Organizational Theory and Practice: A Case Study of Virgin Atlantic

This report discusses the organizational theory, concepts and practices of Virgin Atlantic, evaluating its impact on management, employee motivation, and organizational culture. It also provides recommendations for improving the performance of the organization.

Organizational Theory and
Practice

Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................2
MAIN BODY..................................................................................................................................2
Organisational structure...................................................................................................................2
How it impacts management.......................................................................................................2
Employees of the company motivation in achieving the organisational goals............................3
Organisational culture......................................................................................................................3
Evaluation if the company is performing or operating well or not due to the approaches that
they are being undertaken with proper theory or example..........................................................4
How do they impact the company is being managed?................................................................6
Recommendation to make changes for improving the performance of the organisation with
proper justification.......................................................................................................................7
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................9
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................10

INTRODUCTION
Organisational theory are the different models and tools that are used in the business, helping the
management in conducting internal operations and functions effectively and efficiency. For
running and conducting business practices effectively and efficiency, managers and the team
needs to use the organisational theory in management of their employees and internal
environment of the business (Adler, 2018). It consists of the working culture, structure and
management, leadership styles and many other aspects and impacts that are necessary in proving
better and safe and secured environment to employees for the main motive of increasing
productivity for the achieving goals and objectives. It develops and builds strong relation by
providing better working condition in between employers and employees. This report discusses
with the organisational theory, concepts and practices of the Virgin Atlantic that is UK's airline.
It was founded in 1984 in London. This report also highlights organisational structure impact.
MAIN BODY
Organisational structure
Organisational structure is known as the policies, process and operations, procedures, and
other important operations for achieving goals and objectives effectively and efficiently. It is a
process outlining activities of business and their operating along with their directing for attaining
goals and objectives (Andersson, 2020). It consists of various duties, roles, responsibility and
other functions of employees that results in the easy and systematic operating. Different
organisational structure is present in business these are functional structure, hierarchical and
divisional structure, horizontal and network structure and many other structures. Virgin Atlantic
provides their services by following network organisation structure to public. Network
organisational structure is for permanent and temporary people’s arrangements and it also is
called virtual network structure.
How it impacts management
Organisational structure has influence and great impact on Virgin Atlantic’s management
as it follows network structure. It helps in flowing of information to various department by the
professionals regarding working and operating, improvements and other all related information
with the help of effective structure regarding the employees, product and services and all the

market conditions. It provides the business organisation in clear plans, policies, and other details
by providing support and guidance to the managers of Virgin Atlantic. Determination of required
work force is also done for the HR manager to hire best suited candidates in the growth and
development of the company (Cherepanov and Rekhtina, 2020). Management of extra work and
other things with the help of structuring and defining their roles and responsibility, along with
the power and methods for achieving common goals and objectives of business organisation. The
Virgin Atlantic’s top management follows network based structure for making its functions and
operations with sharing information with top level management of business only. It impacts
business’ productivity and profitability if the data and information is not transferred correctly
leading decreased services’ quality, by no complete achievement of the goals and services as
they were determined and also lack of communication can result in the demotivation in the
employees.
Employees of the company motivation in achieving the organisational goals
Employees of Virgin Atlantic lack motivation with their present organisational structure
as it is creating various problems and issues related to the various relations and operating in
business organisation. Network structure and hierarchy culture is being followed for the working.
In Virgin Atlantic the higher professionals and leaders follows the structure of networking that
results in the complexity and pressure load for employees. Its working is business and working
oriented and this decreases the motivation of employees as it is not people oriented structure
(Clegg, Pitsis and Mount, 2021). They concentrate and focus more on work, tasks, profits and
achievement of goals and objectives rather than values, needs and wants and employee’s
expectations of employees resulting in the less values and no appreciation in the employees.
They feel demotivated as they possess less power and information in task performing as then
they lack to utilise their best efforts that involves the decision to continue or leave the job.
Organisational culture
Organisational culture is known for expectation sums, values and practices that are
required in informing or guiding the behavioural actions of workforce in business organisation. It
defines and have beliefs, values, and different methods and ways that are used in interacting and
that are used in contributing for increasing the employee’s engagement. Significant working

