English
中文I. Executive Summary
This paper attempts to express the extent to which the proponent has comprehended the issue on innovative organizations. To clearly evaluate a company’s level of innovativeness, a person needs to be adept in recognizing the different features that should be present in any innovative company.
Through this project, the proponent has recognized that the subject company, i.e., Apple, is a very innovative organization, tested using the nine elements of an innovative organisation. The Apple iPhone is one of the organization’s innovations that the proponent considers to be a major advancement in terms of global communication technology.
Upon completion of this paper, the proponent realised several areas in communication technology that he can contribute to the development of.
II. Introduction
Apple Computers, Inc. (“Apple” or “Company”) was incorporated on January 3, 1977 under the laws of the State of California. The core business of the company has always been designing, manufacturing and marketing personal computers, and related software, services, peripherals and networking solutions. In addition, the Company has also entered the area of digital music players. Apple designs, develops and markets a line of portable digital music players, along with related accessories and services, which includes the sale of third-party audio and video products (Apple Computer, Inc, Annual Report, 2006).
Some of the most popular products and services of the company include the Macintosh line of desktop and portable computers. The company also offers the Mac OS-X operating system, the iPod line of portable digital music players, a variety of other service and support offerings, and the Xserve and Xserve RAID server and storage products (Annual Report 2006).
The Company has a global distribution network. It sells its products worldwide through online stores, its own retail stores, its own direct sales force, and other wholesalers, resellers and value-added resellers. Other products of the company include a wide array of third-party Macintosh and Ipod including application software and other computer accessories and paraphernalia. The clientele of the Company includes education, consumer, creative professional, business and government customers (Annual Report 2006).
The Company believes that the use of computers and related accessories is a way of life and a separate experience altogether. As such, Apple is committed to offering and providing the best personal computing and the best portable music experience to students, educators, creative professionals, businesses, government agencies and consumers, through its innovative hardware, software, peripherals, services and internet offerings.
The core business strategy of the company is that it essentially combines its uniqueness with passion for customer satisfaction. Apple’s business strategy leverages its unique ability to design and develop its own operating system, hardware, application software, and services to provide its customers new products and solutions with superior ease-of-use and seamless integration, and innovative industrial design. Apple puts heavy emphasis on innovation. As such, the Company believes in continual investment in research and development as a critical action to facilitate innovation of new and improved products and technologies. Apple also emphasizes the need to capitalize on the convergence of digital consumer electronics and the personal computer by creating and refining innovations like the iPod and iTunes Store. The Company also updates its existing line of personal computers and related software, services, peripherals and networking solutions. The Company has included in its business strategy expansion of its distribution network to effectively reach more of its targeted customers as well as provide them with high-quality sales and after-sales experience (Annual Report, 2006).
The company manages its business primarily on a geographic basis. The Company’s business organization is divided into several reportable operating segments, among which are: the Americas, Europe, Japan and Retail. The reportable segments of the Americas, Europe and Japan do not include some matters in Retail. The segment for the Americas covers both North and South America; the reportable segment for Europe includes European countries as well as the Middle East and Africa. The Retail segment currently operates Apple-owned retail stores in the US, Canada, Japan and the UK. Other operating segments include Asia-Pacific which covers Australia and Asia except for Japan, and the company’s subsidiary FileMaker, Inc. Each reportable geographic segment provides similar hardware and software products and similar services (Annual Report, 2006).
III. Gauging the Innovativeness of Apple
There are nine factors shared by every innovative organization, as mentioned by Cook (n.d.). In the following segment, the proponent will attempt to contrast and review if these factors are present in the selected organization, (e.g. Apple):
b. Appreciate the Whole Individual – Another distinct factor of innovative organisations is not only in their efforts to cascade their values throughout the company but also inculcating a culture wherein the people are free to express their individuality and uniqueness within the organisation. By allowing this kind of culture to flourish, the people are able to express important ideas and the development of “out-of-the-box” thinking, most of which are reflections of each individual’s own experience. If the employees were not allowed this kind of freedom, innovation will cease to exist or develop within the organization. In Apple, the company has been successful in cascading its corporate values to its people and at the same time the employees have preserved their uniqueness and individuality. With this, the company has been able to generate and discover new ideas that wouldn’t normally be present if all of the people within the organization had the same thoughts about these matters.
