Element 3 Case Study: Change in Organizational Culture at Jaguar

1. Introduction
In human resource management, the organizational culture is characterized as a lot of
activities, values, convictions, practices and wants shared by a gathering of individuals
who are working in a similar workplace or at an organization (Ebert, 2011). As indicated
by Schultz and Ravasi (2006) the organizational culture is a lot of basic mental
components and suppositions.

The main idea of organizational culture has advanced from before ideas of
organizational atmosphere or corporate culture that were prevalent during the twentieth
century (Mullins, 2007). The exchange of organizational culture applies to a wide range
of sorts of organizations from non-profit organizations, for example, charities and
emergency clinics to profit making ones like banks, producers and private institutions.

2. Background of Jaguar’s Cultural Transition

Jaguar is a automobile producer starting in the UK and is known worldwide for top
quality and luxurious autos. After some time the organization experienced an
adjustment in culture so as to adjust itself to 21st century automobile production.
Organizational culture relates to the general persona of an organization and may
include things, for example, organization arrangement and system that identify with how
workers are supposed to and not supposed to work. For example a few organizations
are more unique where employees are given more independence and can settle on
their own choices and go for some decisions by their own. While others like Jaguar
follow their policies and enable little opportunity to employees. The aim is on keeping up
their tradition and culture.

3. Cultural Changes in Automobile Industry

Over the previous century the automobile business has experienced cultural changes
much like the world's culture have developed. At the approach of the twentieth century,
the industry was ruled by Fordism, a culture that appeared when Henry Ford began
manufacturing the Ford Model (Schein, 2010). This culture was essentially based on
producing traditional cars that needed to experience a standardized procedure to
complete a standard outcome. The procedure of automobile making was clear and
straight forward where the activity of every worker was fixed and did not change.
Individuals working at a location were recognized what was expected from them and as
time passes they would become better in their respective tasks.

The end of twentieth century created a challenge from the east. Japanese automobiles
ruled the market and with their less costs and comfort, they were now ahead of the
companies like Jaguar, TQM (Total Quality Management) was implemented by the
Japanese and ensured prominent quality and speed of production. One of the keys to
TQM is appointment of duty down through the positions (Shiba et. al., 2010), something
that conflicts with Fordism.

4. Response to Cultural Change

In a more competitive atmosphere, organizations should have been ready to quickly
adapt to the changing requests and try to innovate. Automobile organizations could
never again remain inside the policy of delivering a standard automobile however
needed to adapt to the requests of creating cars of all shapes and sizes, each should be
different to other in their maintenance and capacity. This raised the need to expand the
employment department which would have workers who have innovative minds and
ability to cooperate. This was when numerous western automobile manufacturers began
adapting the Japanese work culture.

During the 1990s, because of Ford's expansion into a worldwide level, it took over
Jaguar. This implied Ford needed to begin building Jaguars at its plant in Halewood,
Merseyside, UK where already its laborers had been making Ford Escort following a
Fordist organizational culture. This step also forced them to change their way of using
their employees, they now required their employees to be more creative in their
approach in order to get rid of Fordism.

5. Jaguar’s Changing Culture and Strategy

So as to present another organizational culture, Jaguar concentrated on the evolution of
its technique and its structure with the required culture. An organization’s strategy is its
general business planning and the arranging that goes into acheiving business targets.
Similarly, the structure comprises of frameworks, techniques and procedures that helps
in producing strategic directions.

As a major aspect of moving from a Fordist to a much organized work culture, the need
was in changing the mentality of the laborers from needing to be determined what to do
to choosing what's ideal and after that doing it. One of the signs of TQM is lean
generation. This includes leaving of wasteful and inefficient techniques for getting things
done so similar outcomes are generated in shorter measure of time and with less waste.
The execution of lean creation at the Halewood Jaguar plant implied that employees
were encouraged to work in groups while also inspecting results and thinking about
upgrades. They now had a power to make decisions and were also given a bit room for
taking risks.

Jaguar's program at Ford’s plant was based on the following vision:

 This step would produce world class autos while guaranteeing work fulfillment
and employment stability to the workers.
 The facility would be a sheltered workplace where innovativeness and passion
for greatness will bring improvement.
 The management will concentrate on improvement and decent variety in
employment and will give extra training and education to them.
 The management and the workforce will cooperate to build volume and
productivity and make new employments.
 The facility will take care of the atmosphere and will effectively support the local
network.

6. Conclusion
The cultural change presented at the Halewood plant was exceedingly effective and
was taken off to different plants of Ford. It was a great advantage for jaguar for being a
part of Ford. The fordist culture could have harmed jaguar badly, because of some
crude materials and a lot of care required assembling its vehicles, it profited by Ford's
decision and implementation of Japanese organizational culture and ideas of TQM
which ensured constant improvement. These enabled Jaguar to keep up as well as
improve the quality of its vehicles while limiting waste and expenses.

References
Ravasi, D., & Schultz, M. (2006). Responding to organizational identity threats:
Exploring the role of organizational culture. Academy of management journal, 49(3),
433-458.

Mullins, L. J. (2007). Management and organisational behaviour. Pearson education.

Schein, E. H. (2010). Organizational culture and leadership (Vol. 2). John Wiley & Sons.

Shiba, S., Graham, A., & Walden, D. (1993). A new American TQM: Four practical
revolutions in management (pp. 411-460). Portland, OR: Productivity Press.

Ebert, R. J. (2011). Business essentials. Pearson Education.