Introduction
Organizational Behavior (OB) includes the investigation of knowledge and its relevance to the examination of the behavior of people, individuals, and groups in organizations which is achieved by adopting a systematic approach that involves the interpretation of the relationships of people with their respective organization’s relationships with significance to an individual, an entire group, a complete organization or an absolute social system, the purpose of which is to construct enhanced associations by accomplishing human goals along with institutional and societal objectives.
The primary elements of organizational behavior incorporate the philosophy of the management, its principles, vision, and aspirations which is instrumental in directing the culture of the organization, whether formal, informal, or social which in turn establishes the style of headship, communication, and group dynamics of the organization. It is this aspect that is perceived by the employees to determine the quality of work-life thereby directly impacting their levels of motivation and resulting in varying degrees of performance, individual satisfaction, along personal growth and development. Thus all of these fundamentals unite together to build the model and structure on which the organization is based.
The four major Models of Organizational Behavior are autocratic, custodial, supportive, and collegial with no organization adapting itself to any single model.
Background
The ‘Cirque du Soleil’ is a Canada based circus entertainment company, an organization that was initiated in 1984, famous for its innovation and creativity and its massive diverse workforce of more than 3,000 employees, averagely aged of thirty years, from more than forty representing diverse nationalities and twenty-five languages countries were employed with Cirque by the year 2007.
Cirque Du Soleil, which literally means ‘Circus of the Sun’ in French, is a private limited entertainment company with its headquarters in Montreal, Quebec, and Canada. The annual revenue of the company is estimated to be about 600 million dollars.
Cirque du Soleil is an unparalleled success story with twenty years of imprinting a matchless position in the amusement business, with global performances and receiving enthusiastic appraisals for its innovative and creative shows in Las Vegas and the entire world.
Economics
Economically to the Cirque has on no account misplaced the ‘Midas touch’ with its assets worthy of more than one billion dollars stemming from the annual ticket sales of five hundred million dollars, and over fifty million people in more than hundred cities on four continents having seen its shows. By far, the Cirque has the reputation of the world’s fastest developing diverse live entertainment multinational, accomplishing a phenomenal growth rate of fifteen percent annually.
Remarkably, Cirque provides no exceptional remuneration for the cast or the creators of the show and the final product is by and large the result of the combined effort of the entire team. It is evident that managing such a business of creative people necessitates a crucial harmonizing operation of keeping the artists contented and at the same time constantly magnetizing additional audiences. To achieve this, Cirque spends a colossal sum in employing and preserving talent and managing an annual revenue of approximately twenty percent.
Recruitment and Selection
Cirque’s administration believes that the company is as good as its employees. Nevertheless, the company does not lay down any criteria of experience for selection and the selection process only considered five major attributes of creativity, commitment, responsibility, team-play, and passion in the candidates, and only the quality of people mattered. The human resource (HR) practices of Cirque du Soleil are highly instrumental in enabling the company to manage the diverse workforce with the help of its dynamic HR team.
‘Cirque du Soleil’ has been rightfully described as the foremost modern circus coalescing universal ideas with remarkable presentations, bizarre attires, innovative illumination and melody, and brilliant performers. It employs the acts from the miscellaneous global circuses, incorporating them into their very individual distinctive style and fabricating an amalgamation of street theatre, mime, puppetry, and extravaganza, ballet, along with concerto and rock music, offering a creation encompassing stunning acts of physical dexterity, chimera, and burlesque.
Speaking about the difficulty of the HR task at Cirque, Gagnon states, “Guy Laliberte (Cirque du Soleil’s founder) says that we reinvented the circus. But sometimes you have to reinvent HR.” (Cindy Waxer, “Cirque Du Soleil’s Balancing Act”, retrieved from the website, , January 2005). This study highlights the employment & choice, instruction, execution assessment, traditions, and the general work atmosphere at the Cirque. It also scrutinizes how the Cirque manages the cultural diversity of its workforce which in itself is an enormously complex and dexterous task.
Training and Performance
Nearly seventy-five percent of the total Cirque’s performers are chosen from the field of competitive sports who are then coached to become accomplished artists. The training involves, besides acrobatics, learning to act, sing and play music. What is surprising though is the fact that Cirque functions devoid of make-up artists.
