Business and Management Report: Functional Areas and Leadership

This report provides an overview of business and management principles, using the First Mile recycling organization as a case study. It begins by identifying the functional areas of the business and its hierarchical structure, then emphasizes the importance of communication in management and leadership. The report further examines the current drivers of globalization and contrasts two leadership styles: situational and transformational, concluding that situational leadership is best suited for a modern global firm. The report delves into the specific functions of First Mile, including selling, marketing, finance, and human resources, highlighting how these areas contribute to the company's overall success. The analysis also explores the role of communication within the organization, particularly between leadership and management, emphasizing its impact on employee performance and achieving business goals. Finally, the report discusses how globalization influences business operations, and how companies like First Mile can adapt to a competitive environment.

Introduction to business
and management

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................1
TASK ..............................................................................................................................................1
1. Functional area of chosen business and its hierarchy of management....................................1
2. Communication central to management and leadership..........................................................2
3. Current drivers of globalisation...............................................................................................4
4. Comparing and contrasting 2 chosen style of leadership.........................................................4
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................6
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................7

INTRODUCTION
Business is activity or action of making money by buying or purchasing and selling
services or products. Management is the procedure of controlling with or dealing people or
customers. Business and management work together and run it successfully in market place
(Erasmus, Strydom and Rudansky-Kloppers, 2016). The current report is based on First mile
organization, the purpose of this report is to explain functional area of chosen company and its
hierarchy of management. It clarifies importance of communication central to management and
leadership and also defines current drivers of globalization. Furthermore, this report justifies two
chosen styles of management or leadership and defines which one is suitable for modern global
firm and reason why.
TASK
1. Functional area of chosen business and its hierarchy of management
First mile is United Kingdom commercial recycling organization, it is based in London,
and the core functional area of firm is recycling. They work with many businesses to support
them recycle as much waste things or products as possible and send nothing to land fill and
throughout at road or any other place. Company has 130 worker across 2 locations, it is the
leading recycling and waste management UK firm which headquarter is Located in London
(First mile, 2019). They gather recycle things and waste materials from businesses and sent it for
processing to partners. Organization is focusing on closed loop recycling, striving to keep things
in use and in economy. There are some examples of recycling things such as, glass into glass,
turn cardboard back into cardboard and paper back into paper.
The entire work of this company shows its hierarchy of management, without any
levels in business structure they cannot be able to organize and managed each of their functions
and activities effectively. Each level has been worked with many workers who help to
accomplish projects or given task on time. Level first, Manager in every stage of management
performs effectively and works with its team member in collaboration (Johansson, Miller and
Hamrin, 2014). One of the team of First mile get the information about where the waste materials
are has been storage, they try to communicate with that business. Second level, recycling team
collect over 60,000 tons of waste things per year and has the average recycle rate of 60% ( First
mile, 2019). They gather recyclables materials from one business to other by using different
types of methods such as curb side, buy back centres, drop off centres and deposit programs.
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Third level, in this stage after collection of utilised things procedure of recycling is started,
another team reach at that particular place and gather all the recycling things or products and
resend to partners for recycling it as soon as possible. In this stage of utilization of waste material
is has been proceeded. Once sorted and cleaned, recyclables is proceeding to retrieve waste
thing. Fourth level in management, after utilization the whole structure of goods is changed
and people can used it again without any default. In this procedure production team, broken did
recycle goods, liquefied or melted products into basic elements, before it can be made directly
into mixed or new materials with virgin assets. Firm offer recycle facilities for over 20 materials,
from each day such as glass and plastics, confidential paper to more obscure such as compostable
packaging, coat hungers, food and coffee grounds.
