Introduction 

The evolution of the Telecommunication industry in the US has opened several opportunities for multinational conglomerates. Besides, the telecommunication industry in the US has acted as an extra element of the nation’s economy (“overview”, 2020). AT&T is one of the American multinational conglomerates that serves the telecommunication industry. AT&T is known as one of the largest telecommunication organization across the world. Apart from telecommunications, other sectors such as technology, mass media and entertainment are also served by this business conglomerate. AT&T was founded by Alexander Graham Bell, Thomas Sanders and Gardiner Greene as a Bell Telephone Co. in 1877. Bell Telephone later changed the name to American Bell Telephone Co in 1882. In 1885, American Telephone and Telegraph Company (AT&T) was born from the acquisition of Western Union (telegraph service provider) by America Bell Company (Butler, 2020). The report discusses the strategic case analysis of AT&T effectively and makes different recommendations around organizational structure, health or strategy.

Mission and Vision of AT&T

AT&T is considered as one of the leading telecoms operates across the target segments and markets it operates (“AT&T”, 2020). The organization is capable of securing its leadership position by providing outstanding economies of scale and high bargaining power for the organization. Other advantages, such as market leadership, strong brand image, high brand recognition. The high penetration rate in new markets and strong customer base helps AT&T occupying the second position in the mobile telecom market of the US (“AT&T”, 2020).

Company’s Mission

AT&T aims at exploiting technological innovations for benefiting AT&T’s operation and its associated customers by executing technologies of the next generations and network advancements within services and operations of the organization (“AT&T”, 2020).  

Company Vision

AT&T sights as being the most valuable and praised organization across the world. The primary aim of the organization is to improve the lives of the associated customers and make the business successful by flocking in useful communication services ad value within the business operation (“AT&T”, 2020).

Company values

• Thinking big
• Creative
• Pursuing excellence
• Embracing freedom
• Differentiator (“AT&T”, 2020).

The strategic mission and vision within the organization help AT&T in aligning the skills and expertise of the employees with that of the organizational goals and objectives by encouraging and motivating them to attain the personal as well as organizational goals.

The organizational structure of AT&T

A robust organizational structure helps in allocating, coordinating and controlling every activity within the organization (Ahmady, Mehrpour & Nikooravesh, 2016). The organizational structure has always helped the organization in making optimum utilization of the organizational resources and enhance the productivity of the organization (Dedahanov, Rhee & Yoon, 2017). AT&T follows a divisional organizational structure. This structure adopted by the organization helps in streamlining the business operations and improve decision making within the organization. Divisional organizational structure also helps AT&T to operate in multiple locations in the market and enhance its customer service. Under the new organizational structure, AT&T has divided its operational segment into four divisions that include entertainment and internet services, solutions related to business operations, international routing functions and consumer mobility. Divisional organizational structure allows AT&T in effectively and efficiently coordinating with the organizational activities responding to ongoing changes and trends in the market (Bragg, 2017). Divisional organizational structure helps in the easy expansion of the organization’s division. This is because if the organization introduces any product that is new, it can be easily done without having a chaotic situation in the organization by creating an entirely separate division for the supervision of this new product. This structure also helps in maintaining autonomy to enhance the morale of the employees driving better knowledge among several divisions.

Challenges with current organizational structures 

The changes in the trends and preferences create several opportunities for the telecommunication industry (Boukamel & Emery, 2017). However, there are various challenges faced by the organizations such as AT&T. It is essential for AT&T that whenever a new competitor emerges, the organization must make sure that the associated customers are satisfied. This means that AT&T is capable of adapting the changes in the external environment and accordingly manufacture the services adequately based on new or evolving technologies (Sidorenko, 2019). These evolving technologies may include streaming online video services. This also helps in reducing the overall operational cost of AT&T and thus affecting the business model of the organization (Day & Schoemaker, 2016). This needs to be mitigated in order to have an effective performance in the organization.

Organizational strategies of AT&T

The initial business strategy of AT&T was to be the best local as well as a global service provider. However, later based on the environmental changes and trends, the organization shifted or changed its market strategy to a brand new one that concentrated in acquiring the global markets across the world (Olson et al., 2019). The strategy implemented was effective only when AT&T changed its customer rules for the global customers, thus increasing the satisfaction level of associated customers.

