Introduction to Business Studies Report: Functions, Finance, and Teams

This report provides a comprehensive overview of key concepts in business studies. It begins with an introduction to business organizations, defining their purpose and management styles. The main body of the report delves into the functions within an organization, distinguishing between private, public, and voluntary sectors, and outlining the responsibilities of HR, Marketing, and Finance departments, including their interrelationships. The report also explores collaborative working practices, differentiating between groups and teams, and identifying factors that contribute to team effectiveness. Organizational culture, including Charles Handy's model, and various leadership styles (autocratic and democratic) are also discussed. Finally, the report examines the role of financial management and reporting, covering sources of finance, liabilities, and the importance of financial statements such as profit and loss accounts, balance sheets, and cash flow statements. The report concludes with a summary of the key findings and a list of references.

Introduction to Business
Studies

Table of Contents
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................3
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................3
1. Functions within an organization.............................................................................................3
2. Collaborative Working Practices ............................................................................................4
4. Role of financial management and reporting ..........................................................................7
CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................................10
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................11

INTRODUCTION
Business Organization is defined as an entity which is formed for the purpose of carrying
the activities of the company to achieve the goals effectively and efficiently. Business
organizations seek the management styles that are followed in the process (Allen and Kraakman,
2016). The report will consist the functions of the organizations, organization's collaborative
practices and role of financial management of the organization along with its reporting structure
which will help the business organization to analyse its cash flow statements, balance sheets and
profit and loss account.
MAIN BODY
1. Functions within an organization
The purpose of a business is to identify the strengths and opportunities in the marketplace
so that effective and efficient functioning of the organization takes place.
Private Sector companies are part of the economy that is run by individuals and
companies for profit and is not state controlled. Examples - Reliance Industries Limited and
Infosys Technologies Limited.
Public Sector company includes government ownership on the companies which are part
of the economy and is composed of all levels of government. Examples - Indian Oil Corporation
and State Bank of India.
Voluntary Sector refers to the organizations which create social impact on the society and
are not concerned with any profit – making terms. Examples - Human Wave and CRY (Child
Rights and You).
Responsibilities of functional Units in different segments -
Responsibilities of Human Resource department -
Recruits Candidates – The sole responsibility of Human Resource Department is to recruit
candidates that are best suitable for the job and ensure effective and efficient results by achieving
desired goals.

Conducts Disciplinary Actions – The Human Resource Department of the organization ensures
that there are proper rules and regulations that are followed by the employees conducted by the
HR department.
Responsibilities of Marketing Department -
Search for Marketing Tools – The Marketing Department should search for new marketing
tools that are running in the market structure for the product that the company comprises of.
Marketing Budgets and ROI – The marketing department's main responsibility is to ensure that
the budget formed for the project is sufficient enough along with maintaining a positive ROI for
the company.
Responsibilities of Finance Department -
General Accounting – The finance department of the organization should prepare and keep the
day to day records of the financial statements so that the company is able to calculate the profits
and losses.
Financing – This responsibility should be adopted by the finance department so that they operate
and generate profitable revenues which helps in the growth of the organization.
Interrelation between the departments -
HR and Marketing – Both the departments are interrelated with each other in terms that
marketing helps in the brand name of the company in which the HR department promotes it in
the market.
Marketing and Finance - Finance is totally dependent upon the marketing strategies that are
used to promote the company and its products. The budget is planned according to the marketing
plan that has been formed.
Finance and HR – Financing of the resources that are allocated by the HR Department helps in
hiring and recruitment of employees for the organization.
Interrelationship is important between the organizations to ensure smooth working of the
different departmental functions which takes place for the growth and development of the
process.
Lack of interrelation will lead to increase in the departmental conflicts, employee –
employer differences affecting the business and decrease in the performance of the company
will take place.

2. Collaborative Working Practices
Groups and Teams -
A group can be defined a s two or more individuals who collectively come together which results
in forming of groups for the purpose to achieve objections of the specific project or task
undertaken.
Differences between Group and Team -
GROUP TEAM
1. Group consist of a strong and focused group
leader.
1. In team, there are shared leadership roles
that account for the benefit of the team
members.
2. In group, everyone is responsible for
themselves and appear as individuals working
differently.
2. In teams, individuality and mutual
accountability both are the concerns.
3. The purpose of the group is that they work
to achieve the broader organizational
objectives.
3. Specific team purpose defines short term
goals of the organization.
4. Meetings are conducted based on the
project purpose.
4. Active problem – solving meetings are
conducted with open mind discussions
accepted.
5. In Groups, the work is been discussed,
decided and delegated to the group members.
5. In teams, the work is been discussed,
decided and real work process altogether.
Factors that makes an effective team are -
Communication - Proper flow of communication makes a team effective in its tasks and
projects to be completed successfully as the information is flowing through ways of effective
communication (Mathieu, Gallagher, Domingo and et.al., 2019).
Ideas – Ideas generate effective results as more creativity leads to make the work easier and is
completed with smart working skills of the team members.

