This paper on "The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney" case study aims to analyze the two different case studies by exploring the knowledge about human resource management, human resource practices, and leadership throughout the organizations.
Gerry Yemen and Lynn A. Isabella
Harvard Business Review (UV6787-PDF-ENG)
July 19, 2013
Case questions answered:
- Explore the role of organizational values and culture in a large firm.
- Examine a leadership style and its influence on human management practices.
- How to establish human resource processes and maintain a competitive advantage.
- What kind of culture does WDC want to create?
- Create a pictorial image of how HR works at WDC, and be prepared to share your image in class.
- What is intriguing about how WDC manages its human resources toward that culture? Is WDC really a magical place?
- Are Walt Disney Company (WDC) human resources practices transferable outside the United States?
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The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney Case Answers
Executive Summary – The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney Case Study
This paper, “The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney,” aims to analyze the two different case studies by exploring the knowledge about human resource management, human resource practices, and leadership throughout the organizations.
In this paper, two case studies are used. These case studies, “Creating the Best Workplace on Earth” and “The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney,” both describe the practices followed by the organizations to provide a suitable workplace to the employees and fulfill the goals of the firms by giving good services to their customers.
By using both cases, we describe how organizations use their human resource management in order to maintain their competitive advantage over the other firms, the corporate cultures of the organizations, different leadership styles used by the company’s management, and functions of the human resource department.
Moreover, in this research, we explored both studies and interlinked the ideas of both to conclude how different organizations use their human resource skills to reach their goals. For the exploration of both cases, there are many other resources used in order to support the arguments.
Introduction
This assignment is based on the two case studies which are related to organizational culture, values, human resources, human resource management, and leadership. Both of them are explaining the ideal world.
The first one explains what factors help to make an ideal workplace. In contrast, the second one focuses on the imaginative world, which would provide excellent customer satisfaction by using human resources.
The study of “Creating the Best Workplace on Earth” is about how we can make any workplace ideal. Many executives who were interviewed for this have different opinions about expectations for the ideal workplace.
According to their analysis, six main factors help any organization to maintain a better working environment. Those six factors are:
- Every employee should know the current situation of the company
- The management should help their employees evolve their unique skills and qualities more
- Employees should never change their identity
- A firm should value its employees and all other valuable resources
- Never force your employees to follow stupid rules
- To motivate their employee, management should reward them for their daily achievements
These are the main things that make a dream workplace for any employee. Moreover, they want to promote the shared value thing in any organization. For that, the firm and its employees should not only fulfill their mission statements but should focus on their personal and organizational values equally (Goffee and Jones, 2013).
“The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney” case study also focuses on human resources, culture, and leadership styles. This study showed how Walt had made his dream place a reality.
Moreover, it explains how he managed his staff as a leader who came up with an excellent strategy for his Disneyland business. He believed that always treat your employees as your partners or guests to encourage and motivate them for their work.
This case study also showed how different cultures help Disney to attract more customers by following their values like quality, innovation, optimism, decency, and more. The Walt Disney Company (WDC) is based on an inspiring creativity model that focuses on four factors: organizational identity, structural systems, collaborative culture, and leader’s role. This model helped them to achieve great success because, until now, every kid, even teenagers, is fascinated by Disney characters.
Also, most individuals want to visit Disneyland once in their life. So, from here, it is clear that Walt’s way of handling his employees, guests, partners, and Disney characters made Disney successful (Yemen, 2014).
Q1. Explore the role of organizational values and culture in a large firm.
Organizational culture is a set of values, beliefs, opinions, expectations, and actions that would help the employees behave, dress, and act in the organization. The best thing about the culture is that if it works, then it helps the firm to improve its performance and productivity.
On the other hand, if it does not fit, it would create hurdles to success. Moreover, culture and values help the organization earn a competitive advantage and influence talent (Wong, 2020). The best indicator of customer satisfaction in every business is a positive cultural environment.
In “Creating the Best Workplace on Earth,” the author described the six main factors of an organizational culture that would help them create an excellent working environment.
There are many roles of corporate culture and values in a large firm:
- Helps shape the corporate identity: In any organization, the corporate culture helps to set specific goals and commitments for the organization, which further gives their employees a particular direction to work by developing their plans to achieve the final destination. Therefore, smoothly achieving the goals helps the organization to achieve success and to improve the identity of the organization (Alton, 2017).
- Helps to earn competitive advantage: The organizational culture and values allow the different skills to evolve according to the need. It also helps to select the employees for the work according to their talents. Moreover, as mentioned in the case study, if the organization’s culture allows the different skills to develop and present their ideas in the market, that will help them to achieve a competitive advantage. For example, in LVMH, the main factor for their success is diverse cultures and talents, which work co-operatively, and their employees are so creative. Also, they are capable of presenting their ideas, which helped them to achieve great success (Goffee and Jones, 2013).
- It promotes shared values and cooperation: Culture is a phenomenon that can’t work on an individual basis. So, to achieve success, the primary function of culture and values is to unite the different opinions and values of the employees to work together in a group. Moreover, this shared value culture helps to reduce the conflicts in the groups and promotes cooperation. By this, the employees forget about their incentives instead of focusing on the company’s goal (Groysberg & et al., 2018).
- It helps to build brand image and customer loyalty: If an organization’s culture allows the employees to be themselves, provides incentives daily, makes employees aware of the current happenings, and also does not force them to follow some stupid rules, then employees do their work with more enthusiasm. They do not feel stressed in that working environment and also give their best to attain maximum sales. If employees are treating their customers happy and excitedly, it would be helpful for them to achieve customer loyalty and the right brand image (Alton, 2017).
Therefore, these are some roles that are played by organizational culture for the benefit and success of any organization.
Q2. Examine a leadership style and its influence on human management practices.
Leadership is considered a core task of the organizational members creating, shaping, and negotiating the content of observational structures to represent normal working conditions (Smircich & Morgan, 1982).
In the case, “The Wonderful World of Human Resources at Disney,” Mr. Walter is…
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