Social organizations and functional areas by departments within the company

Introduction

To speak of social organisms is to take into account that there must be or exist a specific objective, which we must work as a team, as a set of functional areas that act in an integrated manner in order to achieve a result.

Functional areas are the divisions that are made in a company to achieve its best operation, so the success of the company consists in the correct coordination of the various functional areas.

Social organizations are called systems that are constituted by structured processes, in which many people intervene, who perform specific and differentiated tasks to achieve a goal, that is, they fight together to achieve a common goal.

Interaction between 2 or more people, the desire to cooperate, and have the purpose of achieving a common goal, are the conditions that must exist for a social organism to exist.

Organizational culture is something that all the members of a social organism share, it deals with attitudes, motivations, beliefs, values, techniques, etc. We will see this and more in this investigation.

Social organizations and functional areas

Social organisms: They are structured processes, in which many people interfere, who perform specific and differentiated tasks to achieve a goal, that is, teamwork is carried out to achieve a specific object.

Functional areas: Group of activities that have the same operational characteristics.

So we can say that organizations can be defined from an operational point of view, as a set of functional areas that act in an integrated manner in order to achieve a result.

Classification

Functional areas

The main activities of each of them will be described below:

Finance

Functional areas

The main functions of the finance area include: accounting, comptroller, treasury, taxes, financial planning, budgeting, costs, risk management, accounts receivable, credit and collections, investments, taxes and accounts payable.

a) Accounting. It consists of the detailed record of operations that have an economic effect on the company. The objective of accounting is to facilitate the decision-making process, through the preparation of financial statements, which reflect the financial situation and performance of the company.

The basic financial statements are:

Balance sheet. It is the statement that shows the financial position of the company as of a certain date. Income statement. It is the document that shows the profit or loss of the company in a given period and the relationship between its sales and its expenses.

b) Taxes. Correct calculation and timely and timely payment of taxes to comply with tax obligations. In Mexico, the main taxes that every company must cover are:

ISR: Income Tax VAT: Value Added Tax Asset tax Taxes derived from labor relations, such as fees to the Mexican Institute of Social Security (IMSS), Institute of the National Housing Fund for Workers (INFONAVIT) and the Retirement Savings System (SAR) Taxes on imports and exports Special taxes such as property, property, rights to consume water, electricity, telephone, food, beverages Local taxes of the state or municipality where the business.

c) Financing: Financing can be:

Internal: It involves the reinvestment of profits and the proper management of the company's own investments. External. The sources are totally unrelated, such as suppliers, bank credits or commercial discount of documents.

d) Financial planning and budgets. A budget is a document where financial and monetary resources are quantitatively expressed to achieve the objectives and control of future operations. Generally, budgets can be: sales, production, purchases, cash flow, treasury or investments.

e) Costs. Branch of accounting that deals with the classification, registration, distribution and collection of costs incurred in the production of goods or services, with the main purpose of determining both the unit cost of manufacturing an item and, consequently, the price of sale.

Marketing

Functional areas - Marketing

Phillip Kotler, known as one of the great marketing gurus, defines it as “a social process through which individuals and groups obtain what they need and want, through the creation, offer and free exchange of products and services. of value by others.

The activities carried out in the marketing area are market research, strategic planning, market segmentation, and the marketing mix.

Market research. It consists of systematically collecting, organizing, presenting, analyzing and interpreting relevant market data to obtain information about all the variables involved in the consumer's purchase decision. Strategic planning. It involves the design of the philosophy, mission, objective, strategies, programs and budgets of the marketing area. Market segmentation. It consists of taking a heterogeneous population and dividing it into several parts or segments with the same characteristics. Marketing mix. The marketing mix refers to the combination of specific elements of the environment and the population, in order to achieve the satisfaction of customer needs and a greater penetration in the market. It is made up of the so-called "four Ps" of marketing, which are:

1) Product. Defined as the set of tangible attributes and qualities, such as: presentation, packaging, design, content; and intangibles, such as: brand, image, life cycle and prestige, which the client accepts to satisfy their needs and expectations.

2) Price. It is the monetary cost of a product or service in relation to the customer's perception of value.

3) Square. It basically refers to the placement of the product at the point of sale through distribution channels, including storage, transportation and positioning of the product in the ideal place.

4) Promotion. It refers to the set of activities that stimulate the purchase decision. Its purpose is to publicize the product, as well as increase and guarantee sales.

Production

It is the area in charge of creating the article

Production

The production area must take into account the following elements:

Market. Determined by the demand for a certain item, which motivates the company to manufacture it. Raw materials. Considering the nature of the materials: if they are perishable, renewable, self-sustaining. Human resources. Integrated by the workforce.

