Organizational Behavior and Leadership in Woolworths Group

This document discusses the organizational behavior and leadership issues in Woolworths Group, one of the largest retail food businesses in Australia. It explores the company's hierarchical structure, employee motivation, and leadership styles. The document also evaluates possible solutions to improve the situation and suggests the application of theories such as Herzberg's Two Factor Theory and Situational Leadership Theory.

ORGANIZATION AL BEHAVIOUR AND LEADERSHIP

Table of Contents
Introduction to Organization......................................................................................................4
Description and analysis of the organizational Behavior or Leadership Issue..........................4
Organizational Behavior Description.....................................................................................4
Leadership Description..........................................................................................................5
Literature Review: Evaluation of Possible Alternative Solutions Required to Improve the
Situation.....................................................................................................................................6
Recommendations of the most suitable strategies.....................................................................9
Conclusion................................................................................................................................10
References................................................................................................................................11

Introduction to Organization
Woolworths Group is one of the largest retail food business in Australia and the group
has been the second largest company of the country as per the revenue. The founder of the
company is Stanley Edward Chatterton, Stanley Chatterton, Percy Christmas, George Creed,
Ernest Williams, Ernst Robert William and few more were there. The Organization is widely
spread over the country and in New Zealand along with some global coverage. The
company’s headquarter is located in Bella Vista and the Chief Executive Officer is Bradford
Banducci since 2016. The company has about 800 stores around the globe and employs about
30000 staffs. The company has some subsidiaries named as Woolworth’s supermarket, Big
W, BWS, and few more are there. The company has been dealing in liquor retailing under the
name of BWS and Dan Murphy’s in Australia, along with the hotels and pubs under the
Australian leisure and hospitality group. The company has been maintaining its employee
satisfaction and managerial capabilities which has led to the success of the company but even
after being accurate in all the measures taken for the well working of the company, the
company faced a loss of $1.235billion in the financial year of 2016 which has been the
largest and the most high figured loss in the twenty years of operation. The loss of the
company was quite huge which required some transformation in the management and the
operations and leaderships of the company in order to regain the fluency in the working
environment (Alshmemri et al. 2017). The acknowledgement of the organizational behavior
and the leadership style would be provided in the following path which would help in getting
a clear idea on the reason for its downfall and the way it regained its position.
Description and analysis of the organizational Behavior or Leadership Issue
Organizational Behavior Description
Woolworths has been the company which needs to manage huge number of
employees and this brings in the issue of organizational behavior. The management of the
large number of employees by the concerned company was done through maintaining a
hierarchical structure. The multiple stores were provided with a supervisor and a manager
who used to look after the entire store and the staff working in that store needs to report to
them. The staff included some part time and the some permanent workers which provided the
Organization with a mixed behavior (Armstrong and Taylor, 2014). The part time workers
are mainly the college going students who need to earn for today and they do not have any
perspective of sustaining in the company r gaining any higher designation. This perspective

demotivated them and thus, this impacted their services and the deterioration in the quality of
the services has been impacting the goodwill of the company (Bakker & Demerouti, 2017).
The increasing number of complaints from the customers has been one of the major reasons
for the downfall of the company. The full time employees has been working in favor of the
company, and has been observed to be motivated towards their work but still the company
was required to take on some motivational techniques in the Organization which would have
accelerated the working of its employees. The permanent workers desire some incentives and
perks which would keep them motivated and committed to the Organization (Bratton and
Gold, 2017). The issue of the Woolworths Group with the loss has been the consequence of
the irresponsibility of the managers and the Human resource department in providing the
motivational environment to its employees. Motivation is one of the requirements of the
employees and of the Organization which was required in the concerned company especially
for the pat time workers which would have helped the company in avoiding the loss that took
place. The management of company along with the leaders of the company has been
observed not to work accurately and the need of the employees has not been given
importance which has led to the scenario (Dinh et al. 2015). Providing the employees of the
company with the most comfortable and the most soothing environment helps in maintaining
the commitment and the interest of the workers in the company. The motivation and the
dedication has been avoided in case of Woolworths Group and this has been because of
inaccurate HR department as well as the management group. The organizational behavior on
an overall basis, has been quite low in case of the concerned company which has provided the
company with some negative impacts and thus, the cost has been the huge loss (Dubos,
2017). The Woolworths Group could improvise its situation of demotivation and non-
committed.
Leadership Description
The concerned company has been the Organization which followed some specific
leadership styles and those styles has been chosen in concern of the goals and objectives of
the company. The company has been successful in achieving its goal through the leadership
style followed that is autocratic and democratic. These two styles are a bit contradictory to
each other which has helped in maintaining a balance in the Organization working. The
company has gained success and is listed in the top five companies of Australia has been the
result of the follow up of the leadership styles (Hur, 2017). But the company also faced a
downfall with a huge loss which has also been the consequence of the leadership style being