AT&T is the leading telecommunication provider in the US market. Therefore, primary business level strategies adopted by the organization in order to maintain this leader position includes cost leadership strategies, market and operational strategies and differentiation strategies (Olson et al., 2019). These strategies help AT&T in maintaining a competitive edge as combated to other players serving the same market. AT&T provides an extremely competitive pricing to the competitors and makes numerous services available to the associated customers.

However, there are several corporate level strategies implemented by AT&T that helps the organization in gaining competitive edge than the present competitors and helps in producing differentiated products for the customers. Therefore, it can be accordingly said that AT&T concentrates on offering high quality products to the customers by inheriting technological advancements ongoing in the external market. AT&T does this by acquiring next generation technologies for manufacturing the goods that would help in improving the service quality for the customers and assist business simultaneously.

In the same way, the competitive strategy of AT&T concentrates on customer satisfaction and innovation. Thus AT&T focuses on implementing new software aggressively in order to experience an exponential growth of the organization (“AT&T”, 2020). This competitive strategy has helped AT&T in maintaining consistency in growth for the past decades and helped in avoiding interruptions and coverage losses of reliable networks.

Challenges and opportunities faced by AT&T

AT&T believes that in order to attain the greatest impact based on the sustainability efforts, it is crucial that the organizations constantly assesses the challenges and opportunities faced in the external as well as the internal environment of the business operation (Linke et al., 2016). Doing an assessment will help in devoting required resources to correct place and address the issues accurately. This, in turn, will help in reinforcing network reliability and ensure product safety as well.

Moreover, technological innovation results in upgrading the workability of organizations and enhances the overall digital economy (Linke et al., 2016). Therefore, AT&T finds it beneficial for investing in the digital disruption currently going in in the external environment in order to keep the organizational position secure. Implementing a new business model and teams will also help AT&T in undergoing digital transformation and help in coping with the evolution of current trends in the market.

Recommendations 

Digital transformation is the most popular and high end risk or challenge faced by AT&T. The organization believes that digital transformation is the process of investing in systems, processes and technology at the same time. Doing an assessment will help in devoting required resources to correct place and address the issues accurately. This, in turn, will help in reinforcing network reliability and ensure product safety as well.  The telecommunication undergoes several changes every now and then. Therefore, it becomes crucial for multinational conglomerates such as AT&T to restructure its corporate structure in accordance with the current trends and preferences of the customers and external market (Donnelly, 2017).

Looking at the business operation of AT&T, it can be recommended that there is a need for changing the organizational structure of the organization.  Likewise, factors such as methods of delivering content and changes in taste and preference of the customers could also impact the organizational performance and functioning (Leder et al., 2019). Therefore, any effect on the organizational performance depicts the change in organizational structure as well. Outdated organizational structure causes ambiguity and confusion within the organization, causing decreased productivity. Besides the organization often faces issues like lack in accountability when the organizational structure is not changed for a long time. Hence, in order to execute the organizational strategy accurately, it is essential that there is a proper and compatible organizational structure. This will enable continued support of core elements in the organization and will result in scaling up the business.

Therefore, AT&T must shift its organizational structure from the divisional organizational structure to the functional organizational structure. This will help the organization in having a better information flow among the organizational members and result in better coordination (Boukamel & Emery, 2017). Besides, if AT&T shifts its organizational structure to divisional structure, it will help the organization in increasing the productivity and accountability by focusing on each department and creating better clear management lines within the organization (Mayer et al., 2017).  Functional organizational structure is also helpful in reducing the confusion and maintain clarity within the organization.

Besides, in order to improve the organizational effectiveness, AT&T must concentrate on making optimum utilization of human resources and keep them informed and engaged. Efficient management of human resources in the organization acts as a critical success factor for that organization. Thus, after optimizing the human resource in the organization, the organization experiences better customer satisfaction and enhanced productivity. Optimizing human resources also helps in enabling the total connection between the quality of business and quality of performance. Optimum utilization of human resources is another key for organizational development. This strategy helps in adopting scientific and modern methods for organizational success. Utilizing human resources optimally by the organizations helps in reducing the overall production and operational cost of the organization and maximize the productivity of the organization. Human resources are the key elements for gaining competitive advantage in the market and bridge the existing gap between the organizational strategic objectives and performance of the employees.

