Culture, Leadership and Staffing at Xerox

Our textbook provides us with the definition of organizational culture “as the set of shared, taken-for-granted implicit assumptions that a group holds and that determines how it perceives, thinks about, and reacts to its various environments” (Kinicki & Williams 227). The Publix Corporation formally states its commitment to its organizational culture in their published mission statement. One of the bullet points of the Publix mission dedication “to the dignity, value and employment security of our associates” ("Mission Statement & Guarantee").

Increasing productivity and sparking motivation in employees, are challenges that managers, businesses, and organizations have struggled with for centuries. While there are many beliefs about which method(s) yield the best results, and what is considered to be the desired result, a ‘one-size-fits-all’ management technique still does not exist. The current movement in psychology, called Positive Psychology, focuses on what is “right” in an individual, and not on their faults. This basic concept is starting to extend its influences into the workplace, making it seem that Positive Psychology may become the key ingredient corporate culture, and all places of employment alike, have needed to promote success and satisfaction in their lines of work.

To understand the organizational culture of a company, one needs to start by looking at the history. Lakeshore Learning Materials was born from a divorced mother of three named Ethelyn Kaplan, who took a dream and a chance by moving her family to California in 1954 to open a toy store. When she started noticing that teachers were interested in her material, Ethelyn realized that she needed to expand her business into educational materials. 60 years later, Lakeshore Learning Materials has grown into a company with over 2000 employees, 60 retail stores throughout the United States and growing. Lakeshore Learning Materials is currently headed by Ethelyn’s grandsons, Bo and Josh Kaplan. Under the supervision of Bo and Josh, Lakeshore continues to be a leader in the Educational Materials, yet still able to keep the family culture that their grandmother started. Highest quality customer service and hard work are the core values that shape Lakeshore’s Organizational Strategy. These high expectations aren’t hard for employees at Lakeshore because the company is so loved by everyone that works there, that they give nothing less than the best.

Various television shows have pushed boundaries to create positive differences in social perception of minorities, but only few have had the power and influence to make a noteworthy impact on American culture. Television Comedy has been able to cleverly impact acceptance of American Culture boundaries for years on end. From the show “Good Times” all the way to “The Office”, comedy has been an effective way of creating positive perceptions and acceptance of all different kinds of views on our society. An easily countable number of academic texts give evidence to Black-watched, Black-targeted television narratives. (Marc, 1997). Racially directed comedy television shows have, in my opinion, have been one of the most prevalent types of television

Workplace culture is often hard to describe, because it means something different in every organisation and many times employees feel it’s ‘just the way things are’. But so often it can define a company and when it’s not working well, everyone knows about it.

The company’s department stores continued to struggle in the late 1990s with high operating costs and buffeted by competition from discounters such as Walmart. Since then the company moved to different directions in order to retain its claim as U.S.’s largest department store.

As the CEO of Xerox Ursula Burns demonstrates many strengths and weakness, some of which stand out more than others. Ms. Burns is very innovative not only in her leadership style, but also in the products and services the company now offers. Last year in 2012,

According to Robbins and Judge, organizational culture is, “a system of shared meaning held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations” (Robbins 249). A strong organizational culture is one whose organization’s core values are both intensely held and widely shared. After viewing Enron: The Smartest Guys in the Room, it is obvious that Enron had not only an organizational culture that was strong, but one that was extreme and aggressive. This aggressive and strong organizational culture discouraged both teamwork and ethical behavior and in the end it only plagued Enron until it eventually collapsed under its downfall.

The company was too reliant on orders from the US Government. They need to expand its operations into other areas.

Xerox hopes to avoid mistakes of the past by having “a system to prevent technology from leaking out of the company”, according to Robert V. Adams, president of XTV. They have a $30 million dollar fund to support this intrapreneurial activity. It has supported a dozen start-ups thus far, only two having failed. These are extremely promising numbers, with 83% of ventures coming to fruition.

We live in a world where, because of the Internet and the Web, we can communicate with someone in Africa or Asia as easily as we can communicate with someone in the office next door. A company like Xerox represents businesses all over the world, and the diversity of its employees is a big plus. Acknowledging our differences and

Xerox is an American corporation having its headquarters currently in Norwalk Connecticut. The headquarters of the company moved from

Financial Research – The Xerox Abstract On April 8th, 2002, the Xerox Corporation ("Xerox") announced its willingness to accept the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) to reach a settlement with the conditions. Thereafter, its financial fraud became surfaced. On June 28th, Xerox Corporation in accordance with the requirements of the settlement, submitted the unaudited 1997-2000 restated annual financial statements to the SEC, and recognized fraud interest income of $6.4 billion, pre-tax profit of $1.4 billion (SEC thought that should be $1.5 billion) during this period, which sparked

Investors do not like to see this and so inevitable just as quickly as the figures were announced, their shares plummeted: from 14p to £10.54 (Fletcher, 2010). It’s clear the company needs to sort this issue out and develop a strategy that will enable them to make profits in all the markets they are in. The question that needs to be asked is: Why is our strategy working in Africa and Asia but not in Europe and North America?

Major advantage with this option is the fact that Xerox operates in the market it fully knows, dominates and controls. As a market leader, having gained clear edge over main competitor IBM, Xerox can consolidate its position with the introduction of innovative new product "Book-In-Time solution" that could significantly reduce the publishing costs.