“For us, training is “creative transformation” and recruiting is “treasure-hunting”. Even at Cirque, we have to work hard at it. We too could lose our soul, if we didn’t have the commitment. We have a ‘Creative Synergy’ department, whose preoccupation is in doing this.” (Arupa Tesolin, ‘Business at the Big Top: Four Rings for Creativity and Innovation’, August 08, 2007). In a short span of a little over two decades, Cirque which was initiated as an undersized corporation with seventy-three artists has extended its business from one corner of the world to another.
Insurance case study
With the vertical development of the company, Cirque had to undertake an absolute prototype shift concerning employment, guidance, and even preparation of the HR policies for its employees. For example, in early 2005, Sylvain Carrier, the ‘director for compensation, benefits, and HR Systems’, along with his team evaluated and refurbished Cirque’s group insurance system. In order to do so, they had to determine the accountability and perils of general insurance as well as human capital.
They desired a dependable insurance policy for each and every employee of the company which was a goal difficult to achieve owing to the global spread of the Cirque. As a result, the differentiated its indemnity exposure based on the four geographical locations including the International Headquarters in Montreal, the Las Vegas office, the Amsterdam office, and the other touring shows. This kind of policy guaranteed that the performers obtained reasonable coverage, wherever they were performed in the world, which in turn enabled Cirque to avail of only the best among the talented performers worldwide.
Culture and Work Environment
At Cirque, the artists are proffered their personal space along with an innovative atmosphere with the liberty to share their thoughts and ideas. Cirque also endows the artists’ prospects for professional as well as personal growth. The workplace is a projection of a home-away-from-home and the colleagues are closely knit like family members rather than co-workers. The performers are permitted to take their family units on tours thereby establishing the environment at Cirque as an open and inviting one, rather than a closed and restricted one.
Managing Cultural Diversity
Beginning with Algeria in 1995, Cirque saw an entry of Chinese, Russian, Asian, French, and English speaking performers and staff resulting in immense traditional gaps making communication cumbersome between the performers and technicians consequently affecting the excellence of the show and also giving rise to innumerable conflicts due to cultural diversity. For instance, the laws concerning sexual harassment were more rigorous in the US than in Canada. Where kissing to greet friends and co-workers was a regular feature of Canadian culture, it would not quite be the in the US and particularly some Asian cultures. Due to such instances, there would be complaints from employees leading the company to sometimes face legal issues. In order to conquer this dilemma, the human resources team of Cirque embarked on a fundamental language instruction agenda for the entertainers.
Communication
Clear and unimpeded communiqué within Cirque is almost a form of a corporate policy that enables the staff and the artists to attain quick solutions to problems due to early redresses worldwide. This communication empowered employees with problems or issues to either write or talk to their supervisors about it and anticipate the early redress of the issue.
Policies for retaining talent
It is imperative for Cirque to retain rare and talented artists. In one case a twenty-five-year-old Brazilian dwarf, Alan J. Silva (Silva), spotted in Sao Paulo joined the troupe and gave a tailor-made performance at the Las Vegas show ‘Zumanity’, performing with a female gymnast nearly 6 feet tall. A crisis occurred demanding his replacement for a few days owing to a shoulder injury. Even though an additional dwarf was fetched from Brazil t complete the performance, things didn’t quite materialize between the new dwarf and cirque and so Silva’s part was eliminated until he was fit enough to perform.
Learning with experience
In April 2004, Cirque du Soleil, of Montreal, had to pay 600,000 dollars to resolve a case of HIV intolerance against it. Matthew Cusick, an artiste with Cirque, was asked to leave as he was tested HIV positive, following which he filed a discrimination complaint against the corporation in the federal court the defrayal of which mandates the revision of all intolerant policies of the company. Talking about the incident, Suzzane Gagnon (Gagnon) Vice President, Human Resources, Cirque, remarked, “It’s too bad that it did happen, but I think we have better management practices today” (Cindy Waxer, “Cirque du Soleil’s Balancing Act,” website, , January 2005).
References
Arupa Tesolin, “Business at the Big Top: Four Rings for Creativity and Innovation,” 2007.
Cindy Waxer, “Cirque du Soleil’s Balancing Act,”. 2005. Web.
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Revans, R. W. 1982. The Origin and Growth of Action Learning. Hunt, England: Chatwell-Bratt, Bickley.