followed in the company. The management and the leaders of the company has been
following the autocratic and the democratic leadership styles which states that the leaders has
been strict and followed the attitude of “do it my way”, along with the attitude of
participation which contradicts the former one. Though the two styles has been contradictory
in nature it has been maintained in the Organization through creating a balance of both and
applying it in the most relevant and required scenarios (Lussier & Achua, 2015). Though the
concept of applying the two most contradictory leadership styles in the Organization has been
quite productive and fruitful in the initial period and also provided with success but the
company has been observed not to change its leadership style along with the changing
psychology of the generation. The company has never been observed to bring some changes
in the management or the leadership style of its working which has provided the company
with the downfall and the huge loss case took place. The loss occurred due to poor
performance of the staff and the employees and thus the dissatisfaction of the customers has
led to the loss (Meier et al. 2016). The autocratic leadership conveys the idea of following the
instructions of the leader without any further question and this attitude has impacted the
young employees tremendously which has been the case in the Woolworths. The part time
workers who are mainly the students would never accept this kind of leadership and this has
been observed in the organization. On the other hand the democratic style has been the one
which has helped the company in acknowledging the views of the employees which has been
mainly for the petty areas and not for the major ones (Thompson & Glasø, 2015). The
concerns in which the employees has a right to provide a word mainly revolved around the
areas of cleaning, stock maintenance and others. The views of the employees could also have
been taken for the improvement in the quality of services, the suppliers choice, the offers and
discounts idea, the analysis of the market, etc. These views would have provided the
company with some of the most relevant and new concepts which would represent the views
of the new generation and thus, providing a new frame for the company (McKeever et al.
2016). The company required some effective leadership styles to be adopted with the
changing time and this would have helped in gang the acceleration in the work.
Literature Review: Evaluation of Possible Alternative Solutions Required to Improve
the Situation
According to Wikström & Treiber (2016), the leadership to be followed in an
Organization is a quality which requires to be accurate in its presence and the application of
the traits of leadership should be accurately acknowledged. The Organization needs to choose

its leadership style in a way that its vision and its mission both gets identified in a way that
the leadership application helps in achieving the goals of the organization. The behavior of
organization is dependent on the leadership that is practiced in it and this frames up the base
of organization behavior that prevails over the company. The leadership theories application
channelizes the organization towards the smooth working environment and this helps in
enhancing the organization behavior. As per Clarke et al. (2016), leadership is the action or
decision of the Organization which builds up the organizational behavior and thus, the inter-
connection between the two factors makes it essential to consider the choice of the leadership
an act of accuracy. There are multiple types of leadership present which conveys the
difference in the aim of the Organization depending on the choice. The autocratic style is the
one which conveys that the leader is the only decision maker and others just need to follow
his words without any cross questions. The democratic style id the one which provides the
employees with a scope of participation which helps in providing the employees with an
opportunity to convey their thoughts and the lassies faire style provides the employees with
the power of decision making in consultation with the leader. These three styles are the most
relevant and the most applied ones. According to Northouse (2018), the application of some
of the most effective theories such as the Herzberg’s Two Factor Theory, Situational
Leadership Theory, motivational theories could help in accelerating or gaining back the
position of the organization. The frame up of the theories has been done in consideration of
the side effects of the leadership style applications which could be mitigated through the
application of the theories mentioned.
Motivation is one of the factors which helps in building up the environment of the
Organization and thus the Organization behavior automatically gets enhanced, as stated by
Meier (2016). As opined by Ghasabeh et al. (2015), Herzberg’s two factor theory states two
vital aspects of the employees which could be utilized by the company in order to help the
employees be committed and loyal to the company. The hygiene factor helps in keeping the
employees motivated and dedicated to their work as the place where the people work should
be safe and secured which provides the employees with an attitude of being committed to the
company. This factor could be explored by the company in order to gain the loyalty of the
company which would repay the company through the services provided by the employees.
The motivation that gets received by the employees helps in enhancing their working quality
and thus, this provides the company with quality services. The hygiene factor is made up of
the variables such as company policies, administrative policies, physical working conditions,

