The Strength and Weaknesses of Structure and Systems In A School

During our business lesson on wednesday we were seperated into groups and discussed the 7S Matrix of a business organization. Our group worked on the structure and system branches of the 7S Matrix. Below are the conclusions we reached as a group.

Structure:
Departments:
o Strength: Each department is responsible of its own job. They specialize on the field in which they are good at. So the efficiency of the school increases.
- Decentralized:
o Strength: By this, people concentrate on their own field. They can be more successful by only specializing on their own profession. They can be more ambitious and as a result, more successful.
o Weakness: If they specialize too much, they can diverge from the subject.
- Solid Relationship:
o Strength: Even though, there are departments of everything, the connection between them is solid, which makes the cooperative. If there weren’t a solid connection, than the school wouldn’t be able to survive.
Systems:
- Service bus system:
o Strength: The school being too far away from the city leads it for a need of transportation system. Our schools bus system allows all students to arrive at school at the same time. Also safely.
- Food system:
o Strength: It is healthy. It is adequate. Varied food options.
- Assessment system:
o Strength: What we learn in class (input) are tested by several quizzes, projects, assignments etc. to get the feedback of the inputs, the assessment system is used.
o Weakness: The grading system, which is a part of the assessment system, tests the students knowledge according to a 40 minute long exam and most of the students grade comes from this system. It isn’t an effective way of evaluating students. A student may not show all his capability in an exam. As a result, they cannot get the grade they deserve

18/10/2010

Today we had our first business quiz. Below you can find the notes I took while we were discussing the answers and some other additional notes I took during the lesson.

1) Define private sector

Private sector is the sector of business which has nothing to do with the government. It’s independent from the government.
2) What are the service sectros of an economy?

Tertiary and quaternary sectors of an economy are the only service sectors.
3) What is the difference between these sectors?
Tertiary sector - sells goods to the customer
Quaternary sector- the activities are not related to the primary, secondary or the tertiary sector e.g.education institutes, hair dressers, advertising, marketing, financial works or individual business.
4) The mission of a business defines- its purpose of existence
5- Why do we need to do an analysis of the external environment of a business?
We need to do an analysis of the external environment of a business to plan what you will do with the business. In order to plan the future you must now where you are now (your current position).

SWOT

"SWOT" stands for; strengths, weaknesses, oppotunities and threats in a business.
The SW part of SWOT:
It stands for the internal factors affecting a business.
Strenghts are positive internal factors , while the weaknesses are negatively affect.

These internal factors are called the 7S Matrix ;

Strategy-the path/mission organization chose for its development

Structure- the way the organization developes itsself.

Systems-the procedures and processes of the organization

Skills-the capabilities of the organization

Staff-the human resources of the organiation

Style-the approach of the organization

Shared Values- the values of the organization

All the S's in the 7S Matrix are related to one another so, all are need for a successful business, if one is missing than the company cannot be successful.

The structure, strategy and systems are called Hard S's because they cannot be changed. They do not depend on a single thing.

The skills,style and and staff on the other hand are Soft S's, they are related to individuals in a business organization. They are the part of the 7S Matrix which can change.

The OT part of SWOT:
It stands for the external factors affecting a business.
The opportunities are the positive external factors and the threats are the negative ones.

The external factors affecting a business as we can remember is STEEPLE( social, technological, economic, ethnic, politics, legal and environmental)

STEPS OF PLANNING

SWOT
1-Where are we now?
STRATEGY
2-What should we do to get where we want to be? What is your strategy?
OBJECTIVES/GOALS
(These are not purposes, the purposes don’t change and could be find in the mission section however the goals of a business company can/must change from time to time)
3-Where do we want to be (in time/horizon X)?
CONTROL
4- How do we know we are getting there?

ALL OF THE STEPS OF PLANNING HAPPENS IN TIME X WHICH DOESN'T CHANGE.

TIME is a very important factor in business, everything is related to time. Thus time should be pricise to constantly improve.

EXTERNAL INFLUENCES ON BUSINESS!

STEEPLE

Social
Technological
Ethical
Economic
Political
Legal
Environmental

*THESE ARE THE FACTORS THAT POSITIVELY OR NEGATIVELY AFFECT A BUSINESS.

*Examples for the social factor,
If the school increases the scholarship program then there would be more students coming ,
Demographic profiles of the families of the students in the school.
*Examples for the economic factor,
Dollar increases weakly. This is good for imports. If your company has a loan of 1 million dollars and if dollar weakens then its beneficial for you, because you wouldn't have to pay more for your imports.(Depends on what aspect you look it can hurt you or benefit you)

How do you distinguish between a social and economic factor?
Social factors have to do with; religion, class, ethnic identities and occupations. Economic is some factor in the economy.
E.g. let us think that the ministry decides that no longer the Jewish people can go to school; then this would be a social change because it affects the society.

