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Case Analysis: General Semiconductor
Synopsis: Ronald Ostertag, new senior manager of General Semiconductor wanted to implement a corporate-wide company culture change. With challenges lying with the inept senior managers, major changes were needed to make the flailing multi-million dollar company into a success.
One of the biggest actions Ostertag undertook when trying to change the company culture was creating the company’s mission statement and company values. One of the biggest influencing factors in how well a company succeeds depends on the company’s values. A clear goal makes striving towards it much easier than hoping things will just work out, and creating values help set that goal. By focusing on such values like quality, on-time, and integrity, General Semiconductor is able to allow everyone to know what the company is striving to accomplish.
Another important action that took place was spreading and reinforcing the new values. By making sure that every employee in General Semiconductor knew those values, the new culture is seeded to take effect rapidly. To reinforce the company values, the HR staff created an information binder on the company’s core information. By implementing this change, the company was able to allow employees to understand what is expected of them and thus allow them to not only strive towards those goals, but do it autonomously as well.
The change to the company culture played a large part in the company’s improved performance. To reiterate a little, focused goals mean employees have a better idea on what is to be done and how to do it. The previous culture did not foster the ideals of quality, integrity, and others, as suggested through the case overview. With the senior managers arguing amongst themselves during an important meeting, this implies a very disorganized culture where there are no rules of conduct or guidelines to follow. As compared to the latter, where everyone could recite most of the company’s core values, this change in culture is one of the driving points of the improved productivity.
Of all the changes Ostertag made as manager, the most questionable act was the laying off of the entire senior management. While it helped bring in a new and more experienced management team in to implement the change, the loss of the sense of job security in the company could have potentially created a negative impact on employee productivity. Massive layoffs, or even replacing a large portion of the senior management has a large potential in influencing company moral. This means that a big change in the company structure also has a large impact, and changing the culture could mean a change in the structure of the company as well.
The lesson learned here is that knowing how to get the right culture working with the company is important to being successful or not. Being able to determine what is needed to make things successful plays a large role in this success. By measuring how deep the values penetrate within the company and making sure that they stay rooted firmly in place amongst all the employees should be of the utmost priority. Ostertag was able to do this whenever he would approach an employee and have him recite a few of the core values of General Semiconductor. As such, the key to making a successful culture is to make sure everyone knows the values and abides by them.