Likewise, the following factors intervene in the production process:

Regional factors

The costs of transporting raw materials from their place of origin to the factory. Transportation costs from the factory to the consumption centers.

Agglomeration factors

Savings in production costs by establishing large-scale production Use of processes or techniques that reduce costs Existence of a market that ensures a reduction in the value of inputs Existence of accessible credit Favorable economic, social and legal environment to the enterprise.

Human Resources

The main functions of the Human Resources area are the following:

Recruitment and selection. Recruitment is a set of activities whose purpose is to attract duly qualified personnel to occupy positions within the organization. It can be internal (fill vacancies with the same employees of the company) or external (With applicants who do not belong to the organization). Personnel selection is the set of stages and techniques through which an evaluation of the characteristics and aptitudes of the candidates is carried out, in order to choose the most suitable for a position. Administration of salaries and salaries. It involves the valuation and analysis of positions, incentives, and payroll administration. Training and development. Labor relations. Prepare and carry out negotiations with the union Hygiene and industrial safety.Discover the environmental factors that endanger the physical or psychological health of employees, in order to reduce, control and prevent accidents at work, and maintain the well-being of the staff.

According to article 55 of the Law of the Mexican Institute of Social Security, work risks can produce:

Temporary disability Partial permanent disability Total permanent disability Death

Services and benefits. Provide goods, facilities or activities, in order to ensure that staff obtain additional benefits to their salary and, therefore, greater motivation, such as: dining room service, transportation, savings bank, coexistence and loans for the acquisition of a house, automobile, postgraduate, among others.Planning and evaluation. To do this, replacement grids are used, which are documents that establish the natural succession of positions based on the characteristics and skills of the employees who occupy them, as well as their possibilities for growth and promotion.

Social organisms as an open system

The open system as an organism, is influenced by the environment and influences it, reaching a dynamic balance in that sense.

The most important category of open systems are living systems. There are differences between open systems (such as biological and social systems, namely cells, plants, man, organization, society) and closed systems (such as physical systems, machines, clock, thermostat):

The open system constantly interacts with the environment in a dual way, that is, it influences and is influenced. The closed system does not interact. The open system can grow, change, adapt to the environment and even reproduce under certain environmental conditions. The closed system does not.

It is typical of the open system to compete with other systems, not the closed system. Like living organisms, companies have six primary functions, closely related to each other:

Ingestion: companies make or purchase materials to be processed.

They acquire money, machines and people from the environment to assist other functions, just as living organisms ingest food, water and air to supply their needs.

Processing: animals eat and process food to be transformed into energy and organic cells. In the company, production is equivalent to this cycle. Materials are processed and what is useless is discarded, with a relationship between inputs and outputs. Reaction to the environment: the animal reacts to its environment, adapting to survive, it must flee or else attack. The company reacts as well, changing its materials, consumers, employees and financial resources. The product, the process or the structure can be altered. Provision of parts: parts of a living organism can be supplied with materials, such as blood supplies the body. The participants of the company can be replaced, they are not from their functions but also by purchasing data, production,sales or accounting and are rewarded in the form of wages and benefits. Money is often considered the lifeblood of the company.Regeneration of parts: the parts of an organism lose efficiency, become sick or die and must be regenerated or relocated to survive in the whole. Members of a company age, retire, become ill, become disengaged, or die. The machines become obsolete. Both men and machines must be maintained or relocated, hence the role of personnel and maintenance.they disengage or die. The machines become obsolete. Both men and machines must be maintained or relocated, hence the role of personnel and maintenance.they disengage or die. The machines become obsolete. Both men and machines must be maintained or relocated, hence the role of personnel and maintenance.

The open system is a set of interacting parts constituting a synergistic whole, oriented towards certain purposes and in a permanent relationship of interdependence with the external environment.

Herbert Spencer stated at the beginning of the 20th century:

“A social organism resembles an individual organism in the following essential features:

In growth In the fact that it becomes more complex as it grows In the fact that becoming more complex, its parts demand an increasing interdependence Because its life has immense extension compared to the life of its component units Because in both cases there is growing integration accompanied by growing heterogeneity ”.

According to the structuralist theory, Taylor, Fayol and Weber used the rational model, approaching organizations as a closed system. Systems are closed when they are isolated from external variables and when they are deterministic rather than probabilistic. A deterministic system is one in which a specific change in one of its variables will produce a particular result with certainty. Thus, the system requires that all its variables be known and controllable or predictable.

