qualities of Tim Cook show the contribution to the wellness to the community by deliveringimprovements in the personal devices through enhancing better privacy encryptions pursuing high morality and ethical standards.

Steve Jobs was a man of creativity which enabled the company to produce innovative advancements. During the administration, the innovation of iTunes that impacted the sale growth of iTunes and iPhones developed integration and direction of accessing high cost along with high risks. The leadership skills followed by Steve Jobs helped in launching new products in the market however failed to focus on the direction of meeting the objectives. This is very clear by Tim Cook, who improved the existing products while achieving better sustainability and objectives. Better recognition of was also achieved showing the leadership skills of Tim Cook, maintain its sales that is eventually growing with an estimation of 260.17 billion US dollar in 2019 (statista.com, 2021).

2(b): Link specific managers’/leaders’ actions to different theories and models of approach. These should include situational leadership, systems leadership, and contingency.

Situational Leadership

Developed by Dr Paul Hersey and Kenneth Blanchard, situational leadership traits focus on four styles namely, directing, coaching, supporting, and delegating. While determining the four levels of maturity the theory also focuses on the aligning to that of Apple (Henkel and Bourdeau, 2018). When applied, the company will exhibit in gaining greater knowledge to its employees at the time of starting a new project at hand along with providing more valuable training. This leadership style will also help the company in recognising various solutions at the time of dealing with several problems (Al Khajeh, 2018).

Systems Leadership

Systems leadership is often referred to as a set of skills that are capable of enabling support and process systems along with accessing the insight in order to mobilise innovation over a large scall of existing networks. Often used by large scall industries, following this leadership style will help in resolving matters that process high complexities along with bringing change that inherits transparency with the system.

Contingency

The innovation of Contingency Management Theory, introduced by Fred Fiedler showcases the leadership styles of a leader along with bringing effectiveness within the organisation. This could help in bringing significant change with Apple along with acknowledging the leadership traits of the current CEO, Tim Cook. Measuring the acceptance of the leader and the position it maintains while encouraging the employees will help in bringing more influence in self-engagement and accessing good relationship between the management and the workers.

2(c): You should include critical analysis of at least two of these stated theories.

Situational Leadership

Situational leadership constitutes of 4 major concerns that help in satisfying the organisational structure of a company along with encouraging adaptability in various situations. One of the leadership qualities is that it helps in weighing the variables during engagement within the workplace along with choosing the best strategy focusing on the goals. However, it could cause confusion because of the constant change in the organisational structure in accessing the need of the situation (Thompson and Glasø, 2018).

Figure 1: Situational Leadership Style

(Source: selfawareness.org.uk, 2013)

Contingency

Contingency theory implies the positional impact of the leader and its state of functioning with an organisation. Leadership traits that help in being the role model for the workers are appreciated in this management style. However, this includes to acknowledge various leadership styles that help in outlining the productivity of the concerned organisation. On the other hand, it helps in building proper communication with the workers along with meeting their demands and needs while measuring their outputs (Drier et al., 2019).

Task 1, Part B

1(a): You must identify two theoretical approaches which could help address the customer order fulfilment issues AND quality issues at Apple. You should choose from Six Sigma, LEAN/Kaizen, Just-In-Time/Just-In-Case, Sales & Operations Planning and TQM.

Figure 2: Six Sigma

(Source: Antony et al., 2017)

Six Sigma

The method that provides organisational tools in order to improve the process of the business along with increasing the business performance and increase the variation of the concerned process id refer as Six Sigma. This helps in detecting the improvements and reductions in the overall organisational structure in terms of profits, employee morale as well as the quality of the products. In order to address the quality production in Apple, implementation of Six Sigma will help in initiating direct impact on the products by accessing statistical training and focusedemphasis on the solving and analysing the errors with more control and initiating improvements (Laureaniand Antony, 2019).

Just-In-Time

One of the management theories that align in accessing raw materials directly from the suppliers within the schedules. The main focus of this strategy helps in reducing inventory costs by decreasing waste at the time of receiving thus increasing efficiency. Depending mainly on the enhanced supply chain process, this helps the manufacturing unit of Apple to move from one desk to another quicklywhile minimising the warehouse demands. After the implementation of Just-in-Time strategy, Apple can minimise cost evolved in the production along with fulfilling the customer orders rapidly (Rivera-Gómez et al., 2019).

1(b): You should clearly identify how each of your two stated theoretical approaches would address each issue; and the strengths and weaknesses of using those approaches in this context.

