Working on the “Newskool Grooves” case study and drawing on relevant organisation design and
development theory address the following tasks:
Identifies and describes the nature of topic(s) critically and thoroughly
Literature review (30%)
Has evidence of reading on relevant material beyond those given in teaching sessions or exercises
Refers extensively to sources
Evaluates literature logically and critically
Analysis and discussion (35%)
Presents strong and critical analysis and discussion well-grounded in literature
Shows both depth and breadth of understanding of the topic(s)
Conclusion and recommendation (15%)
Summarises the assignment thoroughly and critically
Provides realistic and feasible recommendations
Presentation and reference (10%)
Conveys all information clearly and completely with logical order
Displays excellent use of reference style
The Scenario
Newskool Grooves is a transnational company developing music software. The software is used to compose
music, play recordings in clubs, and produce albums. Founder and CEO Gerd Finger is, understandably,
the company’s biggest fan. “I started this company from nothing, from just me, my ideas, and my
computer. I love music—love playing music, love writing programs for making music, love listening to
music—and the money is nice, too.” Gerd says he never wanted to work for someone else, to give away his
ideas and let someone else profit from them. He wanted to keep control over them, and their image.
“Newskool Grooves is always ahead of the pack. In this business, if you can’t keep up, you’re out. And
we are the company everyone else must keep up with. Everyone knows when they get something from us,
they’re getting only the best and the newest.”
The company headquarters are in Berlin, the nerve center for the organization, where new products are
developed and the organizational strategy is established. Newskool outsources a great deal of its
coding work to programmers in Kiev, Ukraine. Its marketing efforts are increasingly based in its Los
Angeles offices. This division of labor is at least partially based on technical expertise and cost
issues. The German team excels at design and production tasks. Because most of Newskool’s customers are
English speakers, the Los Angeles office has been the best group to write ads and market products. The
Kiev offices are filled with outstanding programmers who don’t require the very high rates of
compensation you’d find in German or U.S. offices. The combination of high-tech software, rapid
reorganization, and outsourcing makes Newskool the very definition of a boundaryless organization.
Gerd also makes the final decision on hiring every employee for the company and places a heavy emphasis
on independent work styles. “Why would I want to put my company in the hands of people I can’t count
on?” he asks with a laugh. “They have to believe in what we’re doing here, really understand our
direction and be able to go with it. I’m not the babysitter, I’m not the school master handing out
homework. School time is over. This is the real world.”
The Work Culture
Employees want to work at this company because it’s cutting edge. Newskool’s software is used by a
number of dance musicians and DJs, who have been the firm’s core market, seeing it as a relatively
expensive but very high-quality and innovative brand. Whenever the rest of the market for music
software goes in one direction, it seems like Newskool heads in a completely different direction in an
effort to keep itself separate from the pack. This strategy has tended to pay off. While competitors
develop similar products and therefore need to continually lower their prices to compete with one
another, Newskool has kept revenues high by creating completely new types of products that don’t face
this type of price competition.
Unfortunately, computer piracy has eroded Newskool’s ability to make money with just software-based
music tools, and it has had to move into the production of hardware, such as drum machines and
amplifiers that incorporate its computer technology. Making this massive market change might be
challenging for some companies, but for an organization that reinvents itself every 2 or 3 years like
Newskool does, the bigger fight is a constant war against stagnation and rigidity.
The organization has a very decentralized culture. With only 115 employees, the original management
philosophy of allowing all employees to participate in decisionmaking and innovation is still the
lifeblood of the company’s culture. One developer notes, “At Newskool, they want you to be part of the
process. If you are a person who wants to do what you’re told at work, you’re in trouble. Most times,
they can’t tell you what they want you to do next—they don’t even know what comes next! That’s why they
hire employees who are creative, people who can try to make the next thing happen. It’s challenging,
but a lot of us think it’s very much an exciting environment.”
The Boundaryless Environment
Because so much of the work can be performed on computers, Gerd decided early to allow employees to
work outside the office. The senior management in Berlin and Los Angeles are both quite happy with this
arrangement. Because some marketing work does require face-to-face contact, the Los Angeles office has
weekly in-person meetings. Employees who like Newskool are happiest when they can work through the
night and sleep most of the day, firing up their computers to get work done at the drop of a hat.
Project discussions often happen via social networking on the company’s intranet.
The Kiev offices have been less eager to work with the boundaryless model. Managers say their computer
programmers find working with so little structure rather uncomfortable. They are more used to the idea
of a strong leadership structure and well-defined work processes.