With the effective management company work better than its competitors and build
strong customer based, they have over than 10,000 customers and consistently grow at quick
pace. In company management adopt all the culture and remove culture barriers, all the workers
within hierarchy management or structure respect to another person in workplace and work
together for achieving goal and for making environment healthy. Recycling is procedure of
converting waste thing or materials into new objects and materials. It prevents waste of possibly
useful things and reduces consumption of fresh or new raw materials, thereby decreasing air
pollution, energy usage and water pollution. First Mile recycles, paper, glass, plastics, organics
and textiles materials and gives it different look. The company is doing many recycling work
which is covering all type of business waste and collection need as well.
First Mile functions include selling, marketing, finance and accounting, customer service,
distribution and human resource.
Selling- This is primary function of any company which indulge into selling and purchase of all
products and services to end use customers.
Marketing- This is promoting goods and service in suitable markets to the target audience so
that they could be attracted towards them.
Finance and accounting- This is keeping track of all records, cost and profits or loss of
company so that First Mile could be able to manage all its books of accounts in proper manner.
2. Communication central to management and leadership
Communication between leadership and management of company is very essential, as it
help to share information from one person to another one. Communication is action or act of
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transferring data from one place, group of people and person to other. Every communication act
includes at least one sender, recipient and message (Hu and Kapucu, 2016). Verbal, written, face
to face, nonverbal and oral are five different types of communication.
It plays important role in between management and leadership as leader have to
communicate with manager in company in context of employee performance. Leader always try
to communicate about goal and vision to its team so as they can motivate or inspire them to
achieve business objectives and goals effectively. The role of communication in management
and leadership or manager and leaders is to communicate various topic to many people. For
example, First Mile company business function is recycling materials, they can enable to work
with effective workforce with the support of leaders placed at each of its hierarchy business
structure. Leader guide their team in context of whom to work, they assure manager that work is
going under control and according to plan through communicate with them. Manager arrange all
the required tools that is useful in process of collecting waste materials and also help to provide
essential resource used in recycling. Communications contribute to reduce gap and increase
collaboration working style more than before. With the helps to communication leader inform
manager about working environment and workers requirements, after that manager make plans
and identify importance of resource that is required or not. They plan to gather things and
provide it to leader, the whole process is completed with support of effective communication.
Therefore, it is essential or required that managers and leader are good communicators. Example
of effective interdepartmental communication, Human resource management work more closely
with finance department. Finance department communicate with HRM in context of hiring
people under allotted budget in which HRM need to run whole process effectively within fixed
given cost.
It is very much important that company is looking forward with its interdepartmental
communication to be effective and helping them to achieve goals and targets. For First Mile it is
essential that marketing department is communicating with other department especially
production. With their collaboration production section could come to know how much to
produce, what to produce and what target audience is demanding. Other that this human resource
department of First Mile should effectively communicate with finance so that they could be able
to allot appropriate budget.
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3. Current drivers of globalisation
Globalization is driven by different gradual changes and new development in world
economy. Usually, organization drive towards global for increasing their profit and sales and
expanding its markets.
The current drivers of globalization include technological advancement and increase
competitive environment in market. Technology advancement is simplified way to do business, it
increases production, improve business environment, its saves time, simplifies communication
and its has also helps to expand businesses. It is conceived as major driving and facilitator force
of globalization procedure. In current market environment technologies get changed and increase
more and more rather than before as it helps to drive business more towards international market.
Technology get advanced due to current market needs and for purpose of satisfy customers, it is
very beneficial for business to adopt new technologies. It gives new way to gain profit and
increase productivity, as it helped a lot in growth and creation of international market.
Technology advancement impact businesses because of technology in venture many
things have been successful possible like supply consumer better services or products and it
helps to flow production. It affects business in today in so many ways both negative and positive,
technology advancement contribute to grow business at international level, but on the other side
it brings many difficulties for organizations as to change their whole structure according to new
technology which is quite difficult and takes too much time.
Competitive environment is increased in market consistently, organizations try to beat
another firm to gain profitability and raise market position higher than before. It is the second
driver or force of globalization that impact on businesses' growth and success. Competitive
atmosphere is driver of globalization it affects business to move across borders. It put pressure
on companies to expand their business more than before and enlarge it at global level which
helps to increase productivity and profitability. Increasing competitive environment in
marketplace boost up moral of businesses and make them enables to beat business rivals in
industry. As it support businesses to serve its best and better than anyone else in sector or in new
market place.
