Analysis of Snapchat's Organizational Structure and Strategy

This assignment delves into the organizational structure of Snapchat, identifying it as a functional structure with a strong emphasis on situational management. The cultural web framework is also analyzed, highlighting the core power making high-level business decisions within the CEO and business executives. Additionally, the cost leadership strategy and Porter's generic strategy are discussed, as well as the company's focus on user experience and its impact on market share.

Running head: MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
Management and Organization
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author’s Note:

2MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction................................................................................................................................3
2.0 Task 1.........................................................................................................................................3
a) Introduction to Organization....................................................................................................3
b) Organization Structure.............................................................................................................5
3.0 Task 2.........................................................................................................................................6
a) Benefits and Drawbacks of Situational Management Approach.............................................6
a. 1) Benefits of Situational Management Approach...............................................................7
a. 2) Weaknesses of Situational Management Approach.........................................................7
b) Three Elements of Johnson & Scholes Cultural Web Framework..........................................8
b. 1) Power Structure................................................................................................................8
b. 2) Symbol.............................................................................................................................9
b. 3) Control System.................................................................................................................9
4.0 Task 3.........................................................................................................................................9
4.1 Two Innovative Strategic Management Objectives...............................................................9
5.0 Conclusion...............................................................................................................................11
Reference List................................................................................................................................13
Appendix 1.....................................................................................................................................15

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1.0 Introduction
Snapchat Inc. is one of the most successful organizations in the social media industry
(Snapchat.com 2018). This report will help in understanding the structure and characteristics of
the selected organization and at the same time will highlight the principles of modern
management. Moreover, the interrelationship between business environment, functional
management and strategic objectives will be discussed here. Primarily, the organization will be
introduced followed by its detailed structure. After all these, benefits and drawbacks of a specific
modern management approach will be discussed along with cultural web analysis. Finally, two
strategic management approaches taken by Snapchat will be discussed.
2.0 Task 1
a) Introduction to Organization
Snapchat is the multimedia mobile application that operates in both iOS and Android
platform. The core product of this organization is its free app that the users mostly prefer for
sharing media, especially pictures. Snapchat is operating on the social media industry and by
giving free access to its users; it has drawn huge attention globally. The application was released
in 2011 and now it is competing with Facebook and Instagram. The company was established by
mixing the business ideas of Evan Spiegel, media entertainment ideas of Reggie Brown and
coding ideas of Bobby Murphy. Currently, its maximum revenue is collected from the digital
advertisers and with the Geofilter feature; it has started gaining more response from investors
and other partners (Snapchat.com 2018).

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The core purpose of this organization is to share entertainment among users digitally by
accessing the camera of smartphones. Users mostly use this app for fun purpose whereas
company ensures great privacy through one-to-one message encryption technology.
Figure 1: Snapchat Scope and Scale
(Source: Velten and Arif 2016)
From the above image, it can be said that the organization is growing rapidly each year
and is standing at the 4th position in social media industry. Therefore, it has huge scope for
market expansion in future as well. On the other hand, Fortune (2018) pointed out that fourth-
quarter revenue of Snapchat jumped to 72% on 6th February 2018. Moreover, with 8.9 daily
active users it is gaining the biggest quarter-to-quarter jump.

Chief Executive Officer
Board of Directors
Chief Operating Officer Engineering Center
Finance Center
Marketing CenterBusiness DevelopmentInformation Security
HR
Remote
Applications
Advertisers
Public
Policy
Growth and
Engagement
Consumer
Service
Assistants
CIO
Office
Business
Head
Operating
Managers
Regional
Manager
Business
Partners
Adverting
Head
Global
Marketing
Head
Marketing
Communicati
on Head
Public
Relation
Head
Consumer
Analysis Head
Application
Promotion
Head
Treasurer
Audit
Head
Tax
Manager
Risk
Manager
Application
Development
Head
R&D
Operation
Head
Infrastructure
Engineering
Head
Project Admin System Engineer Electronics Engineer
Mechanical EngineerSoftware Engineer
Assembly Manager Testing Manager Production Manager
5MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
b) Organization Structure
Figure 2: Organization Structure of Snapchat
(Source: Lee, Kozlenkova and Palmatier 2015)

