Leadership Strategies and Change in HR: Uber, Microsoft, Google Report

This report provides a comparative analysis of leadership strategies and human resource management practices across three major technology companies: Uber, Microsoft, and Google. It begins with an executive summary and an introduction outlining the report's objectives. A PESTLE analysis is conducted to evaluate the macro-environmental factors influencing each company, followed by an application of the Five Forces framework to assess competitive dynamics. The core of the report examines the leadership styles adopted by the CEOs of Uber (Dara Khosrowshahi), Google (Sundar Pichai), and Microsoft (Satya Nadella), highlighting their approaches to change management and employee engagement. The report explores how each company has adapted its HR and leadership strategies to navigate challenges and achieve growth, including discussions on Uber's surge pricing and team management, Google's distributed leadership style, and Microsoft's shift towards transformational leadership. The report concludes with a summary of key findings and implications for leadership and HR practices in the technology sector. References are included to support the analysis.

Running Head: Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
Leadership Strategies and change in Human resources
Uber, Microsoft and Google

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
Executive Summary
Microsoft, Google and Uber are the three companies which have made its mark in the type of
industry they operate in. Uber is one of the known Taxi services and is known worldwide.
Microsoft and Google are world known about their operations in information technology and
other operations. The goal of this assignment is to provide the Macro environment in which
all these three big names operates as well as to provide the leadership styles too on which all
these companies relate to. Any organization has to go through a few changes in its lifetime
when the company is in the growth stage of their life cycle and hence, all these companies
also underwent some changes in human resource and leadership styles to grow further. This
report focuses on all such changes and the analysis of the environment and leadership styles.

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
Contents
Executive Summary...............................................................................................................................1
Introduction...........................................................................................................................................2
PESTLE Analysis..............................................................................................................................2
Five forces framework.......................................................................................................................3
Leadership Styles...............................................................................................................................6
Uber...............................................................................................................................................6
Google...........................................................................................................................................6
Microsoft.......................................................................................................................................7
Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................8
References.............................................................................................................................................9

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
Introduction
In this report we will discuss about the three technological companies such as Uber,
Microsoft and Google. The objective of this report is to focus on the styles of the leadership
and strategies of human resource management. Microsoft gave people a reason to love the
technology and always learn something new about it. Microsoft has steadily helped people to
work, live, play and connects through significant technology. Uber has provided a platform
where riders connect with drivers through an application on mobile. Uber has been the
discoverer in the sharing economy and it also offers various service levels and supported
people in terms of conveyance (Matherne & Toole, 2017). Google is the world’s most
powerful, far and wide search engine which provides significant results immediately. The
main mission of Google is to arrange the world’s information and make it globally
approachable and useful (Baldonado, 2015).
PESTLE Analysis
PESTLE UBER MICROSOFT GOOGLE
POLITICAL Uber has been facing
some obstacles all
over the world for not
having appropriate
laws and regulations.
Lawmakers have
asked the company
about insurance
policy and licence of
the drivers.
Microsoft increased
its performance
through political
stability of markets
that leads to
opportunities.
Government helped
the company in
increasing sales
through government
clients.
Government supports
businesses when the
market is stable, then
these businesses
advertise on Google
and this is advantage
for Google.
ECONOMICAL Uber works in the
industry of sharing
economy. This has
created employment
on large scale and
also they had reduced
the charges of taxi
and this cutting of
prices generated
competition.
Customer’s
purchasing power
increases with the
growth of economy.
So, this helps the
company in
generating profit and
revenue.
Microsoft is affected
by economic factors
such as inflation
rates, tax regulations,
interest rates and
exchange rates.

