Strategic Alignment: Managing Team Performance at Amazon Inc. Analysis

This report critically assesses the links between team performance and strategic objectives, using Amazon as a case study. It evaluates tools and techniques for setting team performance targets and measuring future performance. The analysis includes determining required performance targets against current performance, addressing individual commitment, and evaluating delegation, mentoring, and coaching. A team performance plan is critically evaluated to meet strategic objectives, and tools for monitoring team performance are identified. The report also discusses influencing methodologies and the impact of individual dynamics and organizational politics on securing commitment to strategy, providing a comprehensive overview of managing team performance to support strategic goals within a large organization.

Unit 01 Manage Team
Performance to
Support Strategy

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................4
TASK 1............................................................................................................................................4
A.C 1.1. - Critically assess the links between team performance and strategic objectives........4
A.C 1.2. Critically evaluate tools and techniques available to set team performance targets....5
A.C 1.3. Critically evaluate the value of team performance tools to measure future team........6
performance................................................................................................................................6
TASK 2............................................................................................................................................7
A.C 2.1. - Analyse how to determine required performance targets within teams against.........7
current performance....................................................................................................................7
A.C 2.2. - Address the need for individual commitment to team performance in achievement
of strategic objectives..................................................................................................................7
A.C 2.3. - Critically evaluate the application of delegation, mentoring and coaching to the
achievement of the strategic objectives.......................................................................................8
A.C 2.4. - Critically evaluate a team performance plan to meet strategic objectives.................8
TASK 3............................................................................................................................................9
A.C 3.1. - Identify tools and methodologies to assess the process for monitoring team
performance and initiate changes where necessary....................................................................9
A.C 3.2. - Evaluate team performance against agreed objectives of the plan and address
problematic performances.........................................................................................................10
TASK 4..........................................................................................................................................11
Apply influencing skills to respond to the dynamics and politics of personal interactions by
meeting following assessment criteria (A.C.)...........................................................................11
A.C 4.1. - Determine influencing methodologies that can gain the commitment of individuals
to strategy..................................................................................................................................11
A.C 4.2. - Critically discuss the impact of individual dynamics, interests and organisational
politics on securing the commitment of individuals to strategy...............................................12
CONCLUSION..............................................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................14

INTRODUCTION
The business practices are managed and administered with the aid of effective team work
in order to enhance the productivity with possibility of developing efficiency within the
organisation. The development of an organisation is ascertained with conversion of material and
labour into goods and services in an efficient manner. The operations and process of an
organisation is managed through operational management in which marketing, supply chain,
finance and human resources are some of the functions of operations management. The
capability of a group of people in order to work together with their enhanced skills through the
guidance and participation of team members and team leaders is referred as team performance.
The management of team enables a person to work efficiently by being motivated to work in a
productive manner and execute great results (Stone, 2021). The organisation chosen for this
report is Amazon, which is a multinational technology company that focuses on the business of
e-commerce, digital streaming, cloud computing and artificial intelligence. This report will cover
the strategies that are required for team performance in order to develop long term strategic plan
with short term implementation of operational plans.
TASK 1
A.C 1.1. - Critically assess the links between team performance and strategic objectives
There are various problems that are faced by the organisation during management of
team and which in turn arises the need for effective team work. Therefore, team performance
plays a very important role in smooth functioning of an organisation (Ugoani, 2020). There are
many strategic objectives which Amazon has formed across its multitude of various business
divisions such as Amazon e-retail, Amazon prime streaming services and even the newly
proposed Amazon bank. Some examples of such strategic objectives are listed herein which
Amazon will strive to achieve on the basis of their impressive team performance.
 Bolstering the growth of their Amazon prime streaming services by engaging with more
customers and increasing the subscription based sales yearly by 10% Creating more diversified revenue streams for the company in the future such as Amazon
4-stars which is a recent retail endeavour to sell products only rated 4 star or higher or

