From the learning course, I understand that business policy requires recognition and authority at the top decision-making level. Organizational programs must be carefully planned and based not merely on knowledge of internal corporate affairs, but also on knowledge of external environments. A homeostatic point of equilibrium between customer wants and needs, is called for on the one hand, and corporate goals and resources on the other. Under this approach, American business, and indeed the American economy, accepts the concept that improved marketing capabilities will furnish answers for some of the economy’s basic problems by directing the business to profitable growth opportunities.
Business organizations in the future are more likely to make fundamental and continuous corporate adjustments to the demands of shifting market environments. To date, relatively few have truly adopted a market orientation, despite the lip service that has been paid to marketing as an orientation in business. Such factors as continued economic growth, increased disposable income, vigorous domestic and foreign competition, accelerating technology, automation, population decentralization, expansion, and innovation will spur the appearance of this new marketing form. This change stems from the aggressive marketing activities and responsibilities adopted by management. A mass economy caters to the market, meeting its wants and needs, eschewing the notion that “we can make anything we can sell.” It is this approach that is followed when marketing is considered the essential business function (Gregory et al 98). This approach suggests that a business should be seen from the customer’s and consumer’s standpoint. All-encompassing, this concept of marketing enters the enterprise at the beginning of the production cycle, is coordinated with all the phases of the business, and permeates all its areas.
implementation of the marketing philosophy; the particular marketing organizational arrangements, or posture, adopted by a specific company in carrying out these changes refers to the marketing concept (Gregory et al 55). The philosophy is broader than the organizational concept. Implementation of the marketing philosophy occurs through a company’s marshaling of its marketing capabilities – its marketing concept. The mission means that such activities as pricing, management of the sales force, advertising, personal selling, credit, physical distribution, and other marketing efforts should be integrated, coordinated, and directed at satisfying consumer wants. It also emphasizes that the success of the firm is dependent on profitable sales, which in turn depend on consumer action. The organizational concept refers to a company’s management of its marketing resources, with particular emphasis on the organization of marketing activities. The marketing concept is not new (Gregory et al 132). The emphasis it is now receiving, and its general acceptance by top management as an approach to business problem-solving, is. It results in a new relationship between marketing, manufacturing, and finance, with greater emphasis given to the importance of marketing factors and marketing information in shaping corporate effort. The concept may be implemented through such organizational techniques as holding planning sessions, making position audits, specifying future projects, establishing a market calendar, communicating with the sales force, providing identity for the marketing program developed, eliciting market research information, and furnishing effective sales tools (Gregory et al 133). Organizational policy may be considered an intervening variable which, to a large extent, links the relationship between the company on the one hand and society on the other. Previously, production was this variable. Organization forms suited to production were developed. Now new forms must be developed to reflect the role of marketing. For instance, the systems approach to marketing., changes in markets, cost-price pressures, evolution of the product and brand manager concept, the shifting distribution structures, and changes in physical distribution, have resulted in the need for new views. They require systems of interrelationships among people, [functions, and activities. Organizational coordination and integration of behavior and activities to achieve a firm’s objectives should be achieved at three levels: the extracorporate level, which coordinates the marketing activities of separate businesses; the interdepartmental level, which coordinates with other departments; and the intradepartmental level, which coordinates within marketing.
In sum, the course helps me to understand the core principles of organizational policy and its functions. The classical doctrine is concerned mainly with the anatomy of formal organization, and focuses on the division of labor, scalar and functional processes, structure, and the span of control. The study of line and staff structures falls into this realm. It is associated with the emphasis on human relations. Modern organization theory is integrative and studies organizations as systems of mutually dependent variables. It investigates the parts of the system, the formal organization, the informal organization, the pattern of behavior resulting from the interaction of the two, the physical setting, and the linkage process.
Works Cited
Gregory G. Dess, et al. Strategic Management: Creating the Competitive Advantage, McGraw Hill, 2007.