Six Sigma

Applying Six Sigma can help in signify the improvement of the employee while bringing change in the productivity within the organisation. However, there arefew disadvantages can be needed to be recognised to overcome future possibilities of a hindrance. Implementation of Six Sigma will help in gaining substantialamounts of empirical data. Based in bringing improvements in the products Apple has toconsider the adaptation of new protocols and increasing modern infrastructure will lead in increasing both the cost of the products as well as manufacturing involving a change in policies (Antony et al., 2017).

Just-In-Time

Increasing productivity through accessing goods directly from the suppliers will help Apple in implementing Just-in-Time strategy within its organisation fulfilling the customer orders. However, complications involve potential threats in the supply chain pipeline. Complete dependence in the effective supply of the goods and timed schedules is one of the concerning factors that lead in Just-in-Timestrategy to be quite risky. Proper backup and logistics that can increase the supply chain process with more indulgence in control of time are to be inherited by Apple in order to attend the mishap (Phan et al., 2019).

1(c): You should explain the role of management/leadership in your recommended approaches, and explain the business value of addressing these problems.

Contingency Management Theory

The main role of the Contingency Management Theory is to access the various adaptability in accordance to exercise various leadership skills and traits under its belt. As Apple mostly follows, autocratic, transformational and transaction leadership within the organisational work frameto access its effective business acquisition. The demand for a modern management system with thecompany will further help in rising social and economic reforms within the country along with specifying sustainability (Vidal et al., 2017). AdjuringContingency theory will help in providing better communication with the employees thus imparting a knowledgeableapproach further helped by rewards and recognition. This will also help Tim Cook to gain more footprint in increased recognition along with the establishment of improved leadership skill to motivate and encourage the workers. Heads-up in achieving worthy results that show increased approach to the working culture of the employees those are self-engaged and motivated will lead in producing improved results supporting renewed market gains. Falling under the attributes of situational leadership traits, contingency strategy also helps in minimising uncertain circumstances making it more profitable.

2(a): Identify potential factors in the business environment at Apple that may impact on the realistic possibility of carrying out your recommended approaches. Those factors should cover leadership/stakeholder relationships, competing interests and sources of conflict.

As Apple already leads by an example in terms of gaining increased markets and competitive edge than most of the brands, however, it has still failed to impact the market and the organisation in penetrating global market while eliminating the market presence. Studies from Statista shows the graph of net revenue of 260. 17 billion US dollars, a drop down to the earnings of the previous year that was estimated as 265.6 billion US dollars (statista.com, 2021). While the company has switched in controlling and improving the existing products rather than innovating new products in the market the company is need of motivation under the light of Tim Cook at the centre.

As recommended Contingency theory to address the downfall and rebuilding its organisational structure with improved market presence and brand loyalty. Apple also needs to recognise the various factors like stakeholder interest, leadership skills, competitive edge, and sources of conflict. Determining the impact of the strategy will help in satisfying the leadership skills of Tim Cook with more concern to its employees in terms of motivation and encouragement ultimately leading in the smooth functioning of the organisation. Providing training programs will help in up growing the working culture along with motivation in producing quality goods. Brands like Samsung and One Plus has recognised in market demands and acted accordingly exhibiting situational leadership qualities. This shows the need for contingency strategy in order to profile the needs of the customers and gain a competitive edge over other brands (Cote, 2017).

2(b): Analyse how those factors might impact on the decisions managers/leaders will need to make with regard to carrying out your recommended approaches.

Implementing the Contingency Management Theory will initially bring change in the leadership style in Apple while prioritising the decisions of Tim Cook. One of the first impacts will help the leaders of Apple to come close to the employees buildingtransparency while seeking more motivation in leading increased productivity. Secondly, it will also help in acknowledging the needs and desires of the employees. Rewards and recognition will help in cultivatingself-motivation along with showcasing in idolising the leadership traits with the management. This will also help in a gradual increase in CSR making it sustainable in the long run. However, it will also leave in having full control over the employees, unlike autocratic leadership traits. As it is based on taking faster decisions by an individual aligning with that of Tim Cook will also impact in increasing complexities in the decision making.

Conclusion

This study finally concludes the various leadership and managerial skills used by both Steve Jobs and Tim Cook in increasing production of Apple. It conveys several ideas conveying the responsibilities and strategies varying from each other in the different leadership traits. Based on the findings from various articles and journals along with the in-depth study of the functioning fundamentals of Apple has reflected in showcasing the importance of the study while identifying the differences in accessing increased market profits.

Reference List

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