c. Encourage Openness and Playfulness – the only way an organization can develop the innovative potentials of its people is to enable them to get out of their rigid and restricting attitude towards work. It has to be clear that the proponent does not hint that seriousness has no value in organizations because it is really one of the most important factors in corporate life but to enable innovative processes to prosper, people in the organization need to be quite at ease and at some point, even need to forget about work per se. By doing this, it allows people to look at the bigger picture and reassess the work they’re doing and their own interaction with the other work processes being done. Apple, being modern and forward in thinking, allows its people to convey their ideas to any management level in the corporate organization and not limiting the sharing of these ideas to direct superiors only. As a matter of fact, for quite a long time now, Apple has kept away with protocol when it comes to communication flow.
d. Celebrate Successes – another noteworthy factor in any innovative task is the manner by which the company associates with small victories in the process of innovation. Innovation is a lengthy and work-extensive process and results don’t happen overnight. In line with this thought, continuous motivation is important to maintain the inertia towards that goal. A factor of this motivation is to accept the importance of small victories that come along the way. In Apple, this practice has been something that it has observed for a long time now. Achievements and successes, big or small never go unrecognized, thus making sure that due recognition is given to deserving individuals.
e. Clearly Communicate History – it may seem insignificant to include the organization’s history during employee orientation but this actually aids in giving newly-hired personnel a feeling of strength and pride. By knowing about the company’s humble beginnings, new employees are able to clearly envision the company’s future. In every employee orientation, Apple makes sure that every person that enters the organization is well-informed of its profile, including the company’s history.
f. Maintain Intense Customer Focus – the focus on innovation is really to satisfy the constantly evolving needs of the customer. Many organizations spend a lot of money for experts to do employee training in Customer Oriented Selling and Customer Service Excellence. It is actually a misnomer that these types of programs are only for sales people in the organization. In reality, all company employees, CEO included, are salesmen for the organization, varying only in respective capacities. So, in effect these salesmanship programs are essential to all people in the organization. Apple conducts these types of training for all its personnel on a regular basis.
g. Focus on Trends – innovation is only possible if the company is provided with the latest technology at the onset. Non-compliance with this basic feature and requirement is tantamount to failure of innovation to flourish in the organization. Being in the business of technology, Apple assures that all of its people are provided with the latest in both hardware and software. This allows its people to concentrate on thinking than in bridging the gap in using old and outdated equipment or programs.
h. Cross Functional Teams – innovative companies are usually conscious of the benefits of Cross Functional Teams. By definition, Cross Functional Teams are basically teams composed of people from different departments or divisions of the organization. This teaming style provides a more holistic view in the direction of providing a recommendation and action plan for a particular problem. Apple has always observed this kind of teaming up and makes sure that project groups are composed of not only people directly connected with the project, e.g., Programming project should be composed of Programmers only, but also those from other departments like finance, logistics, sales and many others.
IV. Conclusions & Recommendations
From the factors discussed above, it is safe to conclude that Apple is one of the most innovative companies in the world. As a matter of fact, this innovativeness spearheaded by their CEO brought them from the brink of folding up to the top of the heap.
Apple’s iphone can be considered as the epitome of their innovative efforts. It has radically revolutionised the mobile phone industry. This product innovation has certainly broken borders between corporate requirements like telephony, task management, computer applications and email capability rolled into and the need of the younger and more casual sector that uses the phone as an MP3 player, movie player, camera and game console. As a proof of their innovative success, other companies have followed in their direction developing their own version of the mobile phone & PDA cum entertainment centre.
The preceding discussions have shown how Apple’s innovative genius has allowed them to regain substantial ground in the electronics industry. While other companies settled for mobile phone and PDA features, Apple went the extra mile and combined the features of both a PDA and an entertainment console. The iphone has definitely hit the world with a bang. Certainly, other companies can now only try to copy what Apple has created thru their own version of the Iphone. With the way things are going, Apple is likely to take their creation to greater heights and prove to everybody that they are definitely a force to reckon with in terms of innovation.
While Apple has perhaps been the trailblazer in innovative products, the proponent believes that his extensive exposure both as a regular phone user and a corporate person will enable him to help Apple find ways to better their iphone.
