The Lincoln Electric Company Analysis Essay

Lincoln Electric Company has a very strong culture based on shared assumptions values and beliefs. This is evidenced by the attitudes of both the company management and employees towards the organization. The unchanged policies, practices and products point towards a very strong corporate culture. High employee performance and productivity over the many years of the company’s existence is also another indicator of a strong culture.

Every organization has values and beliefs that define what they do and how they do things in the organization. These values have significant influence on how the employees behaves and the general performance of the organization – it is these set of values and beliefs, rooted deep in the company’s organizational structure that depict the “dos”, “don’t” and the “hows”, of the organization and these unequivocally represents the culture of the organization. This concept became popular in the 1980s when Peters and Waterman in their book: “In search of Excellence” presented the profound argument that, the success of any organization is inextricable linked to the quality of its culture. (Carpenter, M., Taylor, B., Erdogan, B. 2009 p183). The purpose of this paper is an attempt to analyse the impact diverse cultures played in the success of the Lincoln Electric Company.

Organization culture which is a system of shared assumptions,values,and beliefs showing people what appropriate and inappropriate behavior can best be analysed in the Lincoln Electric Company from the P-O-L-C Framework as below.

The Lincoln Electric Company was a legacy company from which the families ' personal values were incorporated in the beginning and continue to be the fundamental beliefs compromising the company 's culture. By creating and implementing a culture of service, respect, and loyalty, the Lincoln Electric Company has become an institutional leader in American business standards. Lincoln 's culture cannot be summarized by a single dimension of cultural analytics because of its multifaceted culture that is innovative, outcome-oriented, people-oriented, and team-oriented

In order to make future international plants more successful than previous acquisitions, Lincoln Electric’s managers may consider re-evaluating their management control approach; carefully evaluating the international labor laws and regulations of the plant prior to deciding whether or not to invest in it; and providing increased training and development to managers and workers of both the parent company and host company to ensure understanding of both sides’ cultural values and beliefs.

In this case analysis I will be analyzing and summarizing my understanding of the organizational culture of the Lincoln Electric Company, based on key pointers and a Harvard Case Study by Arthur Sharplin. In my analysis I will be using the framework from chapter eight of the textbook “Principles of Management” by Carpenter, Bauer and Erdogan to discern aspects of the company’s culture. The company is said to have a distinctive management culture and manufactures welding equipment. It is located near Cleveland, Ohio USA. Lincoln Electric Company is considered to be one of the best managed manufacturing companies in the world.

While at first glance, Lincoln Electric would appear to be an Outcome-Oriented culture, on deeper reading, it becomes clear that the company takes many of the good points from a few types of organisational cultures to create their own.

The Lincoln Electric Company is indeed a success story. It remains the world’s leading welding machines and electrode manufacturer. Notably, estimates indicate that the company may be controlling about 40% of arc welding equipment market. It has two factories in US and 3 more factories abroad with a combined workforce about 3000 excluding field sales staff. However, the immense success the company has registered in its operations is tied to its long-standing management style. This essay discusses the Lincoln Electric Company’s culture and how impactful it has been in maintaining a motivated workforce.

The success of a business is intimately tied to the success of its culture. To understand better how organisational culture is created and maintained we will examine one of America’s most successfully managed companies, the Lincoln Electric company. We will examine many aspects of the company that contribute to its culture, such as the influence of the company’s founders, the golden rule, the incentive management plan, the performance appraisal system, the merit pay plan, the bonus plan, the way people communicate in the company and the management style. In analysing these we hope to understand not only what the culture of Lincoln Electric is, but also how it was formed and how it is maintained.

The success of a business is intimately tied to the success of its culture. To understand better how organisational culture is created and maintained we will examine one of America’s most successfully managed companies, the Lincoln Electric company. We will examine many aspects of the company that contribute to its culture, such as the influence of the company’s founders, the golden rule, the incentive management plan, the performance appraisal system, the merit pay plan, the bonus plan, the way people communicate within the company and the management style. In analysing these we will reveal a strong people oriented culture formed and maintained for over a century.

“An organization’s culture may be one of its strongest assets…,” (Principles of Management p. 184). Culture at the Lincoln Electric Company exemplifies this statement, and has since 1914. The Lincoln brothers’ attitude towards the employee has helped skyrocket this once small company to the powerhouse that it is today. Examining this outcome oriented company yields a perfect example of how a strong culture can add to the overall bottom line.

The company culture of Lincoln Electric is one of teamwork, support and innovation. After reading and reviewing the case study done on Lincoln Electric by Arthur Sharplin of McNeese State University, I have come away with a better understanding of how the company has become the role model for management world-wide.

Lincoln Electric Company was founded by John Lincoln and his brother James Lincoln. The company is now the world’s largest manufacturer of welding machines and electrodes (Sharplin, 1989). As stated previously, the founders’ values have a huge impact on what becomes of an organisation’s culture and James Lincoln (and his golden rule) is a good example. From early on he took a different approach to managing his company than others at the time. James Lincoln’s innovative

The factors that are most important during the culture birthing process are founders’ values, preferences, and industry demands. The founder of Lincoln Electric Company was John C. Lincoln, who started the company in 1895, later incorporating the business in 1906. The story is one of modest means which yields big returns. Specifically, “He opened his new business, unincorporated, with $200 he had earned redesigning a motor for young Herbert Henry Dow”. Further strife marked Lincoln’s humble beginnings, “Started during an economic depression and cursed by a major fire after only one year in business, Lincoln’s company grew, but hardly prospered”.

AurtherSharplin wrote a case study on Lincoln Electric Company [1]back in 1989 to document their success and what led to it. The company was very successful at the time of this study and it is a well written document. The case study finds many factors for the success of the company which appears to have a truly altruistic approach to business. In my case analysis I will not only look at the positive and negative attributes of the company, but I will also look at modern available data to see how well has the company faired and compare corporate policy changes. Meeting with a company and discussing with its leadership its success is not the only factor which should be considered now that we have an additional 24 years’ worth of data. The