Impact of Technology on Organizational Structure of Apple Inc.
For this assignment, you will analyze the impact of technology on organizational structure in a globalized economy. Select a company that has recently undergone a significant technological change, such as the implementation of artificial intelligence, cloud computing, or blockchain technology. Your analysis should cover the following areas:
Introduction: Provide a brief overview of the company and the technological change that has been implemented. Discuss the significance of this change and its potential impact on the company's organizational structure.
Organizational Structure: Describe the company's current organizational structure and analyze how the technological change has impacted it. Evaluate the effectiveness of the current organizational structure in facilitating the adoption of the new technology.
Technology and Organizational Structure: Analyze how the new technology has impacted the company's organizational structure. Discuss the advantages and disadvantages of this impact, and evaluate the effectiveness of the new organizational structure in facilitating the adoption and integration of the new technology.
Recommendations: Based on your analysis, provide recommendations for how the company can improve its organizational structure to better facilitate the adoption and integration of new technologies in a globalized economy.
Your analysis should be approximately 3 to 4 pages in length, double-spaced, and use APA formatting. You should include a minimum of 5 scholarly sources to support your analysis.
Business Analysis
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Business Analysis
Even though many companies were founded in the 19th century, Apple Inc. is a company that stood out. Having been founded in 1976, Apple Inc. has grown to be one of the major tech companies globally, where it has spread to most parts of the world, having approximately 137 000 employees (Semuels, 2020). The company mainly designs, manufactures, and sells personal computers, smartphones, tablets, accessories, wearables, and other related services (Cunha, 2022). One reason the organization attains outstanding performance is its organizational structure (Hitt et al.,2009). One of the reasons that have made this company outstanding is the technology it employs. For example, the company has employed artificial intelligence. The application of artificial intelligence has transformed the way the company has been performing over the years. Since artificial intelligence has positive and negative impacts on Apple Inc., measures should be taken to improve it to attain outstanding results.
One way in which artificial intelligence has affected organizational structure is through automation. Even though Apple Inc. is a technology-related firm, previously, most of the employees were performing the tasks manually. Nevertheless, as A.I. became more sophisticated, it started automating most tasks that human employees previously did. For example, some types of A.I., such as customer service robots, have been designed to augment human employees since they will automate time-consuming and repetitive tasks. For example, Apple Siri has Chatbots, which have programs that understand user input (Shekar, 2019). The main reason is that customer service robots have some reason for performing similarly to humans.
Furthermore, artificial intelligence is helping to shift Apple's organizational structure from centralized to decentralized. For example, the company had a defined chain of command in centralized leadership. For example, it had a long and specific hierarchy of superiors and subordinates. Moreover, every person has a clear responsibility for every law and must listen to their superiors. However, the application of artificial intelligence has started to shift the company to a decentralized organizational structure. This transformation is therefore making the company agile, fast, and adaptable. This is one of the features that makes it outstanding in the market.
Even though artificial intelligence is shifting the company toward a decentralized organizational structure, it has not attained its full degree. However, there are some changes that individuals can currently notice. For example, there has been a decrease in the number of employees. The current organizational structure is more effective since there are few employees. Furthermore, this organizational structure will be more effective since it is more flexible, adhering to the changing technology.
Artificial intelligence helping to shift from a traditional structure to a more decentralized structure have some bene...