culture results in the boosting of the employee’s morale and values and their confidence is also
increased for leading them to provide great efforts in achievement of goals and objectives
(Diamond and Lewis, 2019). It states and defines the methods related to staff members and
connecting them to each other for building and making strong their relationship by bringing
clarity and uniformity in their operations. Effective organisational culture helps the management
in setting clear vision by providing great communication between all employees and
departments.
It is important to bring positive and great organisational culture to improve confidence
and provide motivation to employees for increasing productivity or retaining them for long run.
The managers of Virgin Atlantic use rigid culture of operating that is autocratic leadership style
culture in the company. Autocratic leadership style means leaders and managers of every team
are responsible for taking major and important decisions and also take control over activities
regarding working and operating, duties, plans and others by informing members without being
involved into decision making process. It means followers and employees need to follow all the
instructions that are given to them by their leaders and managers without sharing or hearing their
points or suggestions. As this creates employees to feel stressed and leads to more pressure and
by feeling demotivated as they are not being heard and valued.
Evaluation if the company is performing or operating well or not due to the approaches that they
are being undertaken with proper theory or example
Handy culture model
Charles Handy introduced Handy culture model to provide four cultural structures that
were to be followed by the company for the effectiveness and efficiency in a business
organisation. In this model there are four cultures and they are power culture, person culture, role
and task culture that can be used by the managers of Virgin Atlantic for motivating their
employees along with the increased productivity. The four cultures that are there in Handy
culture model that are related to Virgin Atlantic are as follows-
Power culture- in this organisational culture, there is restriction on powers, authority and
rights as they are with top management, leaders, and other directors and board members for
taking crucial and important decisions that are related to company operations, methods and many
others (Golensky and Hager, 2020). Management of Virgin Atlantic needs to use this for making
plans and strategies and all other strategies in advance and also involves the employees to be

informed with their predetermined plan to attain goals and objectives on time. As major
decisions that are taken in the business like technology modification, methods, and various
policies and all other rules and regulations that are need to be taken by the top management
without involving employees in it.
Role culture- In this culture, every employee or worker have clearly defined
responsibilities, roles, along with rights, power and all for their job role and all the skills and
knowledge. In Virgin Atlantic, if this culture is being used by the professional it will result in
benefits to the organisation along with clearly defined duties and responsibilities, task, roles,
authorities and accountability of each and every employee that will result in the growth and
development along with the increased productivity and profits. With this culture the employee’s
productivity can be increased along with their workload to be reduced. It also helps in reducing
overlapping, miscommunication among employees, disagreement, conflicts in between team
members and also in the increased quality of services of the employees.
Task culture- In this culture, leaders and managers makes team by seeing the similarities
of skills or knowledge for meeting the demands and wants of urgent work (Hayes, 2022). As staff
members that possess similar skills are connected and belonged to same stream or team and then
they come together to reduce and decrease the complexities of urgent tasks by solving various
issues and problems. In Virgin Atlantic, professionals and leaders use this culture for getting
their urgent task to be completed along with solving the various issues and all other technical
problems to provide good, secured and safe airline services for the increase in the experience and
values of customers.
Person culture- This organisation culture helps the management in providing more
importance and value to employees’ welfare. It is people oriented culture that concentrates on
needs and requirements of employees and their satisfaction for motivating them in increasing
overall effectiveness and efficiency of company. In Virgin Atlantic, leaders utilise this culture
for organising and maintaining informal development plans and programs by providing them
great training for improving their skills, by understanding about various fields and their
knowledge. This culture helps in providing more freedom and options to employees in taking
and having great initiatives by leading the operations as their own understanding and thinking
and also with the help of their experience by improving and increasing morale and confidence