job security, interpersonal relations and payment. The enhancement of these variables or the
right use of the variables on the exact time, could help the company in gaining the most
productive workers and it could also help in adding on to the productivity of the employees as
mentioned by Zigarmi & Roberts (2017). The other factor is the motivational factor which
helps in providing the workers or the employees with a strong motivation to work for the
company with full loyalty. The variables which impact or build up this factor includes sense
of achievement, promotional opportunities, growth, responsibility and recognition. The
fulfilment of these variables helps in motivating the employees to work for the company in
the most efficient manner so that the company achieves the objectives and the employee
skills also gets added on with it. Herzberg states that the hygiene factor cannot be regarded as
the motivational factors. This is so because the motivational factors provide a positive
satisfaction which is inherent to work. The performance of the employees gets motivated and
the employees try to perform for the superior stages. In other words these factors are called
satisfiers. These factors are found to be involved in the performance of the job (Sanjeev &
Surya, 2016). Thus, the application of the concerned theory could be productive in nature and
this would provide the company with the most relevant results and outcomes. This theory has
been applied by many of the companies and has provided them with relevant results which
provided them with fruitful outcome.
As per Holmberg et al. (2018), the situational leadership theory has been one of the
most relevant and the most fruitful theories to be adopted by the companies in order to sustain
its success or gear up its success. As the name suggests the theory conveys that the
application of the leadership styles should be based on the situation and the most relevant and
the most suitable style should be applied in the relevant situation (Skinner, 2016). The
situational leadership theory is the most flexible theory of leadership and provides the
company with the most effective movements to take place within the company. Paul Hersey
and Ken Blanchard have established the best situational theory of leadership in the field of
psychology and Human Resource. According to Alfayad & Arif (2017), the two most vital
levels of leadership behaviour are management and support which has to be present in a
leader in order to be an effective and a productive leader. The theory is based on the four
levels of behaviour which helps in providing the zest of the concept that in which situation,
how the leader needs to react or handle it. The foremost is “leader tells”, where the leader
needs to be concise in his instructions to his team, the second is “leader sell”, here the leader
needs to supervise the team and respond to the performance of the team members, third is

“leader advises”, that is the leader encourages the team to perform well through every
possible means and last is “leader delegates”, here the leader delegates its team in the most
balanced manner through presenting the responsibility and the maturity in the most efficient
and accurate manner.
According to Band et al. (2016), the leadership followed in the company helps in
creating the organizational behaviour as well as the organizational environment which are
inter connected. Thus, in the aim of enhancing or improving any of the segments, the
company could gain in all the three fields. Organizational behaviour impacts the employees
mind set in a drastic manner and the mindset of the employees are created through the
leadership style being followed in the company, thus, the direct connection of the two factors
makes it vital to choose the leadership style in an accurate and the most effective manner.
Recommendations of the most suitable strategies
The thorough exploration of the organizational behavior and the leadership theories has
provided with some of the most effective and the most productive leadership styles as well as
the theories which could help in transforming the organizational behavior. Considering the
Woolworths Group and its issue of the loss that the company experienced in the year 2016,
the solution to the issue could be provided through the various theories that are available for
maintaining or channelizing the path of leadership and the organizational behavior. The
exploration of the theories has provided with some relevant and some most applicable
theories concerning the organization. The recommendations for the improvement of the
Woolworths issue are as follows
 The foremost recommendation is to apply the situational leadership theory in the
Organization as this would help Woolworths in understanding the mind-set of the
employees and thus, the future steps could be channelized (Van et al. 2018). The
situational theory application would help the Organization in providing its leaders
with the variety of reactions that they could provide to its team under different
situations. This would help in making the employees responsible as well as a sense of
maturity would get inculcated in them (Hur, 2018). Once this would be done, the
employees would get committed to the Organization and thus, the working conditions
in the Organization would improve. The four levels of psychology provided in the
theory would help the leaders in acknowledging their team in the most effective
manner.

 The second recommendation is that the company needs to motivate its employees and
this could be done through applying the motivational theories provided by some of
the renowned and experienced personalities (Brown & Capozza, 2016). The
Herzberg two factor theory could also be applied which would help in providing the
employees with the most comfortable and secured environment to work in and thus,
this would provide the company with committed employees (Rudolph, 2016).
Motivating the employees would help in adding on to their productivity and thus the
quality and the output of the company would accelerate.
The recommendations has been provided through acknowledging the various theories and
models of leadership along with understanding the issues of Woolworths. The issue of the
concerned company has been keenly explored in order to provide the most effective
suggestions for improvement.
Conclusion
The exploration of the organizational behavior and leadership has been quite
interesting and it has helped in understanding the correlation among the various factors of the
organization. Woolworths has provided with a concept that even the big companies faces the
management issue and the leadership issues which impacts the organizational behaviors and
thus, the overall company deteriorates. The exploration of the various leadership and
organizational behavior theories has provided with a wide range of knowledge and
information which helped in gaining the view that the Organization works in a chain and each
factor that builds up the Organization needs to be maintained in order to achieve the goals
and objectives set by the company. The management and the leaders of the company needs to
be active and sensible enough to understand the sensitivity of the situation and then react to
it, this attitude could help the company in regaining its position. The motivational factors
needs to be concentrated on by the company in order to gain the employees commitment
along with the loyalty of the employees. The entire exploration has provided with some
psychological factors too which works in the Organization and is the base of the leadership
theories.

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