According to Fayol, organizational efficiency will always prevail if organizational variables are controlled within certain known limits.

The Fayolian concept and modern components of functional areas

The classical theory of administration, also called the Fayolist current in honor of its creator Henri Fayol, his studies covered all spheres of the company, since for Fayol it was very important both to sell and to produce, finance and insure the assets of a company.

For Fayol, the worker as well as the manager were human beings, it was necessary to take them into consideration to create a single energy, a unity, a team spirit.

I create scenarios conducive to administrative efficiency and therefore, for the generation of profits for the company, all this Fayol defines as the act of managing or administrative process taking as steps those of how to plan, organize, direct, coordinate and control. Administrative functions encompass the elements of administration, that is, administrator functions.

Planning: Envision the future and draw up the action program Organization: Build the material and social structures of the company Direction: Guide and orient the staff Coordination: Link, unite and harmonize all acts and collective efforts Control: Verify that everything happens according to the established rules and the orders given.

These elements of administration, which constitute the so-called administrative process, are present at any level or area of activity of the company. This is that the director, the manager, the boss, the supervisor, the foreman or the person in charge carry out activities of planning, organization, direction, coordination and control, since they are fundamental administrative activities.

Fayol recognizes the use of the word administration as a synonym for organization, makes a distinction between the two words. According to him, the administration constitutes a whole, of which the organization is one of the parts. Organization refers only to the definition of structure and form; consequently it is static and limited.

The organization is divided into two that are:

Organization as a social entity: People interact to achieve specific objectives; this is any intentional human initiative, undertaken to achieve certain objectives. Companies are an example of social organization.Organization as an administrative function and part of the administrative process (planning, direction, coordination and control): Here organization means the act of organizing, structuring and allocating resources, defining the bodies in charge of administration and set their attributions and interrelations.

Classification of the functional areas of the company in relation to the operations carried out:

Activities identified by Henri Fayol	Basic functional areas of 21st century companies
Techniques	Production
Commercial	Sales, marketing and distribution
Financial	Finance
Accountants
Of security	Human Resources
Administrative	General Management

Cycle of operations of a company

Set of activities carried out by a company in order to achieve its objectives through the satisfaction of its customers. The functions that comprise the cycle of operations in a company are: purchases, sales, collections and payments.

Documentation of the operation of the Businesses:

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Internal Control of the operations cycle companies

Purchases

A purchase is defined as the acquisition of goods that can be made in cash or on credit. Some activities that they involve are: obtaining low prices, calculating the time of acquisition and receipt of the merchandise, evaluating the quality offered by each of the suppliers and the service they provide.

Sales

It means transferring ownership of an asset through an agreed process.

Sales forecasts and budgets

They are the basis for the planning of short-term operations of all functions of the company.

A sales forecast can be defined as an estimate of the expected demand for a product in units during a specific period of time.

Collection

It constitutes the moment in which the company manages to recover its investment, the collection of clients must be the main source of cash for the companies.

Credit

Its objective is to attract a greater number of customers, which translates into an expansion of sales and a greater generation of cash.

Accounts payable: these take place when the company liquidates its debt with the supplier.

As soon as one cycle of operations concludes, another one begins and thus indefinitely, the important thing is to try to minimize the time taken to complete it.

Basic operating cycle of a company

conclusion

Finally, we can say that organizations can be defined from an operational point of view, as a set of functional areas that act in an integrated manner in order to achieve a result.

As well as the classes of social organisms and their derivatives are, for example, functional areas. According to the functional organization, companies are generally divided into production, marketing, finance and human resources.

This is the most logical way, among its advantages it is very easy to supervise since managers are dedicated to a specific area and the special skills of each department can be mobilized quickly to another area, establish a hierarchy, so that there is an order in the organization, since an organism must have leaders and subordinates.

Bibliography

Chiavenato, Idalberto. Introduction to the general theory of administration. Mexico, Mc Graw Hill. 2004. Munch, Lourdes. Administration. Schools, administrative process, functional areas and entrepreneurial development, Mexico, Prentice Hall. 2007 Hernández and Rodríguez, Sergio. Introduction to administration. General administrative theory: origin, evolution and vanguard. Mexico, Mc Graw Hill. 2006. Koontz, Harold, Administration: a global perspective, Mexico, McGraw Hill, 1994.Stoner, James, Administration, Mexico, Ed. Prentice Hall, 2000. Reyes Ponce, Agustín, Modern Administration, Mexico, Ed. Limusa, 2007. Rodas Carpizo, Alejandro, Basic Administration, Mexico, Ed. Limusa, 2007.