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
SOCIAL Uber is user friendly
and provided
efficiency and
convenience in
public’s routine.
Uber gives better and
quicker ride
experience than other
taxies (Europarl,
2015).
Microsoft has faced
big challenge because
people have switched
to big screens smart
phones. Microsoft is
helpful for growing
software business and
computer hardware.
Google might face
threat due to rise in
social media usage as
Facebook also
provides the
advertising services.
TECHNOLOGICAL Uber increases smart
phone users as to
avail the services it is
mandatory to
download the app on
smart phone. Uber is
helpful in saving time
technically as people
can book the nearest
cab that arrive the
pickup location
within minutes.
Microsoft has the
opportunity of
innovation for mobile
devices as the
demand of mobile
technology has been
raised. People prefer
handy technological
devices.
Google has the
opportunity in
technology as
improvement of
market is more
connected to online
and believes in
technology and this
would leads to high
advertisement profits.
LEGAL Uber must follow
laws such as the
technical usage laws,
copyright laws,
labour and employee
safety laws.
Microsoft should be
concerned for patent
law such as computer
software piracy.
Google can utilise the
opportunity of legal
regulations through
improving their
privacy for individual
users.
ENVIRONMENTAL Uber is providing
eco-friendly service
such as Uber pool
(Frue, 2017).
Microsoft has been
creating carbon
neutral products. The
company has also
invested in renewable
energy (Gupta,
2013).
The environmental
factors affect the
technical users in
terms of safety.
Google should make
sure that users are
protected from
hackers and other
scams (Thomas,
2007).
Five forces framework
Five Forces
Framework
Uber Microsoft Google
Threat of new
entrants
Uber is operating the
business with the
concept that people,
Threat of new
entrants to Microsoft
is not considerable
Many competitors
can enter the market
as the cost of

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
who want to work
with Uber as their
drivers then they are
welcomed with their
own cars and get
their vehicle
registered and work
at variable hours for
Uber. Hence, any
new company who
want to establish
similar business as
competition then the
obstacles and costs at
initial level are low.
Uber has high threats
of new entrants
(Ogutu, 2015).
because of its high
financial investment
and technological
knowledge.
business is average,
but it could be very
challenging to defeat
goodwill of Google.
Threat of substitutes A substitute is a
common fear that is
faced in competitive
business
environments. In the
industry of
transportation, there
are many competitors
that can quickly
replace Uber in the
market. The
possibility of threat
considered due to
service quality can be
from traditional
transportation
industry such as
taxis, public
transportation and
private cars etc., they
are comparatively
lower in cost due to
their efficiency and
quality. Hence
similar services can
threaten the existence
of Uber.
Threat of substitute is
low because
Microsoft includes
operating systems,
software applications
and cloud based
computing services.
The cost of
advertising can cause
a threat of substitute.
Supplier bargaining
power
Uber does not own
any of the vehicles in
its name. Company’s
Microsoft handles the
bargaining power of
suppliers by
Supplier bargaining
power is low because
the competition of

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
business platform is
dependent on drivers
owning vehicles.
Uber is providing
their drivers along
with cars for services,
this leads to rule the
suppliers over Uber
and suppliers have
high bargaining
power in case of
Uber. The company
should take care of
suppliers because if
anything bad happens
then it will affect
goodwill of the
company.
providing productive
supply chain to
suppliers (Njambi et
al., 2016).
Google is very low.
Buyer bargaining
power
As the market is
growing, the
alternatives and other
competitors are
increasing and they
bring more choice to
the customer and
switching cost which
are comparatively
lower. The Uber
application software
is free and requires
only downloading
and free registration,
customers can easily
switch on the
opponents of Uber.
Bargaining power of
buyer is of a
moderate level
because the existing
customers would not
switch easily on
another as this would
result in lack of
efficiency while
adapting new
product.
Individual buyers can
impact the Google
very less. Hence, the
bargaining power of
buyer is less.
Degree of rivalry Uber needs to
advance its
innovation strategies
as there are many
competitors. To
survive Uber should
lower the costs with
better quality of
services (Omsa et al.,
2017).
The competitive
rivalry is high for
Microsoft. Although,
Microsoft is the
discoverer of many
technologies in
computers but now
the same products are
made by other
companies with the
same features.
Degree of rivalry is
moderate as Google
has many competitors
in search engine, still
obtain majority of
internet services
(Tehrani & Rahmani,
2014).

