Management and Operations Report: Leadership and Strategy at Uber

This report delves into the management and operational strategies of Uber, examining the distinct roles of managers and leaders and their contributions to the company's success. It compares the characteristics of managers and leaders, highlighting their responsibilities in various scenarios such as change management, product launches, and employee engagement. The report explores leadership theories like situational, system, and contingency leadership, illustrating their application within Uber's organizational structure. Furthermore, it analyzes key approaches to operations management and their significance in achieving business objectives, emphasizing factors that influence decision-making within the business environment. The report uses Uber as a case study to illustrate the practical application of these concepts.

Management and
Operations
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Table of Contents
Introduction.....................................................................................................................................3
Task 1..............................................................................................................................................3
P1 Comparison between roles and characteristics of managers and leaders..............................3
Task 2..............................................................................................................................................5
P2 Role of a leader and function of a manager in different situational contexts.......................5
P3 Different theories and models of approach...........................................................................6
Task 3..............................................................................................................................................8
P4 Key Approaches to operations management.........................................................................8
P5 Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives.............9
Task 4............................................................................................................................................10
P6 Factors within the business environment that impact decision-making..............................10
Conclusion.....................................................................................................................................11
References.....................................................................................................................................12
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Introduction
All the activities that take place within business with a view to increase value are known
as part of its operations. Designing and controlling the process of those activities with a focus on
the optimum utilisation of the resources is operations management (Grabner, 2019). This report
is prepared with the focus on the role of management and the leadership on improving the
operational management process of an organisation. With a view to enhance understanding of
the contents present in this report, UBER Technologies Inc. is taken as company for case study.
This company is commonly known as Uber. It is an American multinational company
headquartered in San Francisco, California. It was founded by Garrett Camp and Travis
Kalanick in 2009 and offers aggregator services for vehicles as taxi, food delivery, freight
transportation, package delivery, etc. This report presents a discussion on the roles and
characteristics of a leader and manager in the organisation. Also, discussed below are the
contributions of the managers and the leaders in the different situations that arise in the
organisation. Various theories and models of management applicable to leaders are presented
below. In the final segment of the report, key approaches, importance and value of operational
management is discussed with a view of their contribution in achieving business objectives of
the Uber.
Task 1
P1 Comparison between roles and characteristics of managers and leaders
Leaders are those who are designated to lead the organisation to road to success while
mangers are those who are responsible for taking company ahead on the path that leaders have
enlightened (Streich, 2016). For success of an organisation, it is very important to have
managers who have leadership skills and leaders who are skilled managers.
Leader – Leader can be defined as someone who has a good vision to achieve a goal and
can influence subordinates towards maximising their efforts to realise that good vision. Leaders
use social influence not some coercion to lead, not direct.
Role of a leader Set up organisational structure – It is the most important role of leader to set
organisational structure and objectives and also, to organise resources that would be
required to achieve those targets. It is the leadership to Uber i.e. its CEO and other
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members of the Board who are responsible to develop and organise organisational
structure, command chain, communication channels that makes basis for its
organisational culture.
 Strategist – It is also one of the most important role that a leader has to play i.e. devising
a strategy that the organisation would implement to achieve organisational targets that
have been set earlier. Uber leadership develops flexible strategies in alignment with the
market situations to achieve targets and empower growth of the company.
Characteristics of a leader Enlightened – A leader always have a clear mind to know what their specific focus shall
be in prevalent situation for they are the one who are responsible to implement vision and
objectives of the company (Furtner and Baldegger, 2016). Leadership of Uber lays down
clear goals and develops clear strategy for the employees to provide them clear
instructions as to how they are supposed to carry out organisational objectives.
 Strong decision-making power – Leaders are responsible for taking big and most
important decisions in an organisation that can make or break it even. It were the wrong
decisions of the earlier leadership of Uber that had developed toxic organisational culture
which was improved by correct decisions of the new Board and CEO.
Manager – Manager can be defined as someone who is entrusted to manage a company or
its some function. Managers are generally those persons who are responsible to carry out
functions of management such as planning, organising, staffing, controlling, etc.
