Functional Areas of Business: Descriptions, Key Areas, and Employee Skills

This article provides an overview of the functional areas of business, including descriptions of key areas such as marketing, HR, customer service, finance, and research and development. It also discusses the skills needed by employees to work effectively in each area.

Business Functional
areas

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Describing business.....................................................................................................................1
Functional areas of business........................................................................................................1
Key functional area of business..................................................................................................2
Description of the various functional areas in business organization.........................................2
Description of the types of skills needed by employees to be able to work effectively in
different functional areas.............................................................................................................3
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................5
References:.......................................................................................................................................6

INTRODUCTION
Functional areas of business are those areas which is concern with performing daily
activity of an company. The main purpose of business functional areas is to make sure that all all
functional activities are going in right direction or not (Hu. and Han, 2019). Analysing the
performance of different departments within an organisation help the company to maintain
efficiency in their productivity and it also help in finding out that which department is lacking
behind in performing well and taking corrective measures to remove all those obstacles which is
presented. Functional areas of a business are HR department, marketing department, customer
service support and many others. IOM Electronics Ltd. is a British small scaled company which
was founded by John. They have their offices in Manchester and Liverpool, UK. They are well
known for regional organisation with total 200 employees. The following report covers
description of business, functional areas, list of functional areas for an company and employees
skills in different functional areas.
MAIN BODY
Describing business
Business is an economical activity which is done with the main aim of earning money
and for gaining fame. Sometimes business is done for societies benefit and well-being like
business for charitable missions which is involve to increase life standards of poor people. It
covers buying and selling activities where it is compulsory to have at least a buyer and a
consumer. Most of the businesses has the main aim of earning profit by satisfying their
customers by their offered products and services in market. Business can be done by single
person as well as more than one person (Wang and et. al., 2021).
Functional areas of business
Functional areas of business covers all those activities and departments which is done to
achieve organisational goal. In simple words it consist of main functional activities and
departments of a company. This departments contribute in increasing overall productivity by
increasing their daily performance. A business can not survive longer in the absence of
functional departments. HR, marketing department, production department, customer support
department and many others are the example of functional department. Nature and aim of
business describe that which department is considered their main functioning area.
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Key functional area of business
IOM Electronic Ltd. is an electronic company which deals in manufacturing and selling
different electronic items. The main functions or main activities of an electric company is to
design and manufacture product, involve themselves in marketing research to know who are their
customers and to identify the needs and demands of their customers. Managing workforce is also
one of the main task of this industry. Hence, it is clear that IOM Electronics Ltd. Consist of few
main functional areas which are research and development department, sales and marketing
department, manufacturing department, HR department and customer service department.
Description of the various functional areas in business organization
There are various functional areas in every company, some are managed by single person in sole
proprietorship and some are managed by a group of people in partnership, public and private
limited companies(Luo and et. al., 2021). In IOM Electronics Ltd. their key functional areas are
explained below-
Marketing department- This is the department which is concern to do marketing research
or marketing analysis. This main task of this department is to analyse market by identifying
targeted customer, needs and wants of customers, competitive environment and identifying all
those basic factors which impact upon business.
Human resource department- This HR department is consist of managing manpower
within the organisation. In context of IOM Electronic Ltd., initially the owner John is supposed
to manage whole business because its a small scaled company with few number of employees
but now recently its growing and expanding its business in two different areas. Hence they need
HR department to control employees and their performance in their organisation. The main work
performed by HR department is recruiting and hiring of new employees, recording managing
performance of employees, taking decisions on strategic matters, making policies for company,
handling grievances within offices and etc.
Customer service department- This department consist of contacting and communicating
to customers directly by listening their complaints and solving it. In electronic industry, customer
service department is compulsory to know whether their customers are satisfied with their
products or not(Zeng and et. al., 2021). The main functioning activities of this department are
listening complaints of customers, passing the issues of customer to those department in which
the problem is related, suggesting senior authority that how customers get more satisfied and
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what are the common complaints of customers so that management team will take corrective
measures. Helping customers to understand the basic features of products and how to use them is
also an main activity of customer service department.
Finance department- This is the department which is consist of handling inflows and
outflows of cash related to business transactions within the company. The main source of
surviving for a business if funding and their performance. In context of IOM Electronic Ltd.,
they financial department is responsible of making financial statements like profit and loss
accounts and balance sheets. They are also responsible to pass the necessary information about