the new idea to come up with Amazon branded banks which is in the current company
pipeline To overhaul the internal performance evaluation process to make the company a
healthier place to work for and to increase international goodwill Fund new forms of certificate based learning around complex skill-sets such as use of IT
technology and to fund advance degree studies
There is a major link between the team performance of Amazon and the above mentioned
strategic objectives as these objectives are either completely employee oriented such as new
forms of training or need proper teamwork such as hitting new sales targets of Amazon
prime.
A.C 1.2. Critically evaluate tools and techniques available to set team performance targets
A team performance target refers to the objective given to a group working together in
order to make them complete a given task within agreed time constraints and fixed amount of
available resources (Zhang, and et.al., 2019). There are various tools and techniques through
which Amazon sets SMART team performance targets which are achievable within set time
limits and agreed resource usage and some of them are listed herein. 360-degree feedback: This consists of a performance based data that is generated from
various sources that can be used to improve the quality of work that is executed by the
members of organisation. Amazon’s higher management uses this tool to work upon
particular employee performance and make their departments more productive which
helps in achieving set strategic objectives
 Key performance indicators: This tool refers to a quantifiable measure of employee or
team performance tied to the completion of a specified objective. Amazon setups
multiple KPI’s associated with each team’s working and the major goal they are working
on such as marketing of streaming services of Amazon prime. This helps the company
keep track of team progress and adjust goals and objectives accordingly. Goal setting software’s: There are many software’s available in the market which help
firms which are as established as Amazon with smart interfaces which track down
individual growth and performance and help build effective teams. The overall project

breakdown and work delegation done with software’s such as Hub Flow and Taskque can
help Amazon setup achievable team performance targets Personal development plans: Such plans help the management of company’s such as
Amazon keep a personal record of individual performance and team strengths and helps
set achievable goals which help increase the efficiency of the teams in question. Through
formation of PDP’s, performance management of Amazon employees is done in a
justified and non-biased way which keeps them satisfied and productive which also
reflects in their apparent team work.
A.C 1.3. Critically evaluate the value of team performance tools to measure future team
performance
Amazon being a globally widespread business employs thousands of people in its
workforce and in order to keep their teams productive and achieve their strategic objectives in a
SMART manner, various tools can be used by the company which are highlighted herein.
 Management by objectives: Amazon is a culturally rich company and incentivizes its
workforce to be productive and innovative and measures future team performance using
MBO which is a complex framework of framing specific teamwork related objectives and
working on accomplishing them one step at a time. This tool is beneficial to achieve
strategic objectives such as internal process overhauling of Amazon by forming SMART
and easy steps for the teams to take to complete the task in time
 Performance management frameworks: Frameworks such as the balanced scorecard are
one of the most important management tools used to measure future team performance
and to ensure that the teams are working in sync and attempting to complete all the set
objectives. BLC measures the business and team performance by analysing from 4
different quadrants which results in a comprehensive analysis by Amazon.

TASK 2
A.C 2.1. - Analyse how to determine required performance targets within teams against
current performance
The determination of the required and current performance of the team can be acquired
with the help of gap analysis. The required and current performance is differentiated through the
gap in performance.
 Gap analysis: An individual should be able to determine the difference between present
performance and future requirement in order to analyse the requirements of future.
Performance gap is determined by identifying the difference between present and future
(Yeung, and Ulrich, 2019). With the help of gap analysis, Amazon can find out the
various aspects of its operations which need drastic amount of improvement and allocate
the required work to teams on the basis of their current efficiency
 Creating action plans: Action plan refers to a document which contains all the necessary
steps require to complete a specific objective which in Amazon’s case is used to
determine SMART performance targets. Amazon develops detailed action plans to make
sure that they assess the situation and proposed strategic objectives in a comprehensive
manner to set achievable performance targets.
A.C 2.2. - Address the need for individual commitment to team performance in
achievement of strategic objectives
The need for individual commitment to team performance is quite vital as with the help
of such personal commitments, Amazon helps reach their strategic objectives in a proper
manner. A team’s overall productivity is tied to the sum of individual performances in the team
which is thoroughly monitored using various software tools and techniques. For Amazon to
achieve all its strategic objectives, individual commitment has various benefits which are listed
herein.
 Development of a cooperative team culture and building of better interpersonal
relationships which increase the productivity of all teams involved
 Being committed to the goals and objectives helps set achievable goals which in turn
makes the goal easier to achieve both individually and as a team