Role of a manager Link between subordinates and senior management – A manager is responsible to
provide information about senior management decisions to its subordinates and to inform
subordinates issues and activities to senior leadership. In Uber's organisational culture,
managers play an active role as mediator to keeps the organisational culture healthy.
 Supervision - It is the responsibility of manager to make others perform activities that are
required for achieving organisational objectives (Harel, Schwartz and Kaufmann, 2020).
Managers of Uber play a supervising role that their subordinates are performing their role
in a correct manner in such a way that it provides employees a developmental
opportunity as well.
Characteristics of a manager
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 Time management – Mangers are required to multi-task. Therefore, it is a very important
characteristic of an effective manager that they are able to devote right amount of time to
every task that require their attention. Uber managers are trained to perform multi-
tasking and encourage their teams to develop same skill as well.
 Team management – All managers have teams performing under them. Uber managers
gives special emphasis to devote time for their team welfare so that they can avoid
situation of conflicts within their team as well as of their team members with another
employees of the company.
Task 2
P2 Role of a leader and function of a manager in different situational contexts
Effective implementation of both the role and responsibilities of managers as well as
leaders are vital to the success of an organisation. They need to perform complementary roles in
various situations that arise in business to carry out operations smoothly.
Change in management
Change is important for a company to brings in new and fresh talent that can provide
different lookout for companies to grow and also improve its organisational culture. Uber once
had leadership that was too ambitious to grow that it left ethics behind. This also encouraged
power politics which left company with a toxic organisational culture (Edelman, 2017). Then, a
management change was brought on board that improved the organisational culture. Leaders
were changed and so was leadership style. It was responsibility of functional managers to
organise and control their departmental resources in accordance with the strategies and
objectives set by new leadership. Joint efforts of leadership and managers soon paid a result in
the form of improved employee morale and goodwill of the company back on track.
Launch of a new product
Whenever a company is about to launch a new product or service, there are multiple
activities that are needed to be planned and performed. Uber is a service-based company. When
it launches new services say it launched its food delivery service segment i.e. Uber Eats, it
includes defining roles to be played by both managers and leaders right from planning for the
launch event, developing marketing strategies and managing smooth integration of all activities,
etc. Company leadership will be required to plan all the activities and their sequences with the
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assistance of marketing managers and it will be the responsibility of all functional managers to
ensure successful execution all the processes that are concerned to their department so that
product launch as an event becomes successful.
Employee engagement
Employee engagement is the approach that motivates leadership and managers to
develop right working conditions for their employees and team members (Elliott, 2015).
Leadership of Uber has developed specific processes that can ensure that employees have an
enhanced feeling that their well-being is taken care of by the company and this encourage
employees to commit themselves towards achievement of organisational goals. If it is the
responsibility of leadership of company to set strategies for employee engagement, it is the
responsibility of HR Managers to carry out appropriate recruitment and selection. Also, they are
responsible to motivate employees to give their best each day, develops opportunities for them to
learn, observe, experience and grow their personality as well as have satisfactory development in
their professional life.
Performance management
It includes all those activities that focus on improving employee morale, performance
and productivity in line with organisational objectives. Post the change in leadership, new
leadership had developed new processes that encourage holistic development of the employees.
It had clear instructions for the HR department to develop range of activities and processes that
can have employee feedback, performance report, renewed look on appraisal techniques, etc.
(Bratton, 2020). Leadership of the company had responsibility of defining processes and HR
managers were asked to develop specific policies and all functional managers were asked
perform leading function and were made responsible for the performance management and
improvement of their respective teams. This has helped company reduce employee turnover and
developmental cost.
P3 Different theories and models of approach
Leadership involves motivating people that follows the leader to perform to the best of
their capabilities (Kibbe, 2019). Below mentioned are few theories and models that are reflected
in leadership of Uber:
Situational leadership
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This theory asserts that face and nature of leadership shall change according to present
prevalent situation. Leadership of Uber adopts this theory and implements it accordingly. It was
designed by Blanchard and Hersey who developed below mentioned styles for implementation: Telling – This style is for those situations when leaders have to closely lead their team to
achievement of objectives. Selling – This style is for those situations where employee needs motivation to perform
their job. Participating – This style is for those situations when leaders have to provide confidence
to employees to own up to their responsibilities and perform the task with their full
competencies.