“When I started,” says one manager, “Gerd said getting in touch with him would be no problem, getting
in touch with L.A. would be no problem. We’re small, we’re family, he said. Well, it is a problem. When
I call L.A., they say to wait until their meeting day. I can’t always wait until they decide to get
together. I call Gerd— he says, ‘Figure it out.’ Then when I do, he says it isn’t right and we have to
start again. If he just told me in the first place, we would have done it.”
Some recent events have also shaken up the company’s usual way of doing business. Developers in the
corporate offices had a major communications breakdown about their hardware DJ controller, which
required many hours of discussion to resolve. It seems that people who seldom met face to face had all
made progress—but had moved in opposite directions! To test and design the company’s hardware products,
employees apparently need to do more than send each other code; sometimes they need to collaborate face
to face. Some spirited disagreements have been voiced within the organization about how to move forward
in this new environment.
The offices are experiencing additional difficulties. Since the shift to newer products, Sandra Pelham
in the Los Angeles office has been more critical of the company. “With the software, we were more
limited in the kinds of advertising media we could access. So now, with the hardware—real
instruments—we finally thought, ‘All right, this is something we can work with!’ We had a whole slate
of musicians and DJs and producers to contact for endorsements, but Gerd said, ‘No way.’ He didn’t want
customers who only cared that a celebrity liked us. He scrapped the whole campaign. He says we’re all
about creativity and doing our own thing—until we don’t want to do things his way.”
Although the organization is not without problems, there is little question Newskool has been a
standout success in the computer music software industry. While many are shuttering their operations,
Newskool is using its market power to push forward the next generation of electronic music-making
tools. As Gerd Finger puts it, “Once the rest of the industry has gotten together and figured out how
they’re all going to cope with change, they’ll look around and see that we’re already three miles ahead
of them down the road to the future.”
Recommended readingKey textbooks: organisation design
The theory and practice of change management – Hayes, John 2014
Managing quality – B. G. Dale, Anthony van der Wiele, Jos van Iwaarden 2007 (electronic resource)
Managing change: a strategic approach to organizational dynamics – Burnes, Bernard 2009
Managing change: a strategic approach to organisational dynamics – Burnes, Bernard c2009 (electronic
resource)
Managing change in organizations – Carnall, C. A. 2010
Organisational structure: an essential lever in managing change – Cunneen, Patrick c2008
Organization: theory and design – Daft, Richard L., Murphy, Jonathan, Willmott, Hugh c2010
Managing quality – Dale, Barrie G., Wiele, Anthony van der, Iwaarden, Jos van 2007
Organization development: a Jossey-Bass reader – Joan V. Gallos, MyiLibrary 2006 (electronic resource)
Quality management essentials – Hoyle, David, MyiLibrary 2007 (electronic resource)
Quality management essentials – Hoyle, David 2007
Change management: a critical perspective – Hughes, Mark, Chartered Institute of Personnel and
Development 2006
Organizational theory, design, and change – Jones, Gareth R. c2010
Images of organization – Morgan, Gareth c2006
Organizational development: a practitioners’ guide for OD and HR – Cheung-Judge, Mee-Yan, Holbeche,
Linda 2011
Organizational change – Senior, Barbara, Swailes, Stephen 2010
Key textbooks: organisation development
People and organisational development: a new agenda for organisational effectiveness – Francis, Helen,
Holbeche, Linda, Reddington, Martin 2012
Reinventing organization development: new approaches to change in organizations – Bradford, David L.,
Burke, W. Warner c2005
Managing change in organizations – Carnall, C. A. 2010
Organization development: a Jossey-Bass reader – Joan V. Gallos, MyiLibrary 2006 (electronic resource)
Organization development & change – Cummings, Thomas G., Worley, Christopher G. 2008
Change management: a critical perspective – Hughes, Mark, Chartered Institute of Personnel and
Development 2006
Change management: a guide to effective implementation – Paton, Rob, McCalman, James 2008
The fifth discipline: the art and practice of the learning organization – Senge, Peter M. 2006
Key journals
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/10.1111/(ISSN)1748-8583
OR
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/store/10.1111/(ISSN)1748-8583/asset/homepages/HRMJ_SPECIAL_ISSUE_CfP_-_E
mployer_engagement_Feb_2015.pdf?v=1&s=b2caa03792f4a0d185a63be19a9d2522377e340d
International Journal of Human Resource Management [online]
People Management [online]
or
http://www.cipd.co.uk/pm/
Personnel Review [online]
Or
http://www.emeraldinsight.com/loi/pr
Work, Employment and Society [online]
OR
http://wes.sagepub.com/content/by/year