Free «Control Mechanism Paper» Essay

McDonald’s corporation is one of the world’s largest chains of hamburger fast food restaurants. It serves a population of about 47 millions on daily basis. The operation of the company is by means of franchise system. Also, it operates more than 30,000 restaurants in more than 100 countries world wide. In regard to this, there are several control mechanisms that make Macdonald to be one of the examples of organizations that act as a symbol of globalization. By definition, control mechanism in its management is one of the ways that is used to regulate or rather to guide the processes of the organization. Organizations in most cases employ control mechanisms that regulate their business in terms of production, distribution ands finance among others.

As a function of management, control mechanisms are also aimed at directing attention, motivation and giving encouragement to the members of the organization to act in a manner that will enable them to meet the goals of the organization. In this connection, the importance of control mechanisms is to monitor progress and evaluate the general performance of the organization. There are various reactions that are associated with control mechanism in management of McDonald’s Corporation. To begin with, this company has been working on its strategy to be among companies that are fighting obesity in different countries that it operates in. Therefore, one of its policies has been to include salads and other foods that are less fatty in its menu. This has reduced criticism that this company has been receiving from policy makers and other lobby groups in the society. Criticisms affect the working environment of any business. As a result, McDonalds’s has been able to avoid them and instead attract attention as one of the fast food restaurants that is committed to providing to its clients food that will not endanger their health (Thinking Made Easy).

There are however negative reactions that are associated with control mechanisms that are utilized by McDonalds Corporation. In an effort to control its employment policies and strategies, McDonald’s Corporation found itself fighting the laws by violating the rights of its employees. While it worked on enhancing its employees’ working environment and reducing the overhead costs that it experiences every day due to wages and other workers’ issues, it found itself being sued by employees and labor movements. This eroded the image that this company presented to its customers and instead tainted its corporate image and caused this company to incur heavy costs as a result of fines that were paid out to people that sued it (Berry, 2007, p.97).

Control mechanisms have been found to impact companies both positively and negatively in terms of planning, organizing, leading and controlling. First, the impact that the image of an organization has on its clients has been found to enhance planning and organization of the activities of such an organization since there is a guaranteed market for its products. On the other hand, while planning to carry out major innovations and expansion programs in an organization, lawsuits can affect these plans in a negative. For example, McDonald’s Corporation was at one time affected greatly when funds that could have been used to carry out expansion activities were used to pay some of its employees as lawsuits. Similarly, this company has been fined on various occasions because of lawsuits against it. There are also leadership challenges that emerge as a result of negative reactions that are tied on control mechanisms that are being employed by a company. For example, the introduction of the nutritional policies at McDonald’s Corporation was found to enhance the leadership of Ronald McDonald, making it easy for him to be able to reach out as a transformational leader (Boje & Rhodes, 2005, p.95-100).

Control Mechanism in management plays a very important role in aiding a business or organization to curve for itself in niche in the market in which it is operating. However, it must be noted that economies of scale that are obtained from such controls depends on market factors and may result in either positive or negative gain. Similarly, control mechanism affects greatly the operational functions of organizations such as planning, organizing, leading and controlling. As a result, before a company implements control measure, its impact on the overall operation of the organization or business should be critically examined.