 Delegating – This style is for those situations when team is performing well and leaders
can delegate them independent tasks under supervision.
Strength – This leadership style helps leaders in building a working environment that is
capable of adapting according to any situation. This increases productivity and improves the
chances for the growth of the company.
Weakness - This leadership style asks leaders to change their style of leading according
to the situation, this might confuse employees and team members as to what style they must
adhere with. This could have negative effects over the performance of the team members.
System leadership
This leadership theory believes in encouraging the maintenance of the system of
functions and departments of the company (Penney, Kelloway and O’Keefe, 2015). Uber
Management takes inspiration from this theory and identify all inter-personal aspects of the
issues and situations among departments before dealing with any problem. This has helped
improve inter-relations among various departments.
Strength – This has helped Uber management to maintain coordination between
departments and take on external threats and opportunities presented before it in a more
collective manner. Taking view of team members in consideration also makes them feel
connected with the company and responsible for their behaviour.
Weakness - Analysing all aspects of a situation before taking any decision is a time
consuming process and many a times, company might have to face opportunity loss because of
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it. This could also lead to creation of friction or power politics in company to prove their
departmental superiority.
Contingency leadership
This is the leadership style that focuses on leader’s responsibility in dealing with the
contingent situation that arises in the company (Karlsson, 2016). Effectiveness in dealing with
contingency makes a leader great. Taking inspiration from this theory, Uber management
believes in analysing all aspects of a contingent situation in a prompt manner before dealing with
it.
Strength – This helps leadership in taking effective decisions during contingent situations
when ineffective decisions could have resulted in negative repercussions for the company. This
helps leaders in developing flexibility and adaptability in their leadership skills.
Weakness - This style focuses on eliminating those situations that might create
contingencies for the company. This might create panic in those employees who are having low
productivity at the moment and with reduced motivation, their performance might fall even
more.
Task 3
P4 Key Approaches to operations management
There are various approaches that are adopted by management to execute operations in
an organisation. Below mentioned are few approaches that can be used by Uber management:
SERVQUAL
This is a quality management methodology which focuses on discovering and capturing
consumer expectations and perceptions of the service provided by the company (Künzel, 2016).
Uber can this model to determine the dimensions in the services provided by the company that
customers are not finding satisfactory.
Role of leader – Leaders have to assume an active an role in determining the expectancy-
disconfirmation paradigm for the customers of the Uber company. It is the process of
understanding the extent of customer's expectations to which the company passed by their
services.
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Role of manager – Once the extent is identified, it is the duty of managers to work with
their teams to reduce and eliminate the processes that can help company improving its service
image in the eyes of its customers.
Queuing Approach
This approach is a mathematical and analytical method used for determining customer
waiting time in line to get services so that company can build efficient and cost effective
business system (Lee and Tang, 2018). This can help Uber in developing a workflow system that
can make the process of customer satisfaction smoother.
Role of leader – It is responsibility of leader to develop the system that can help the
company in optimising its cost and expenses that are being incurred to pacify and bring back the
customers that are leaving company services after being disappointed.
Role of manager – It is they duty of managers to lead their team to execute the system
that can provide support to customer support team so that faster and more effective services can
be provided to its customers.
Lean thinking
This approach is used to record time taken for each step in providing streamlined services
to the customers. With the help of these records, steps not adding value and steps which are
taking too much time can be reduced (Kim, Baek and Lee, 2018). This can help Uber in
minimizing waste processes such as customer waiting time, customer hassle time, defected
service time, etc.
Role of leader – Leaders have a defining role in showing the path to employees that can
help the organisation reduce or eliminate the waste in the process. That will lead company in
increasing operations effectively.
Role of manager – It is the duty of managers to define the steps that are to be taken by
employees to reduce waste in the process. It increases productivity and potential of the
employees.
P5 Importance and value of operations management in achieving business objectives
Managing business operations effectively helps a company in achieving effective control
over its productivity, services and people (Schneider, 2017).