Support – Support of the team members helps in collectively working together without any
conflicts to occur.
Factors that makes an ineffective team are -
Leader Domination – Dominant leader can create ineffectiveness in the team as people will not
listen to only one person rather they believe working on a collective basis.
Avoidance of conflicts and differences – When there is avoidance of conflicts between the
team members and the differences are not solved then it leads to ineffective teams formed.
Effective team helps in achieving the organizational objectives as when the team
members collectively work together for the purpose of the results to be achieved through proper
work plans, effective communication and focus on what is important.
Organizational Culture is defined as the collection of practices and values that the
organization abides in to communicate (Domańska-Szaruga, 2017). It also consist of the
organizational traits that consist of different working patterns in an organization.
Factors that make up the development of culture within an organization consist the size of
the company, the location where the company has been built and the beliefs and norms that the it
follows for the growth and development of the organization as whole.
Charles Handy's Model of Organization Culture -
Power Culture – In the power culture organization, only few individuals hold the power which
influences the whole organization. Rules and regulations are formulated and the people in power
decide what is to be done. And employees are being judged by what they achieve rather than
how they perform or act.
Role Culture - These type of organizations which are based on role culture follow specific rules
and regulations (Odor, 2018). High Control is applied on each one so that they are able to know
their responsibilities and roles and is defined by the role the person po trays in an organization.
Task Culture – Task culture in an organization is formed to address specific problems and
progress projects taken by the team members formed for the work with effective skills and
knowledge applied.

Person Culture – Individuals in the person culture organizations understand themselves as
unique and superior and denotes the number of employees working in an organization
collectively.
Leadership styles -
Autocratic Leadership Style - Autocratic Leadership Style is defined in which the the leader
authoritatively directs the group members (Fiaz and Saqib, 2017). These type of leaders are not
concerned with the opinion of the team members and takes decisions by themselves and then
applies on its members. This type of leadership style is effective in an organization where the
members are least involved and interested in giving their opinions and only follow what is being
said to them. Thus, it has a positive impact on the results which are achieved by the organization.
Democratic Leadership Style – This type of style consist of the collective decision – making
process enables the members in participative role as strong contributions from the group
members are shown towards the achievement of goals. New ideas are generated which are
accepted by the other members and they decide what next step is to be taken. Thus, this style has
positive impact on both the team members and the organization as they value the interest of
different perspectives.
4. Role of financial management and reporting
The type of finance that sole traders can access is from the personal trader, through
retained profit, by selling of assets, sales and lease back, loan from banks. Partnership finance
can be accessed from friends and relatives, through personal savings, banks and other
commercial lenders etc (Paramasivan and Subramanian, 2020). And Public Limited Company
can access its finance from the additional partners, through bank loan or overdraft, leasing ,
mortgage and government grants.
The liability a sole trader may face if they unable to repay the bank will be that the sole
traders personal assets and liabilities will be sold. The enders hold them personally liable for the
debt. The sole traders will undergo bankruptcy which makes it difficult for them to start a new
business any time. Thus, there will be no personal protection provided to the sole traders if they
are unable to repay the amount they borrowed from the bank.
Liabilities a Public Limited Company may face which will be that they will sigh a
personal guarantee and the bank will remove personal protection if the public company fails to

repay to the bank. Any overdrawn directors loan account will be seen as an asset and will
extracted or taken away from the company.
Profits and loss account -
Balance Sheet account -
Illustration 1: Profit and Loss account
(source: Profit and Loss account, 2020)

Cash – Flow statement-
Illustration 2: Balance Sheet Account
(source: Balance Sheet, 2020)

The main purpose of producing these documents are for determining that whether the company is
undergoing any loss or the financial stability is still maintained by them. The balance sheet gives
the overview of the whole year financial statements that have been drawn by the company which
is very necessary for measuring the balance. The cash flow account is also significant for the
company as denotes the net cash flow that is undergone.
CONCLUSION
Thus, we can conclude from this above report that the business requires all the important
aspects of the public sector, private sector, and voluntary sector with their examples and the
different functional units that is HR, Marketing and Finance key responsibilities which helped in
analysing their function interrelated to each other. In the organizational culture concept, Handy's
Model was applied with leadership styles. Sole trader, Partnership and Public Limited Company
was mentioned to describe the financial management and the liabilities along with the profit and
loss account, balance sheet and cash – flow account.
Illustration 3: Cash - Flow Statement
(source: Cash – Flow Statement, 2020)

REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Allen, W.T. and Kraakman, R., 2016. Commentaries and cases on the law of business
organization. Wolters Kluwer law & business.
Domańska-Szaruga, B., 2017. Organisational Culture as a Factor of Effective Management of a
Public Organisation. Management Tourism Culture, p.265.
Fiaz, M., Su, Q. and Saqib, A., 2017. Leadership styles and employees' motivation: Perspective
from an emerging economy. The Journal of Developing Areas.51(4).pp.143-156.
Mathieu, J.E., Gallagher, P.T., Domingo, M.A. and et.al., 2019. Embracing complexity:
Reviewing the past decade of team effectiveness research. Annual Review of
Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behaviour.6. pp.17-46.
Odor, H.O., 2018. Organisational culture and dynamics. Global Journal of Management and
Business Research.
Paramasivan, C. and Subramanian, T., 2020. Financial management. New Age International.
Online
Balance Sheet. 2020. [online] available through : <https://templates.office.com/en-gb/balance-
sheet-tm03934533>
Cash-Flow Statement. 2020. <https://www.vertex42.com/ExcelTemplates/cash-flow-
statement.html>
Profit and Loss account. 2020. <https://www.quora.com/What-is-the-format-of-profit-and-loss>