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
Leadership Styles
Uber
Dara Khosrowshahi is the CEO at Uber. He made strategies such as building trust of people
towards the company, to build trust the company needs to strengthen their capability to get
their customers convinced. The company has to make them influenced that they are in it for
their benefits. Uber has not constraint itself to particular division of cars. They provide
variety of cars for different choices of various people. Uber adapted surge pricing technology;
in this strategy when the demand increases the price also decreases and prices also depends
on the number of drivers availability and the number of people who request for the rides
(Humphereys & Einstein, 2004). Uber implemented the strategy based on weather; if the
weather is unusual then the company increases the price because the demand increases more
as compared to normal weather. The company commenced a procedure of improving new
values and made new standards to avoid the miss happenings and to improve the image of the
company. The management of team is very mandatory to achieve the goals efficiently. When
various people are working together then they should be managed very effectively and
efficiently as diverse team is not comfortable in performing as the equivalent team. The
company can achieve the goals through building trust and managing the team to perform
productively (Mims, 2017).
Google
In the companies like Google, the culture is very different when it comes to its employees
and their work style. Google feels proud that it follows distributed leadership style. Go getter
style which is individual oriented is the type of leadership style Google believed in
(Manimala & Wasdani, 2013). When Sundar Pichai, the CEO of Google entered into the
organization, he had maintained his respectful approach and dedication to proceeding

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
development and training. He was aware of the new innovations that needed to exist in the
organization. He always believed in the great talent. New talent can be very helpful in the
growth of the company. He not only became a transformational leader for his existing
employees but also provided his knowledge to the new entrants. Their important strategy is to
recruit calibre and talented people and for this they give personal attention and involvement
in hiring candidates. The company wants the right people to get opportunity to achieve their
own life goals and also wants people who fit best for the company. Google always believed
in not forgetting its roots. Sundar Pichai always said that he is a person who will always
belong to the roots he comes from, no matter how far he goes or how successful he will be.
He gave his employees a good chance to succeed in t he organisation by listening to their
ideas and giving importance to their innovations (Marketing, 2017).
Microsoft
If the qualities of the ex CEO Steve’s leadership style is combined, it was more into intense
and the aggressive competition. This type of aggressive competition might demolish the new
innovations and the creativity that is shown by the people. When Satya Nadella came, he
introduced himself as the person who believes to be normal with his employees and focus
more on learning and creativity (Kell & Ovide, 2014). He collaboratively got involved with
the teams to create something new and innovative. His belief was not to be aggressive with
his employees. Steve used more of a directive style but Nadella believed to be more
supportive towards the people. When Satya became the in charge, the whole company felt
refreshed. He came from a technical background and started implementing the
transformational leadership style and did major changes in the values, norms, structure and
strategies. The cultural change that he did in the organization was known to be as “Soul the
unique core”. He in the initial phase of his joining understood that he needed to make the
culture of Microsoft more agile and flexible to initiate with the new innovations. Change is

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
the only thing that is constant, that is what he believed in. Such changes could only be done
by a transformational leader (Salem, 2018).
Conclusion
It has been concluded from the above report that Pestle analysis is very mandatory for any
company. Pestle analysis is a tool that is used by marketers to monitor and examine the
macro environmental factors that have an impact on an organisation. The pestle analysis is
important in macro environment because it is necessary to recognize the vital features which
affect the organisation’s costs of production. Pestle analysis is a framework that helps to
know the position and potential of the business and also helps to know when and how to
expand the business. It has been also concluded that leadership strategies play an important
role in an organisation. Strategic leadership helps the organisation in providing the vision and
orientation for the development and prosperity of an organisation. The strategic leaders
support to encourage the interest and strength of the people working in their organisation.
They support the employee of the organisation to learn how to transform the motive into
operation. We have also concluded that the organisations directed by the strategic leaders are
successful in achieving their goals productively. Strategic leaders make a important
difference in the performance of an organisation as they have the capability to enhance the
performance of an organisation with the help of their leadership strategies. They have the
calibre to influence a group towards the way of procurement of goals

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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
References
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_EN.pdf [Accessed 12 April 2018].
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Leadership Strategies and change in Human Resources
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