Administration and management at Canada Dry : a report

Abstract

The primary aim of this exercise is that of performing an organisation analysis of an industrial enterprise i.e. of going through the process of defining the aims, objectives, activities and structure of the enterprise in the light of a study of its external environment and internal circumstances. Parallel to this an organisation analysis of the New Lyceum will be carried out. In the process one analyses the strengths and the weaknesses of each organisation and determines which activity carried out in the industrial enterprise can be carried over to the educational one. In order to be able to perform the evaluation I was allowed to carry out a three weeks observation-with-work experience, as per attached Appendix A. My heartfelt thanks go to the General Manager of Canada Dry, Mr John Dacoutros, for meeting my request and to the majority of the staff with whom I shared my experience. Questions that crossed my mind as soon as I stepped in included 'who does what?', 'how are functions and people grouped together?', 'what lines and means of communication are established?', 'how are people helped to understand their roles in relation to the objectives of the organisation and the roles of their colleagues?'. It soon became evident that the organisation is divided into a number of departments, each department performing a set of related activities. The supervisors or first-line managers control the intra-departmental activities with the senior management team co-ordinating the inter-departmental activities. Thus, the organisational structure may be seen as a system consisting of units and positions between which there exist relationships involving the exercise of authority and the communication and exchange of information. A collective effort is thus explicitly organised to achieve specific ends. Below the formal structure one could not ignore the existence of an informal organisation, consisting of a network of informal social roles and relationships.