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From the above figure of organizational structure, it is evident that Snapchat Inc. follows
functional organizational structure. As per this organizational structure, Snapchat groups their
employees as per their areas expertise. Moreover, these people are supervised by functional
heads having expertise in the same field. Each department of the organization has its own
departmental heads like chief operating officer, information security head, business development
head, marketing centre, finance centre and engineering centre (Tseng and Lee 2014). The chief
operating officer is responsible for supervising and tracking the performance level of the HR,
advertisement, public policy and remote application department. On the other hand, Finance
centre and marketing centre head is responsible for supervising and maintaining the performance
of finance department and marketing department. In such organizational structure, the employees
can apply their expert knowledge and skills to their respective department for enhancing the
performance of department under direct supervision of department head (Reitzig and
Maciejovsky 2015).
3.0 Task 2
a) Benefits and Drawbacks of Situational Management Approach
Situation management approach builds the theme that there is no single best way of
managing a situation that may be applied to all managerial situation. As per this management
approach, management approach depends on the peculiarities of situation and adopts the
approach that yields best results under a particular circumstance. While applying this approach
on Snapchat Inc, there can be both benefits and drawbacks on its managerial decisions.

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a. 1) Benefits of Situational Management Approach
More Control over Current Situation
Situational management approach allows the managers to adopt strategy based on the
current situation. Moreover, the managers need not to be overburdened with preparation of
strategies for controlling future situation. Moreover, Snapchat can adopt customized approach as
per the current situation of the market for gaining more control over the current market situation
(Krupa and Wiśniewski 2015). Hence, this approach can help the organization to have powerful
strategy for beating the current market crisis and use current market opportunities.
Flexibility
Managers are often scared of preparing strategies for dealing with unexpected matters of
future market condition. However, situational management approach gives the managers the
freedom and flexibility of choosing strategies based on the current market situation. Moreover,
the managers of Snapchat may feel more prepared with situational approach for dealing with the
current market situation.
a. 2) Weaknesses of Situational Management Approach
Diversion of Focus
Situational management approach is always based on the current situation of business. It
has less relevance and connection with past and future condition of market. Hence, while
applying this approach, the managers of Snapchat can be diverted from the long-term strategies
for the organization. It can ultimately hamper the success of long-term organizational goals of
the organization.

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Lack of Readiness
In situational management approach, the managers take instant decisions as per the
peculiarities of the current market condition. Hence, the employees may not get much time to
make themselves ready towards the execution of the strategies (Thompson and Glasø 2015). In
this way, the effectiveness of strategy execution may get hamper in situation management
approach.
b) Three Elements of Johnson & Scholes Cultural Web Framework
Johnson & Scholes Cultural Web Framework has identified six elements for assessing the
culture of an organization. Among all the six elements, three elements are described in the
following to assess the organizational culture of Snapchat. The “3-picture narrative input chart
story” in Appendix 1 describes the organizational culture of Snapchat.
b. 1) Power Structure
Power structure is actually defined by the pocket of real power within an organization.
Moreover, it shows the distribution of organizational power among the groups of people within
an organization. According to Denison, Nieminen and Kotrba (2014), most powerful
organizational members are likely to be associated with cultural paradigm. In case of Snapchat
Inc, the organizational power is equally distributed among the groups of people within an
organization. The employees have equal power to share their views towards organizational
success. However, the core power of taking high level of business decision is limited only within
the business executives and CEO of the organization.

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b. 2) Symbol
Stokes, Baker and Lichy (2016) pointed out that Symbol of an organization carries a
particular meaning recognized by the organization that shares a culture. On an ironic note, the
faceless ghost symbol of Snapchar represents the fact that even though the users cannot see their
photos anymore does not mean they are actually gone. It also represents the diversity of
expression of the people to be shared among each other.
b. 3) Control System
Snapchat has an effectively organized control system for achieving organizational
success. The financial distribution of the organization is done in highly an organized manner
through the order from the treasure and audit head. Likewise, the managers of Snapchat uses
reward system for organizing and enhancing the productivity of the employees.
4.0 Task 3
4.1 Two Innovative Strategic Management Objectives
Innovative strategic management objective and framed with an intention is to achieve the
strategic goals of organizations. Innovative strategic management objective of Snapchat Inc has
led to its success within shorter period. The two most important innovative strategic management
objectives of this organization are the followings:
1. Increasing media dominance and market share
2. Improve service approach to new and existing customers