4. Comparing and contrasting 2 chosen style of leadership
Comparison between situational leadership style and transformational leadership style-
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Situational leadership is one of the best and adaptive leadership style, it refers to when
leader of company must adjust her/his style of work or decision making fit to developing level of
staff he/she is trying to impact. In situational leadership, the style of work is changed continually
to fit the wants of other at workplace in organization based on situation. As compare to
situational, transformational leadership is much better than another styles, it is one of most
desirable leadership style. It refers to creating the thriving work environment through effective
communication in group of many people or team. Transformational leadership style focuses on
mixing higher goals with exact deadlines and working in unison to complete task on time. With
this style leaders can set challenging expectations for itself and union to gain exceptional
outcomes.
Contrast situational and transformational leaderships styles-
Situational leaderships styles Transformational leaderships styles
 Situational leadership as compare to
transformational is the most effective
style that helps leader to take their act
according to situation.
 It enables leader to change their style
and perform according to situation that
impact on businesses.
 Situational leadership style make
person able to deal with current
situation in business to get best short
term or long term results.
 On the other hand transformational
leadership helps to leaders adopt
changes and make transition from one
state to another, but it is not appropriate
some time for leaders based on
situation.
 Transformational leader impact their
subordinates with transformational
leadership style, they can motivate and
inspire others.
Situational leadership style is most suitable style for modern international organization
such as First Mile. With the help to this style company leader can make their decision as they are
capable to identify situations in workplace and them take action against it as based on situational
analysis (Luo and Liu, 2014). Modern global company always seek to serve best and better than
other, they want effective workforce that helps to gain profit. Leader with situational style assure
workers that company concern about their belief and understand its different types of culture. By
making good decision leader can gain trust and build strong relationship with its staff.
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CONCLUSION
From above report, it summarizes that recycling is the main functional area of First Mile
company. Recycling help to spread healthy environment and reduce chance of pollution in air,
water or land. It discussed that communication play essential and effective role between
leadership and management. It has been concluded that technological advantages and increasing
competitive environment play role as current drivers of globalisation, that impact on businesses
the most. Furthermore, situational leadership style is considered as one of the most beneficial and
suitable style for modern international firm.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
DuBois, M. and et.al., 2015. Leadership Styles of Effective Project Managers: Techniques and
Traits to Lead High Performance Teams. Journal of Economic Development,
Management, IT, Finance & Marketing. 7(1).
Erasmus, B., Strydom, J. W. and Rudansky-Kloppers, S. eds., 2016. Introduction to business
management. Oxford University Press Southern Africa.
Hu, Q. and Kapucu, N., 2016. Information communication technology utilization for effective
emergency management networks. Public Management Review. 18(3). pp.323-348.
Johansson, C. D. Miller, V. and Hamrin, S., 2014. Conceptualizing communicative leadership: A
framework for analysing and developing leaders’ communication competence. Corporate
Communications: An International Journal. 19(2). pp.147-165.
Luo, H. and Liu, S., 2014. Effect of situational leadership and employee readiness match on
organizational citizenship behavior in China. Social Behavior and Personality: an
international journal. 42(10). pp.1725-1732.
Meier, D., 2016. Situational Leadership Theory as a Foundation for a Blended Learning
Framework. Journal of Education and Practice. 7(10). pp.25-30.
Vom Brocke, J. and et.al., 2014. Ten principles of good business process management. Business
process management journal. 20(4). pp.530-548.
Wilton, N., 2016. An introduction to human resource management. Sage.
Online
The Recycling Process. 2018. [Online]. Available through:
<http://www.all-recycling-facts.com/recycling-process.html>.
First mile. 2019. [Online]. Accessed through: <https://thefirstmile.co.uk/>.
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