 This will also help in increasing their morale and keep them loyal for a longer period (Kumar & Ramachandra, 2017). Human resources are the biggest assets of any organization, including AT&T; therefore, using them optimally will help in increasing the organizational effectiveness and implement the necessary changes within the organization (Boulding & Senesh, 2019). Therefore, AT&T must focus on hiring the right employees for the right position in order to attain the organizational goals.

The human resource of any organization is involved in strengthening the business operations ranging from brand image to strategic planning in the organization. The bottom line of the organization is improved, and the capital implications are properly connected using human resources to the fullest. Moreover, managing human resources properly will ensure healthy workplace conditions and culture, thus enhancing the organization’s ability to draw more profits and keep the business of AT&T growing.

Technological disruption is a significant challenge faced by AT&T as this challenge is entirely based on the corporate culture of the organization (Boulding & Senesh, 2019). The primary reason behind this is traditional organizational culture can at times be very slow in embracing the ongoing technological or digital change without proper support of executives and leaders involved in the process since organizational culture may not adapt the ongoing change that quickly. For avoiding this challenge, AT&T could start becoming more customer-centric, which would help in creating a corporate culture that enables customer-centricity.

Likewise, another recommendation for AT&T could be changing the organizational culture. Organizational culture needs to be changed with a change in time and therefore is not constant. An effective change in the organizational culture will result in changing the entire working style of the organization, thus enabling proficiency within the organization and better coordination among the organizational members of AT&T. AT&T must focus on embracing transparency and cultivate strong relationship among each employee serving the organization (Boué et al., 2018). This will help in promoting the team atmosphere within the organization and therefore enable flexibility.  

Culture drives business transformation. Moreover, if an organization implements successful culture within the organization, this will keep the strategies and employees aligned with each other and assimilate them in accelerating organizational progress. Changing the organizational culture will also enable AT&T in recognizing the constant efforts of the employees for the organization and accordingly value those (Boué et al., 2018). Besides, a robust communication channel for better information flow will help in keeping the employees informed and engaged. Doing this will encourage employee autonomy within the organization and enhance organizational productivity and effectiveness at the same time.

Organizational culture directly affects an employee’s performance. Therefore, it is essential organizations maintains a healthy culture throughout in order to achieve a perfect balance in the organization, eliminating negative impact on business operations. Since organizational culture acts as a guide for the employees, therefore developing a positive culture through continuous feedback and proper interactions in the organization will enable in doing the same.

In order to improve the current health of AT&T, there are several strategies that can be executed by the organization (Donnelly, 2017). It is essential that the organization focuses on its products and internal process. This will help in identifying the current condition of the organization, and accordingly, strategies could be formulated in order to improve the organizational health (Hawkins, 2017). Reinforcing clarity within the organization will also help in improving the organizational health. Moreover, it must be kept in mind that in order to build a healthy organization, it is important that AT&T cultivates effective leadership teams and get the correct management teams within the organization (Donnelly, 2017). This will help in resolving conflicts faster and develop trust among the organizational members resulting in their enhanced performance (Hawkins, 2017). Besides, effective leadership teams will ensure that the employees are highly motivated and are working towards the common goals and objectives to be achieved.  Identifying effective teams by AT&T will also help in realizing the employee’s potential of performing as a whole, and this will allow AT&T to harness the potential towards achieving the organizational objectives.

The recommended strategies will help in improving the organizational health and performance effortlessly, although effectively. Implementing these recommended strategies at AT&T will help in improving the overall workflow of the organization and also help in better decision-making within the organization.

Conclusion

Thus, from the above discussion, it can be concluded that the strategic analysis of an organization has always helped in identifying the opportunities and threats associated with the business within the operating industry. Identifying opportunities assists the organization in accurately exploiting them and make it more beneficial for the organization. On the contrary, the threats identified helps in formulating correct strategies in order to mitigate the risks associated with them, which may, in the future, spoil the brand recognition and image among the customers.

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