 Teams cannot function in a coherent manner without existence of individual commitment
and Amazon should work towards providing more incentives and career enriching
training to keep teams motivated and driven for achieving set goals (Zhou, and Wu,
2018).
A.C 2.3. - Critically evaluate the application of delegation, mentoring and coaching to the
achievement of the strategic objectives
Delegation: For Amazon to achieve all of its set targets and strategic objectives, the delegation
of work to subordinates is very important as it fills them up with confidence and helps register a
much higher team performance metric
Mentoring: Amazon has many veteran workers with decades of experience in its workforce
which mentor a lot of younger employees and fresher’s which helps the company gain high
performing workers. By getting proper mentorship, Amazon can hit important objectives such as
increasing subscription sales and overhauling their internal evaluation processes without much
hassle.
Coaching: By coaching its teams and the workforce, Amazon can impart them with key
operational skills which can help in process overhauling or with technical knowledge regarding
sales and marketing which can help achieve the strategic objective of 10% annual subscription
sales of its prime streaming business division.
A.C 2.4. - Critically evaluate a team performance plan to meet strategic objectives
A team performance plan is a document which analyses the current productivity levels of
a given team, steps to achieve a higher level of productivity which is required of them and the
major objectives to be achieved by the set team. In order to achieve the strategic objectives of
Amazon formulated above, a team performance plan is needed which has been developed and
critically evaluated below.
Strategic
objective
Team
performance
Required
productivity
Additional
support
Success
measurement

standards required criteria
Internal
evaluation
process
overhaul
Dealing with
change resistance
and initiating
process change
Quite high as
dealing and
anticipating change
is an exhaustive
process
Change
management
model
application such
as Lewin’s 3 step
model of change
Company
performance
review metrics
Developing
new revenue
streams
Working on
market research
and identify areas
for disruptive
innovation
Medium as it is
very easy for firms
like Amazon to
enter new markets
and take advantage
of their brand name
Additional team
members which
are experts in the
field of research
can be a big help
Financial reporting
and through
accounts and
book-keeping
Increasing
sales of
Amazon
prime
subscription
by 10%
annually
Designing
marketing
collateral and new
advertisement to
engage more
people
High as the
streaming service
market is highly
competitive and
streamlined
Collaboration
with IT
engineers to
streamline the
interface of the
prime app
Development of
key performance
indicators
TASK 3
A.C 3.1. - Identify tools and methodologies to assess the process for monitoring team
performance and initiate changes where necessary
The team performance can be monitored with the help of following aspects that are
mentioned below: Self-monitoring tools: This is one of the best methods available to monitor team
performance as for firms with large number of teams, giving the team members an

opportunity to measure their own performance is quite vital and time saving at the same
time. Monitoring software’s: Amazon has massive resources to pour into its IT infrastructure
and the company uses many advanced software’s for crunching and simplifying team
performance data. The company also has its own proprietary software’s which use both
input and output based team metrics for proper measure of performance.
A.C 3.2. - Evaluate team performance against agreed objectives of the plan and address
problematic performances
Upon comparing the performance of the selected teams against the agreed objectives of the
plan, even with the provided extra support, there were many avenues of problematic
performances which are listed herein.
 Amazon’s managers lack proper communication with the team and fail to properly
communicate the vision of the business
 The marketing and sales department are not in sync with one another and this hurts the
sales of Amazon prime
In order to address these areas of problematic performances, the following steps are
recommended for Amazon.
 The managers should clear the overall vision of the company and the strategic objectives
required to be completed to maintain clarity
 Tools such as mind mapping, brainstorming and performance evaluation should be done
between departments to share resources and build more collective understanding
A.C 3.3. - Critically evaluate the impact of the team performance in contributing to
meeting strategy
The strategic objectives of the organisation can be met with team performance with the help of
following things which includes: Improving the productivity: The efforts of a team can improve the performance and
productivity of an organisation. The work also gets divided among the team members