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 Increased productivity – Productivity is defined as the ratio of input to output and is one
of the ways to determine efficiency of the employees. Effective operations management
helps Uber in achieving optimum utilisation of its employees' capabilities and also in
developing proper mechanism to ensure that appropriate number of staff is hired by the
company so as to achieve optimum staffing solution as well. Increased revenue – Operations management processes helps a company in allowing
innovations and creativities in the process to improve the operations processes and
reduce customers queries. This helps in increasing revenues for the company. Uber
management should provide opportunities to their employees to innovate the process and
develop a process that is helpful for company to develop sustainable and more profitable
venture. Improved customer satisfaction – Satisfied customers helps a company in growing by
leaps and bounds. Uber is a technology based service company and one of the most
important parameter of judging its success is, satisfaction of its customers by the services
provided by the company. Effective operations management streamlines this process of
improving customer satisfaction.
 Reduced operating cost – When a company has enhanced productivity and provides
quality in services which has earned it loyal and satisfied customers, the cost incurred on
providing services gets automatically reduced. Reduced costs leads to increase in
revenues. Effective operations management helps in realising this process. Uber can also
use this process to improvise the process of waste reduction, service waiting time
reduction, etc.
Task 4
P6 Factors within the business environment that impact decision-making
Internal operations of an organisation are impacted by the factors present in its external
environment (Heizer, Render and Munson, 2017). These factors affect the have both direct and
indirect effects on the operations of the organisation. Few factors that can impact operations and
decisions of leaders and managers of Uber are as follows: Corporate Social Responsibility - All the businesses operate in a societal setting. It
derives all its resources from the society and also sells its products and services in the
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society only. Therefore, it becomes responsibility of the businesses to share their
corporate profits for the betterment of the society and its people. Managers and leaders
are obliged to develop policies and set aside a part of their profit to work for the welfare
of the society. Leadership of the Uber has developed prorgrams like UberHue, Women
of Uber, UberABLE, UberPRIDE, etc. to make a contribution to fulfilling their part of
responsibilities in societal welfare. Also, leaders and other managers of Uber make sure
that no policy of theirs are in contradiction with the culture and ethics of the society.
Socially responsible businesses have goodwill in society which helps it attract new
customers and retain old ones loyally. Sustainability – It is very important for businesses to develop practices that can help it
achieve sustainability in its organisational life. Therefore, managers and leaders should
continue to keep innovating their processes to develop sustainable operational and
organisational practices (Brodeur and Nield, 2018). Managers and leaders of Uber
understand that a sustainable business holds better relationships with the society as well
as have deeper impact on its business environment. Therefore, all of their decisions as
well as strategies are aimed in directions that can help it achieve business sustainability
as well as environmental sustainability. For example, Uber promotes Carpool so that less
pollution generates. It promotes reuse and recycle of products and services to help in
waste management. Company encourages UberEats and others delivery partners to use
eco-friendly packaging to reduce plastic waste.
 Culture, value and ethics – Every organisation has a working environment, values and
ethical practices that develops its culture. This culture keeps on evolving with different
approaches adopted by managers, employees and leadership to operate within the formal
organisational structure (Stone, 2017). Uber is a multinational company and therefore,
employs staff from multiple cultures of the world. It develops policies in compliance
with the legislations and the societal practices prevalent in the domestic country. In other
words, we can say that organisational culture of Uber is a separate culture, from the
respective culture of its employees outside the doors of the company offices. Managers
and leaders at the Uber develops societal culture-neutral employees as well as marketing
policies taking into consideration that they do not hurt sentiments of any community
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knowingly and unknowingly. Its multi-culture employee base also helps cultural
infusion and integration in the society which is good for developing global society.
Conclusion
From the above report, it can be concluded that leadership and management of a
company plays a very important role in streamlining the operational processes of a company.
Managers and leaders adopt various styles and approaches in the company to lead the teams and
employees based on the demand of the situation. Management policies and leadership styles
have a profound impact on the operations of the company. Effective operations helps a company
in achieving a cost effective structure which helps it in improving its revenue and customer
satisfaction.
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References
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