Organizational Analysis Paper

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ORGANIZATIONAL ANALYSIS

JP Morgan & Chase

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Introduction

Speaking with Mr. Giri Babu Lekkala, senior vice president of Asset Management for JP Morgan and Chase helped me gain a foresight on how a large firm strategically works with such a completed structure and design.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. is one of the world’s oldest, largest and best-known financial institutions with assets of $2.6 trillion and operations worldwide. The company has operations in around 50 countries and it combines two of the world’s prominent financial brands: J.P. Morgan and Chase. The firm plays a leadership role in the field of investment banking, financial services for consumers and small businesses, commercial banking, financial transaction processing and asset management. The Bank of The Manhattan Co. is one of the earliest financial institutions of the United States was founded in 1799 by Aaron Burr, a U.S. Senator and future vice president of the United States. The Bank of The Manhattan through several stages was renamed J.P. Morgan & Co. in 1895.

The firm has been working for more than 200 years to help its clients do business. J.P. Morgan & Co. has contributed to business, society and world affairs – doing “first-class business in a first class way” and people are its most valuable asset. To attain its goal, it focuses on its business principles which are important to following objective:

• This firm aspires to develop a world class services and be client-driven and innovation.
• Demand and maintain strong financial discipline and design and maintain the best systems and operations by eliminating waste and bureaucracy and maintaining a strong system of internal governance and controls
• Operate with the highest standards of integrity and train and retain great managers by being open and honest with employees, clients, shareholders and communities.

The firm divides its operation into several departments such as Investment Banking, Asset Management, Retail Banking, Card Services, Commercial Banking and Corporate Banking.

• Investment Banking and Corporate Banking merged into a single department offers a suite of investment banking, market-making, prime brokerage, and treasury and securities products and services to a global client base. The Corporate & Investment Bank’s clients can be categorized as: multinationals, corporations, governmental entities, central banks and asset managers.
• Asset Management Department works as both individuals and institutions, including more than 3,000 financial intermediaries, 60% of the largest pension and sovereign funds, and many of the world’s wealthiest individuals and families. By managing money for clients, it helps individuals retire more comfortably, pension funds meet their obligations, universities reinvest in research and facilities, and wealthy families ensure lasting legacies.
• Commercial Banking provides credit, banking and treasury services to approximately 59,000 clients in the United States across 119 cities in the United States and 13 major international cities. Its clients include mid-sized businesses, corporations, municipalities, financial institutions, nonprofit entities, and real estate owners and investors.
• Retail Banking is general banking department where people bank, save, invest, make purchases with credit cards, and finance homes and cars and Card Services is responsible for creating and maintaining all types of cards client use for easy banking service.

Organizational Culture

Organizational Culture is a shared meaning understood and held by members that distinguishes the organization from other organizations. The organizational culture of JP Morgan Chase & Co. is the intersection of its corporate standards and employees’ actions. The firm has formalized corporate standards through Business Principles, Code of Conduct and Code of Ethics by which all of the employees are held accountable.

The characteristics of organizational culture of JP Morgan Chase are tailored to its formalized set of rules.

• Team orientation which is an important characteristics of organizational culture is highly emphasized in this organization. Transparency and trust which play a vital role in team formation is very active here. The company hires people who are able to work in a team setting and teaches employees to value and support one another. The culture of people orientation emphasizes on fairness, supportiveness and respect for individual rights. It also put great emphasis on people who work for the company and those the company works for e.g. clients. There exists a formalized rule in this firm that requires building a healthy and vibrant company by telling employees the truth and giving them meaningful work and opportunities along with training. If an employee falls down, others come back and help him/her.
• Aggressiveness is a characteristic highly valued in this firm. There exists a competitive atmosphere throughout the company. Employees always try to outperform their competitors. It is common in JP Morgan. The firm always sets the highest standard of performance level. The employees never stop to compare themselves with the best performing companies though they know that they may come up short. Trying to be the best is the motivation for them for their competitiveness and continuous improvement. Candidates are hired and trained on one of the bases of competitiveness. The result of aggressiveness is that the firm has faced a number of lawsuits. Aggressiveness is good as long as it is at the moderate level. Stable culture is generally based on rules and this type of culture is predictable and bureaucratic.

There are other number of characteristics of organizational culture in this firm.

• Integrity is strongly supported by a formalized code of ethics and strongly valued by the employees of the organization. To employees, nothing is more important than their compulsion to act with accountability, ethics and within law. They maintain a strong ethical behavior and follow each and every rule and regulation that exist in the organization. Employees when hired from then are regularly trained how to adhere to the code of ethics and ethical behavior is cultivated and repeatedly endorsed throughout the organization.
• Diversity is one of the characteristics that bring different views and perspectives to work which is vital to creativity and innovativeness. Despite a strong formalized culture, the level of innovation is moderate because of diversity in employees. Diversity is essential as JP Morgan runs its operations across the world.

To form a consolidated culture, JP Morgan has created a number of principles, code of conduct and code of ethics. The newly hired are trained to shape their behavior which is consistent with company’s culture. This has created a stable atmosphere in the organization. That is the reason that innovation and risk taking has not still crossed the boundary of medium level in this firm. Stability is not the direct outcome of strong culture rather it is a stage where top-notch people of the company never expect to put steps on but they ultimately reach there subconsciously. This is one of the barriers of strong culture though strong culture is necessary for the development of a company.