Introduction
The understanding of organizational resources is an important tool to evaluate the function of management of a company. As for say, technology or human resource development or monetary rules and regulations is considered as the most effective element that determines the success of an organization. It is a million-dollar question for the firms whether they have been able to optimize these resources following their target or not. it is seen that because of improper use of technology, many companies were failed to achieve their desired goal.
Not only the technology but also the experience, organizational behavior, human resources, business ethics are the significant factors and each of them play a major role in defining the positive outcomes of the company. Dole food company is the study of this paper to find out whether that company has optimized the organizational resources or not. Furthermore, this paper represents the implied recommendations that are applicable for the upcoming business challenges.
Company background
Dole food company, Inc. is a well-known American-based food company that is the packer of food items such as grapes, pineapples, bananas, strawberries, and other fresh and frozen foods. In the field of ready-to-eat packaged salads and vegetables, the Dole food company has a greater role to produce such demands. Dole was founded in Hawai’i as a Hawaiian Pineapple Company by James Dole. The company has been able to retain its success since 1851 and now it does business in more than 90 countries. It produces approximately 200 kinds of products and is the largest producer and marketer of fresh fruits and vegetables.
But it is not easy to retain such success and market as well without proper and timetable decision. The organizational behavior, human resources, experienced skills and knowledge, and implementation of modern technology are the resources that help the Dole food company to be established and make such a position.
The quality is the all thing to Dole Food Company which is their worldwide commitment. The followings are the philosophies Dole food:-
- Comprehensive programs for food safety.
- Scientific pest management programs
- Stringent quality control measures.
- State-of-the-art production and transportation technologies.
- Nutrition education to help the public understand the benefits of eating 5-13 servings of fruits and vegetables a day. Dole is a founding member of the National 5 A Day For Better Health Program and is the produce industry leader in developing technology-based nutrition education programs for children.
- Continuous improvement through research and innovation.
- Dedication to the safety of their workers, communities, and the environment.” (Philosophy, 08 )
This paper is to find out whether or not the Dole food company has optimized these organizational resources for effectiveness and efficiency.
At first, it is necessary to draw out the general function of food and vegetable marketing management function.
An overview of this industry
Marketing Fruit & Vegetables
- Consumers spent $76 billion annually to buy fruits and vegetables (2000)
- $37 billion (49%) bought from retailers
- $38 billion (50%) bought from a foodservice
- The rest $1 billion (1%) direct from the growers
- The market margin of this industry was ~$57 billion (75%)
- Grower’s share of this industry was ~$19 billion (25%)
Now, it is time to evaluate the organizing functions of management that optimized the organizational resources for effectiveness and efficiency. These are critically discussed below:-
Technology
The quantity of fruits and vegetables that is marketed has increased to serve the rapid growth of the population. The desire for fruit and vegetables marketing services from the consumer has also increased. So, the companies like Dole need to run their management with the demand of these needs. Technology is one of them that help the management to perform these functions and reduce the complexity of running and maintain the business activities. It would not be wrong to say that the more use of the right technology, the more achievement in business. In today’s business, technology is to be said as the driver of a company’s achievement.
The use of proper and modern technology brings a lot of benefits both to the company and to the users as well. But it is also important to mention that the use of technology varies on the basis of product category and its marketing function. Dole Food Company produces about 200 kinds of products. All products market by the Dole food company is perishable products. Most importantly, the marketing of perishable products and implementation of technology is different from the other products. To protect these perishable products from harmful bacteria, appropriate and updated technology is needed.
When you don’t have the time or energy to cook what you want, the DOLE ready-to-eat foods are great to use. But to make it such available the foods packaging system needs to be very accurate and environment friendly. To do so there is no alternative to using proper technology. Technology management needs to be efficient when we talk about the products of Dole Food Company.
Now it is very important to find out whether the Dole food company uses the latest technology or not in operating their business.
Each kind of food has different shelf-lives and it depends on how perishable they are. Until some 50 or 60 years ago, the man depended largely upon the perishable product supplies and produced within a boundary of a few hundred miles of his home. With the rise of bacteriology, the pace of all historical improvement teaches us that the work in fruit and vegetable technology has just begun. The grapes, pineapples, bananas, strawberries, and other fresh and frozen foods market by Dole Food Company are perishable products. These perishable fruits have been moved by rail, ship, air and with the improved technology, it is ensured the quicker and cooler transportation of fresh fruits and vegetables.
Packaging is the method to protect ripe fruit during shipment and handling. But there are several methods to package these fruits or vegetables. The use of technology helps to reduce the uncertainty in marketing perishable products like fruits and vegetables. It is known that Dole uses the very latest technology and method to market their product.
It has been seen that in regarding the perishable nature of the product, there is a limited window of opportunity for effective marketing and sales opportunities. It is a challenge for the Dole food company to create and maintain an effective marketing and sales field. The question is how much Dole is successful in the field of technology and its effective implementation. Post-harvest handling and planning is critical to maintaining the quality of the fruits and vegetables. The SWOT analysis of using technology by the dole food company will make it clearer.
SWOT analysis
- Strength: provides and introduces all the crucial technical information required for business.
- Weakness: the packaging technology has not been developed compared to the other things.
- Opportunity: to meet the growing demand of packaged fruits, vegetables, flowers of the growth population.
- Threats: the competitors, upcoming technologies, local business, oil price etc…
Human resource
The policy of Dole food company ensuring that the organization fulfills all of its equal employment opportunities and other government obligation. That means it arranges employment opportunities and ensures the government obligations. In addition, it carries out job analysis to establish the specific requirements for an individual job within the organization.
From the forecasting point of view, the human resource requirements are necessary for the organization to achieve its objectives both in terms of the number of employees and skills. How many employees are essential to complete the work and what type of skills are required to do that job to achieve the objective of the organization etc. are included in the functions of human resource management.