The politics factor:
This factor is greatly influenced by the ideologies of people. For example, the school would need a change if most of the parents change their attitudes towards the education given in the particular school. Educational companies have always something to do with politics. This reveals that they are dependent to eachother. Politics interferes with education nearly all the time.

Afghanistan – do you want to open a business there?
There is no competition in Afghanistan which may lead to more profit in the business done.

THE HIGHER THE RISK, THE HIGHER THE REWARD!!

11/10/2010- Qualities of a business blog

A business blog should be;

1) Persuasive & convincing
-in terms of comments/observations/interpretations

2) Engaging & appealing
-must include visual material

3) Informative
-how can you make it more informative? Use other resources to add to your current notes
-is it accurately informative? Not exaggerated & repetitive

4) Try to impress;
-Business partners,
-Employees,
by the language you use- using business terms/ concepts/ models.

	Excellent 5	Good 4	Satisfactory 3	Mediocre 2	Poor 1
Persuasive and convincing	The comments and interpretations are well explained with details and are convincing. Several appropriate examples are used to develop the ideas.	The comments and interpretations are explained and include mostly appropriate examples.	The comments and interpretations include errors and are not very persuasive. There are few examples to support the ideas.	The comments and interpretations lack examples and supports. The ideas are mostly not persuasive or convincing.	The comments and interpretations are not explained and include major errors. The information is not convincing.
Engaging and appealing	Visual materials (diagrams, images, concept maps) have been used to make the blog more interesting are appropriate and relevant to the topic/subject.	Visual materials have been made use and generally relevant to the topic/subject. The blog is generally interesting.	Some relevant and some irrelevant visual material has been made use.	There are very few visual material, generally irrelevant.	No use of diagrams, images etc. or includes visual materials but are irrelevant.
Informative	The information given is accurate. There is no exaggeration and repetition of the ideas stated. There are many evidences of the other resources are used to develop the notes taken in class.	The information is mostly accurate but includes minor errors. Repetition and exaggeration is few. There is evidence of the other resources used.	The information given is satisfactory but consist some minor and few major errors. There are few repetitions and exaggerations.	The information gives is poorly justified and includes exaggeration and repetition. The use of other resources is poor. There are some major errors.	The information given is generally irrelevant or not accurate. There are major errors in the information. No evidence of other resources. The information is repetitive and exaggerated.
The use of language	The language is relevant to the topic and business models and terms are made use. There are business concepts in the blog and they are applied correctly. The blog impresses the employees, teachers and other business partners.	The language is mostly relevant and includes business terms and concepts. It is mostly impressive.	Some business terms and concepts have been made use, but there are errors made.	The language is mostly inappropriate. Very few evidence of business terms and concepts.	The language structure is inappropriate. No evidence of business concepts, models etc. It’s not impressive

04/10/2010

*Businesses often make a decision among;
What is happening in the short run – your profits might decrease
What is happening in the long run– production & profits will increase

*Business opportunity: Scanning the market and finding an opportunity that fits your personal strengths and qualities (the strengths and qualities that you have access to)

Leadership + Ownership + management of resources + discipline(partners) + patience
Risk taking
Creativity
Innovation

*Upside of specialization: to increase productivity/efficiency
Downside of specialization: the employee gets bored the quality decreases

*Departments exist only to have people specialize in it.
E.g. there is a part of school which specializes on accounting and managing the schools financial business.

*Size=scale
Large scale org.’s can offer more people who are specialists.

*A system can be a part of another system.
Feedback is in the form of information.
Output is physical.

1/10/2010

On Friday(1st Oct.) we had our first lesson with Mr.Sen which was a general review of the activities we've done during his absence. Our discussion was on the topics below :

• QUALITY, of a non profit organization cannot be measured by a certain thing; there must be a criteria to determine the quality of the company. Thus, you cannot use the same criteria for every company, since every company specializes on different things.
• SPECIALIZATION, is the way of focusing on a particular range of products. It requires higher knowledge and care on producing. Specializing also increases efficiency, but on the other hand it has some disadvantages. It may lead to routine jobs and boredom. For example, if you make a worker work for the same thing all the time, he'll eventually get bored. If the employees/workers work with dissatisfaction than the efficiency will decrease.
• EFFICIENCY, is the same thing with productivity. It is found by the ratio of the outputs to inputs. Efficiency is not a pure number, since it's found by the ratio of different things.