unwanted expenses to management team so that they can handle the issue. They are also
responsible to pay corporate tax on time and analyse proper funding sources of company.
Research and development department- This department plays an most important role in
directing the strategic decisions of a business. The main activities of this department is to test the
quality of product and suggest the requirement of improvement needed in product (Khan, Daddi
and Iraldo, 2020). They develop new and innovative products, they suggest which machines and
equipments are required for the company to increase their productivity and employees
performance.
Sales department- This department is concern with the main aim of handling sales
activity of a company. The main functional activities of sales department is to help them to sell
their all products which is kept in warehouses, maintain permanent contact from customers to
sell them product whenever they need and identifying business opportunities that how can they
increase their sells.
Description of the types of skills needed by employees to be able to work effectively in different
functional areas
It is very necessary to have some special skills for employees to become the member of a
particular department. Some different departments and their key skills for employees are
mentioned below-
Marketing department- Employees of marketing department must have few skills like-
 Business environment analysis skill- They must have the skill of analysing market by
identifying all factors which impact upon business. Their knowledge in this field is most
important for the company to grow.
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 Communication skill- It is necessary that employees of marketing department must have
good communication skills to communicate with customers or others to know marketing
conditions(Kanashiro and Rivera, 2019).
Human resource department- This department is concerning to manage employees and
performance within the company so the basic skills of employees in this department are
mentioned below-
 Good decision maker- It is essential to HR employees to have good decision making
skills to make proper and appropriate decisions in needed areas. Good managerial skills- This skills involve managing people, assigning task to right
person at right place on right time, managing resources within the company, measuring
and controlling performance of employees and many others. All this skills are required in
HR department employee.
Customer service department- This department is responsible for handling customers and their
needs and complaints. Some skills which is required by customer service department are-
 Good communications skills- It is necessary for employees in this department to have
good speaking and listening skills. They must communicate in polite ways to their
customers and listen properly about needs and wants of customers. Coordinative skills- It is essential that these employees must have good coordinative
skills to coordinate and pass information to those departments by which customers are
complaining more.
Finance department- This department handle financial information of a company. The following
skills of employees in this department are mentioned below-
 Time management skill- Time management is most important for employees of finance
department because they are responsible to pay tax on time, mentioning expenses and
incomes on the same day when it occurs and suggesting appropriate time for funding and
paying dividend to shareholders(Choi, Jeong and Kim, 2019). Predicting future skills – Another main task of finance manager is to prepare budget for
whole department which is concerning of predicting that how much expenses is required
in which activities in future.
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Research and development department- This department is concerning with testing product and
identify any changes required to manufacture a perfect product. Some of the key skills required
by their employees are as follows-
 Better analysing skill- It is compulsory that employees must have good skill of analysing
what all changes is required by the company to make it more developed. Coordinative skill- Employees of R&D department must have good coordination with
every department to suggest them any changes which is required for business benefit
(Wang and et. al., 2021).
Sales department- This department's main focus is on how to increase the sells of their
manufactured products. The following skills are required in this department-
 Influencing skills- It is compulsory that sales department have the skill to influence
customer that their product is best from other brand products.
 Communication skills- It is important that sales man of sales employees must have good
communication skill to convey all information to customers about the product so that
they attract to buy the product.
CONCLUSION
From the above information it is clear that functional departments of an organisation
includes all main activities which is concerning to surviving of businesses. There are many key
functional areas of an company according to their nature and aim to perform business. Some
functional departments are marketing department, customer service department, human resource
department, finance department and many more. All department have different skills to perform
their task but most common skill of all department is communication skill. All department need
good communication and good coordination with each other to support their business growth.
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References:
Books and Journals
Choi, S.J., Jeong, J.C. and Kim, S.N., 2019. Impact of vocational education and training on adult
skills and employment: An applied multilevel analysis. International Journal of
Educational Development. 66. pp.129-138.
Hu, Y. and Han, Y., 2019. Identification of urban functional areas based on POI data: A case
study of the Guangzhou economic and technological development
zone. Sustainability. 11(5). p.1385.
Kanashiro, P. and Rivera, J., 2019. Do chief sustainability officers make companies greener? The
moderating role of regulatory pressures. Journal of Business Ethics. 155(3). pp.687-701.
Khan, O., Daddi, T. and Iraldo, F., 2020. Microfoundations of dynamic capabilities: Insights
from circular economy business cases. Business Strategy and the Environment. 29(3).
pp.1479-1493.
Luo, S. and et. al., 2021. The Influence of Spatial Grid Division on the Layout Analysis of Urban
Functional Areas. ISPRS International Journal of Geo-Information. 10(3). p.189.
Wang, Z. and et. al., 2021. Identifying Urban Functional Areas and Their Dynamic Changes in
Beijing: Using Multiyear Transit Smart Card Data. Journal of Urban Planning and
Development. 147(2). p.04021002.
Zeng, Y. and et. al., 2021. Accumulation and health implications of metals in topsoil of urban
riparian zone adjacent to different functional areas in a subtropical city.
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