for achieving and attaining success and also in grabbing opportunities that are profitable for their
future growth and development.
The presented above information states that top management and managers and leaders of
Virgin Atlantic are currently following and has adopted power culture in their organisation that
have demotivated employees resulting in the decrease of their productivity and operating as it
involves more time and resource wastage (Heras, Estensoro and Larrea, 2020). The company is
doing good but employees are not that very happy and satisfied, so there needs to be focus and
concentration by the manager on their internal organisation along with the problems and issues
for increasing their morale. Wherein each personnel recognise approximately their assignment,
obligation and position with freedom as in keeping with their role in company, in order to boost
their productiveness and capacity stage in an effort to deliver specialisation of their performance.
It additionally creates duty amongst them for accomplishing as they are answerable to their
control approximately for the failure in their assignment which boom subject amongst them to
behaviour, truthful or powerful practices to fulfil the preferred operations effectively and
efficiently.
How do they impact the company is being managed?
Whereas, organisational tradition allows the experts of Virgin Atlantic to convey
uniformity and harmony of their employer in addition to overall performance of personnel,
powerful organisational tradition permits leaders to have interaction and talk higher to recognise
greater approximately their private and expert life. With those records they decided on only
motivation technique for you to boom dedication, morale, self-belief and productiveness of
personnel (Hodges, 2018). It assists personnel to increase higher dating with different personnel
and employers for clean waft of communique for you to save you from conflicts, disagreement,
overlapping of labour and wastage of cash or time. It allows them to construct networks outdoor
the employer to get greater information about current marketplace developments and diverse new
strategies so as to allows the employer to get higher opportunities.
By developing pleasant running environment, recognize their efforts and interacting
greater with their personnel to earn them agree with to preserve them for lengthy run. They also
can offer protection coverage and deliver greater attention approximately protection associated
with task or their existence from dangerous sports they are able to encourage them to enhance
their nice of overall performance and placed greater efforts. With higher courting with personnel,

leaders gave them comments to make development and rectified their errors for the betterment in
their personal or company. In Virgin Atlantic, chief undertake autocratic fashion to controlled
workload and gain the goal earlier than time limits which ends up in boom the stress, strain and
workload of personnel. For that reason, many personnel go away their task for higher
possibilities and felt to be valued.
Recommendation to make changes for improving the performance of the organisation with
proper justification.
Organisational structure
As a senior supervisor of Virgin Atlantic, it has been recommended to the specialists of
Virgin Atlantic that they have got to make modifications of their present day way of life and
shape as they ought to alternate and changed their way of life absolutely if you want to
encourage or hold their personnel for lengthy run. The corporation follows community employer
shape which creates troubles and confusion amongst group of workers because it lets in them to
paintings independently which ends up in overlapping of labour because of loss of right
communication (Johnson Jr and Kruse, 2019). They make shape that is associated with mission
primarily based totally workforces as they make their very own choices without consulting with
different leaders that ends in postpone or overlapping of labour. In order to put off the troubles
that is generated through present day employer shape, managers of Virgin Atlantic can use
practical employer shape if you want to in reality outline the roles, obligation and obligation to
each personnel in every unit. It allows them to boom the smooth glide of facts amongst all
departments of every unit so as to finish the complicated project on time. They also can use
diverse generation like automation software program and different IT strategies so as offer facts
and set obligations to every personnel in reality.
Justification
They also can make powerful plan with the aid of using the usage of this shape to allow
to percentage statistics to all personnel involved with numerous stage in place of stay essential
statistics on pinnacle stage only. They also can use virtual and on line communique channels
including email, calling, junk mail and their non-public internet site to percentage statistics at
once for pressing paintings and growth their bond with every other. The senior supervisor