which in turn helps in reducing the stress (Driskell, Salas, and Driskell, 2018). By
improving their organizational productivity, companies like Amazon can achieve
multiple strategic objectives in one such as successfully overhauling their internal
evaluation process and bringing in new revenue streams Better employee management: The distribution of work can be provided through
assignment of roles in a team in order to effectively manage the work of an organisation.
It is very important for Amazon to telecare of their employees as they are the key to
achieving its strategic objectives and Amazon is a global recruiter with thousands of
employees which constitute a diverse workforce.
TASK 4
Apply influencing skills to respond to the dynamics and politics of personal interactions by
meeting following assessment criteria (A.C.)
A.C 4.1. - Determine influencing methodologies that can gain the commitment of
individuals to strategy
Influencing methodologies in the workplace of companies like Amazon are specialized
tactics deployed by the senior management to convince employees to uphold their individual and
team commitment to the achievement of set strategic objectives (Helm Reich, and Schaefer,
2018). Some of these methodologies which can be used by Amazon to gain commitment of
individuals to strategy. Rational persuasion: This method involves the manager to team leader use logical
arguments and facts to convince employees that an objective is achievable and worth
working towards. Amazon can use such methods to obtain long term commitment from
its workforce Consultation: This method is very helpful in targeting individuals with low performance
of team contribution and address them regarding their shortcomings and making them
more committed to self-improve. Combining this method with promise of incentives can
help obtain commitment towards strategy form Amazon

A.C 4.2. - Critically discuss the impact of individual dynamics, interests and organisational
politics on securing the commitment of individuals to strategy
The forces that are unseen by the organisation but affects the team for achievement of
their goals are referred as individual dynamics. They can strongly impact the behaviour of an
individual which further results in productive performance of the team. The impact of the
following things is mentioned below:
Individual dynamics: These factors affect the team performance and commitment of individuals
in a major manner as their personality traits and behaviour influences the way in which they
contribute in a group setting. If one or more members clash in a team due to difference in
dynamics, then securing commitment is quite difficult and this affects the achievement of
strategic objectives formulated earlier in the report
Individual interests: Every individual which is part of the team have their own specific interests
and having likeminded individuals in the team increases the efficiency of the team and helps
secure commitment of individuals as they like working with each other. Amazon managers
should carefully group people having similar hobbies to ensure long term commitment and make
efficient teams
Organisational politics: Behind the scenes politics and all the major events which happen in the
company affect team performance in the major manner. Politics also results in development of
personal groups in the company which if put in different teams, hesitate to commit to the strategy
of the company. To ensure this does not occur, Amazon should measure the level of workplace
politics and make sure that major employee groups in the workplace are put in similar teams for
increased commitment and efficiency.
CONCLUSION
From the above report it is concluded that, a strong system with effective performance of
the team helps in achieving the goals and objectives of the organisation. There are various
problems that may arise while managing a team and therefore the management of team with
active participation of the employees is very essential for growth and development of the
organisation. The evaluation of performance of team is very essential to identify the issues and
conflicts among the members of team. Communication, collaboration and coordination are

various tools and methodologies that help in identifying the team performance. The satisfaction
of individuals, interdependence and team satisfaction are some of the methodologies that
influence the commitment of work towards the organisation. Therefore, an effective management
of team with the guidance and help of managers or leaders with the members of team helps in
creating an effective team performance.