1984 Sodexho HC (“SHC”) business unit was established under Sodexho group. It is managed through a central office in the Paris area and serves both private and public hospitals in France. Sodexho group is a very successful food and management service provider in the world, its services include a wide range of supports, such as laundry, building maintenance and sterilizing surgical instruments. While Sodexho’s head office is situated in France, some 90% of its business in 2005 was conducted globally in over 74 countries. Food For example the Marketing Director believes in modular design with its suppliers “Multi-service on what adds value in the eyes of the hospital CEO, concentrate our efforts on where our service offering impacts SHC’s reputation. It’s not about doing everything”. Two of the Regional Directors have raised concern over the ‘fine tuning’ multi-service and the sales manager is clueless on what needs to be done. Therefore, before SHC delivers ‘multi-service’ offers to their clients, they should evaluate if their organizational design is ready in terms of structure, information systems, HR management and overall culture to support the execution of its strategy.
CAUSES TO THE PROBLEMS
Structure
Sodexho HC has a hybrid organizational structure design which combines functional at the central office in Paris and geographical divisions in Operation/Service unit all over France. By having a functional design at head office, SHC not only gains efficiencies but high quality work. The downside is that each functional area may become concerned exclusively with its own responsibilities. Coordination between functions can therefore be a problem. Geographical structure at the operation level involves delegation of decision-making responsibility to the divisions. SHC’s success has been driven by a strong entrepreneurial culture. Each site manager has its own power over their decision, however, this means each regional