extrudes the present day shape for community shape to Functional shape, that is a decentralised
shape wherein they delegate responsibility, power, authority and duty similarly as in keeping
with the requirement of unique process position all of the personnel of specific crew in a
commercial enterprise unit. It will assist them to the sensation amongst personnel to be valued
and encouraged on the way to growth their productiveness and engagement in the direction of
the improvement of company.
Organisational culture
As a senior supervisor of Virgin Atlantic, it has been encouraged to professional of
British Airways, that they've to enhance their cutting-edge company surroundings and way of
life to reinforce morale in their personnel and interact to enhance productiveness of enterprise
(Pinto, 2019). They can use position and man or woman way of life to offer higher and steady
operating location to them so that they experience steady, inspired and assured to offer their first-
rate efforts and attain their pinnacle ability degree for the advantage of each enterprise and
themselves. By presenting schooling and improvement software to them for his or her private
improvement so we can boom their talents and expertise to carry out complicated venture
effectively.
Justification
Senior supervisor of Virgin Atlantic also can enhance organisational way of life via way
of means of permitting and giving greater freedom to personnel to make casual members of the
family and engage with different to get higher expertise approximately cultures, values, language
and behaviour to convey uniformity of their working. By setting up casual assembly and
introduce contributors of all branch with every different to make higher surroundings for
working. They additionally convey greater motivation amongst personnel via way of means of
giving them feeling to be valued via incentives, recognitions, rewards, greater pay and
promotions for his or her higher paintings they could keep them for longer term and enhance
their effectiveness (Stupak, 2019). It is useful for Virgin Atlantic to growth pleasant in their
offerings and earn large exposure and logo call via way of means of growing morale of personnel
and power their efforts in equal directions.

CONCLUSION
As per above report, it can be concluded that, organisational theory and practices are
important as they are connected with each and every thing in business organisation as they help
in improving effectiveness and efficiency of overall performance. Business managers and leaders
use various theories and practices that are related with organisational structure and cultures in
business. Organisational structure is known as the rules, norms and regulations along with
current policies that are used in a company and they also help in the clarity about the duty and
roles of employees to them. Organisational culture is connected with the values, expectations,
and all beliefs of employees and company that help in driving their actions in the attainment of
goals and objectives. Ineffective culture and structure leads the employees to be demotivated and
also in hindering overall profits and productivity and this results in the unsatisfactory feelings to
the employees and also no good results to organisation due to lack of recognitions, and other
benefits and that also affects sales, and revenues of the business organisation. In order to
improve and increase productivity and the organisational culture and structure, leaders and
managers need to change their present policies, methods of operating by making them more
beneficial for employees with the help of functional structure and positive working environment.

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Adler, R.W., 2018. Strategic performance management: Accounting for organizational control. Routledge.
Andersson, R., 2020. Strategic communication at the organizational frontline: Towards a better
understanding of employees as communicators (Doctoral dissertation, Lund University).
Cherepanov, A.V. and Rekhtina, G.A., 2020. Training-technology as a factor of the success of the intra-
organizational learning and development of human resources: methodological aspect. Professional
education in the modern world, 10(2), pp.3855-3869.
Clegg, S.R., Pitsis, T.S. and Mount, M., 2021. Managing and organizations: An introduction to theory and
practice. Sage.
Diamond, J.B. and Lewis, A.E., 2019. Race and discipline at a racially mixed high school: Status, capital,
and the practice of organizational routines. Urban Education, 54(6), pp.831-859.
Golensky, M. and Hager, M., 2020. Strategic leadership and management in nonprofit organizations:
Theory and practice. Oxford University Press.
Hayes, J., 2022. The theory and practice of change management. Bloomsbury Publishing.
Heras, H.A., Estensoro, M. and Larrea, M., 2020. Organizational ambidexterity in policy
networks. Competitiveness Review: An International Business Journal.
Hodges, J., 2018. Employee engagement for organizational change: the theory and practice of
stakeholder engagement. Routledge.
Johnson Jr, B.L. and Kruse, S.D. eds., 2019. Educational leadership, organizational learning, and the
ideas of Karl Weick: Perspectives on theory and practice. Routledge.
Pinto, J., 2019. Key to effective organizational performance management lies at the intersection of
paradox theory and stakeholder theory. International Journal of Management Reviews, 21(2), pp.185-208.
Stupak, R.J., 2019. Symposium on Organizational Culture: Theory, Practice, and Cases. In Handbook of
Public Quality Management (pp. 208-211). Routledge.