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These two innovative strategic management objectives of Spanchat can be explained through
using Porter’s Generic Strategy Matrix.
Cost Leadership Strategy
As per cost leadership strategy, organizations either sell their products or services at
average industry price for gaining higher profit over their rivals or sell their products or services
at below the average industry price for gaining high market share. Snapchat has adopted cost
leadership strategy for achieving their strategic objective of increasing media dominance and
marker share. In this strategy, Snapchat Inc. has adopted Freemium pricing policy for
maintaining a powerful hold in the industry. As per this strategy, the users can download and use
the Snapchat app at free of cost, but they may need to pay for availing additional features and
services (Bettis et al. 2016). In this way, the organization is being able to gather more number of
users using their app, which can definitely help it in achieving the strategic objective of
increasing media dominance and market share.
Differentiation Strategy
Differentiation strategy suggests development of products and services, which offers
unique value to the customers. Differentiation strategy leads to improvement of products and
services for gaining high level of competitive advantage. Hence, Snapchat had adopted
differentiation strategy for achieving the strategic objective of improving service approach to
new and existing customers. As per this strategy, Snapchat Inc. offers unique ways to the users
for expressing their feeling through unique symbols. It also allows the advertisers and media
companies to create their individual stories through featured title Discover (Bettis et al. 2014).

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Apart from that, attractive stickers, GIFs, audio and video calling have added unique value to the
life of users.
Focus Strategy
Snapchat has targeted the tech savvy people and advertisers for offering their unique
service of interacting with people. In focus strategy, the organization has adopted differentiation
strategy of offering unique features of services for enhancing the quality of life of the people.
Hence, this strategy can also help the organization to achieve their strategic objectives.
Figure 3: Porter’s Generic Strategy
(Source: Tseng and Lee 2014)
5.0 Conclusion
While concluding the study, it can be said that Snapchat Inc. follows functional
organizational structure. As per this structure, the employees are grouped as per their expertise
and they work under one functional head. The situational management approach can be highly

13MANAGEMENT AND ORGANIZATION
effective for having huge control over current situation. As per the cultural web framework, core
power making high-level business decision is limited within the CEO and business executives.
The organization has adopted cost leadership strategy for gaining median dominance and
increasing market share.

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Reference List
Bettis, R., Gambardella, A., Helfat, C. and Mitchell, W., 2014. Quantitative empirical analysis in
strategic management. Strategic Management Journal, 35(7), pp.949-953.
Bettis, R.A., Ethiraj, S., Gambardella, A., Helfat, C. and Mitchell, W., 2016. Creating repeatable
cumulative knowledge in strategic management. Strategic Management Journal, 37(2), pp.257-
261.
Denison, D., Nieminen, L. and Kotrba, L., 2014. Diagnosing organizational cultures: A
conceptual and empirical review of culture effectiveness surveys. European Journal of Work and
Organizational Psychology, 23(1), pp.145-161.
Fortune. 2018. Snapchat Touts Redesign as Surprising Revenue, User Growth Send Shares
Soaring. [online] Available at: http://fortune.com/2018/02/06/snapchat-revenue-user-growth-
rebound-snap-stock/ [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018].
Krupa, T. and Wiśniewski, M., 2015. Situational management of critical infrastructure resources
under threat. Foundations of Management, 7(1), pp.93-104.
Lee, J.Y., Kozlenkova, I.V. and Palmatier, R.W., 2015. Structural marketing: Using
organizational structure to achieve marketing objectives. Journal of the Academy of Marketing
Science, 43(1), pp.73-99.
Reitzig, M. and Maciejovsky, B., 2015. Corporate hierarchy and vertical information flow inside
the firm—a behavioral view. Strategic Management Journal, 36(13), pp.1979-1999.
Snapchat.com. 2018. Snapchat - The fastest way to share a moment!. [online] Available at:
https://www.snapchat.com/ [Accessed 6 Mar. 2018].

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Stokes, P., Baker, C. and Lichy, J., 2016. The role of embedded individual values, belief and
attitudes and spiritual capital in shaping everyday postsecular organizational culture. European
Management Review, 13(1), pp.37-51.
Thompson, G. and Glasø, L., 2015. Situational leadership theory: a test from three
perspectives. Leadership & Organization Development Journal, 36(5), pp.527-544.
Tseng, S.M. and Lee, P.S., 2014. The effect of knowledge management capability and dynamic
capability on organizational performance. Journal of Enterprise Information Management, 27(2),
pp.158-179.
Velten, J.C. and Arif, R., 2016. The influence of snapchat on interpersonal relationship
development and human communication. The Journal of Social Media in Society, 5(2), pp.5-43.

Power Structures
Symbols
Control System
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Appendix 1