The doll food company has utilized its total personnel perfectly, which helps in developing and implementing their plan to meet the desired requirements. Its functions are related to preparing and implementing a plan to conduct the organization properly. Recruiting and selecting personnel to fill specific jobs within the organization is the strong field of the dole industry. Most importantly, recruiting and select the right personnel for the right job in the organization is the important task of human resource management of the dole food company. Orienting and training the employees provided by the organization is also a vital tool.
Designing and implementing management and organizational development programs helps the organization to run the business activities properly. Due to the conduction of the organization, designing and implementing the programs are the important task of human resource management to determine the compensation system. That means, how way company will give them a salary and what method they will follow to determine the salary etc. are the functions of Human resource management.
SWOT analysis
- Strength contains major internal and external factors that affect the organization in the form of analytical breakdown.
- Weakness: not found
- Opportunities: with the rapid change of population and demand of packaged food, the employment opportunity has been increased to meet these challenges.
- Threats: labor union, salary & wages, inefficient employee, employees shifted to competitors.
The Dole food company is committed to delivering the consumer and as well as the customers with the finest, high-quality products and also to lead the firm in nutrition research and education. To do so the company needs a huge number of employees and they do have it. The company operates in the USA, Europe, and Asia. According to estimation “The Company does business in more than 90 countries and employs, on average, 36,000 full-time, regular employees and 23,000 full-time seasonal or temporary employees, worldwide”(Company Info, 2005). These statistics show a strong number of human resources that the Dole food company maintains. In the perspective of today’s modern business, Human resource development is one of the most vital tactics that the company uses.
Another thing that needs to be mentioned is that the Dole food company is used to teach its employees about marketing tools and techniques. The job ranking method of this organization is based on several rules and conditions.
Organizational behavior
Organizational behavior is a crucial resource that is considered the most important function of effective and efficient management. Organizational cultures are important to a firm’s success for several reasons. They give an organization to identify the employees-a defining vision of what the organization represents. They are also an important source of stability and continuity to the organization, which provides a sense of security to its members. Culture help stimulates employee enthusiasm for their task. As there are a lot of employees involved in the business activities of Dole Food Company, organizational behavior is an Unavoidable organizational resource.
Physical asset and Monetary
Physical asset and monetary information both are important for the organization and its effectiveness and efficiency. However, Dole food is to be considered as the world’s largest producer of packaged fruit, vegetable, and cut flowers.
Fiscal Year End:
December
Revenue (2007):
6931.00 M
Revenue Growth (1 yr):
12.30%
Employees (2007):
45,000
Employee Growth (1 yr):
(-4.30%)
Past experience or knowledge
Past experience or knowledge can make a difference with the other organization. The more you are experienced, the more you have faced challenges. As the Dole Food Company has passed more than 150 years of its operation, it has faced numerous challenges and has overcome those efficiently. There is a proverb “learn from the past”. So, past experience or knowledge creates the area where Dole is superior to others.
The Dole food company efficiently has utilized their past experience whenever they face any type of threat or challenges. Every now and then they face various kinds of threats and efficiently they overcome those. The company is well aware of the needs of the consumer, the want of the customer, and the demand of the current population. Various types of problems arise every day and most of them are solved with the help of previous experience.
“Dole Food Company’s worldwide team of growers, packers, processors, shippers, and employees is committed to consistently providing safe, high-quality fresh fruit, vegetables, and food products, along with fresh-cut flowers while protecting the environment in which its products are grown and processed” (Company Info, 2005). In the field of fruit and vegetable management, there is a need to evaluate the quality of the product and the performance of applying the past knowledge. It is known that the Dole food company is aged more than 150 years and it still holds its reputation. In the past years, the Dole has faced numerous challenges and they have overcome them efficiently. So, without any doubt, it can be said the Dole food company is successful to optimize its knowledge resource for effectiveness and efficiency.
SWOT analysis
- Strength: business activities experience for more than 150 years,
- Weakness: to hold up the previous practice
- Opportunities: the market of Africa, China, India, and the 3rd world.
- Threats: new entrants, rapid change in market
The overall weakness
The main objective of Dole Food Company is to retain its previous success and to meet the upcoming challenges by ensuring quality control management. But due to some reasons, this objective may be hampering to achieve. These reasons are as follows:
- Programme is often not linked especially to strategies, challenges, or problems of the organization. These become the reason for the failure.
- Though these programs are designed to create awareness and understanding they are not competent to do so.
- When the program focuses more on individuals rather than the operating units, there is a probability that the program may fail.
Questionnaire section and findings
This questionnaire section is to find out the internal evaluation of Dole Food Company and its management function. 50 employees were the participants in this questionnaire section. In the first question, out of these 50 participants, 43 respondents said the implementation of technology is ok, 5 said not ok and 2 did not comment on this question.
46 respondents said they have participated in human resources training program to develop their skills and knowledge, while the rest 4 are not aware of it.
29 respondents said Dole is different from the other competitors for its long-term experience and knowledge, 13 said Dole is not different and the rest 8 did not comment about this.
Conclusion and recommendations
This paper proposes the management function of Dole Food Company and introduces the notion of an objective evaluator. In Dole Food Company, the enterprise manager needs tools to add knowledge to its employees. The technology, experience or human resource training provides the capability for the firm to encapsulate an instruction set to its employees. The optimization of organizational resources is properly managed by the Dole food company. The following recommendations are to be considered as the better method to get better outcome:-
- Increase the quality and productivity
- Improve organizational climate
- Improve health and safety of personnel
- Develop innovativeness and creativity
- Improve interpersonal communication, leadership, and teamwork, etc.
References
“Philosophy” Dole. Web.
“Company Info” Dole. 2005. Web.