1. Functions within Organisations
What is a ‘Function’?
The actions and activities assigned to or required or expected of a person or group
Functions within Organisations
Accounts or finance
Design
Sales
Production (or service provision)
Distribution
Marketing
ICT services
Research and development
Administration
Human resources

2. Functions within Organisations
Accounts or Finance
Carries out all tasks relating to money that comes into the organisation and money that it pays out.
Recording payments received for goods/services
Banking payments made using cash/cheques
Arrange payment to suppliers for stock, raw materials or services (.e.g water, gas, electric, telephone, rent, mortgage repayments, loan payments)
Arrange payment of staff wages
Record/account keeping of transactions (For TAX/VAT/Shareholders to see and calculate)

3. Functions within Organisations
Sales
Responsible for selling an organisation’s products or services to its customers.
Tasks carried out vary widely depending on nature of organisation.
EXAMPLE - Shop
Sales staff
Help customers find products, take customer payments, wrap purchases.
Ensure goods on display.
Taking orders and reordering stock.

4. Functions within Organisations
Distribution
Responsible for moving goods from factory, farm or other source, to warehouse, and then to shops/customers.
Most likely found in organisations that make/sell goods (rather than provide service).
Ensuring packages correctly addressed.
Arranging collection/delivery (postal or courier service)
Sending by rail/air freight/road hauliers
Running own fleet of vans/trucks/deliver goods (Supermarket chains fleets of lorries)

5. Functions within Organisations
Marketing
Responsible for planning future sales and monitor organisation’s relationship with customers / potential customers.
Advertise organisations products/services
Designing advertisements/buying advert space
Designing flyers/arranging for distribution
Arranging stand for organisation at trade fairs
Updating organisation’s website
Gather customer opinion (Market research e.g. Questionnaires)

6. Functions within Organisations
Research and development
Most likely to exist in organisations that manufacture products.
Responsible for carrying out research into new techniques, technologies and materials to see if they can be applied to products/services supplied by organisation.
Development function then develops new product/service. This may involve creating prototypes of new product/service

7. Functions within Organisations
Human resources
Responsible for dealing with organisation’s employees.
When more staff needed, they…
Organise placing of adverts / notifying local employment agencies
Sending out application forms/receiving completed applications forms, CVs, application letters
Short-listing applications, organising interviews, sending letters to successful/unsuccessful interview applicants.

8. Functions within Organisations
Design
Responsible for taking over where research and development function finishes.
Takes ideas/prototypes developed by R & D and turns them into designs for products/services to be supplied to customers
May design some products from scratch based on customer needs identified by market research
They communicate extensively with R&D, production and marketing departments

9. Functions within Organisations
Production (or service provision)
Manufacturing Occurs only in organisations that manufacture products. It takes raw materials, parts and facilities and uses them to make products.
This may be run using;
Production line: members of production carry out a particular task as product moves along line
Machines running tasks: production function involved in overseeing/maintaining machines and checking quality of products

10. Functions within Organisations
Production (or service provision)
Service Organisations
In service organisations, this function called a ‘Provision’. Function responsible to provide service to customer.
Tasks of function in service differ widely depending on service provided.
(e.g. Airline – Pilot and flight crew fly the plane, Cabin crew look after passengers by serving food/drinks, looking after safety during flight)

11. Functions within Organisations
ICT services
Responsible for the provision of all computer facilities within the organisation.
Obtaining, installing and maintaining hardware
Managing local area/wide area networks services (LAN/WAN)
Obtaining, installing and maintaining software
Providing hardware/software support to ICT users
Internal/external data communications (Maintaining organisation’s Intranet/Website)

12. Functions within Organisations
Administration
Responsible for the day-to-day running of an Organisation
Looks after things such as:
Buildings and facilities
General maintenance and cleaning
Fleet management
Utilities
Often used though to describe other functions that do not naturally fit into any other functions.

13. Task 1
Rewrite the following table so the correct functional area is correct
with the task description
Functional Areas
Task
Finance
Recruiting people to fill a job vacancy
Production
Buying raw materials
Purchasing
Recording how much money the business earned yesterday
Sales
Turning raw materials into a finished product
Marketing
Explaining to a potential customer the benefits of buying the firm’s products
Human Resources
Giving advice to a customer who thinks the product they have just bought is faculty
Customer Services
Writing a questionnaire to find out how much people would be prepared to pay for a new product.

14. Functional Areas
Task
Finance
Recording how much money the business earned yesterday
Production
Turning raw materials into a finished product
Purchasing
Buying raw materials
Sales
Explaining to a potential customer the benefits of buying the firm’s products
Marketing
Writing a questionnaire to find out how much people would be prepared to pay for a new product.
Human Resources
Recruiting people to fill a job vacancy
Customer Services
Giving advice to a customer who thinks the product they have just bought is faculty

15. Task 2 Complete the “Functions Quiz” found on Learn Coombe Dean.
Print off the quiz and place in your exercise book.

16. Organisational Structures
All businesses need some type of structure to work productively.
Firms need specific job roles for the staff to make sure they know what they are doing and do not get in each other’s way
The number of groups and how they are organised often varies according to size and main activities

17. Hierarchical Structures
Some organisations have many levels of staff There may be a managing director at the top, then various levels of managers and supervisors, down to staff at the bottom. You might find this type of structure in a large retail or manufacturing business
Store Manager
Area Manager
Checkout Operator
Chief Executive
Team Leader
Director

18. Task 3
Read the “Logos R Us” scenario from Learn Coombe Dean and list all the job junctions and roles.
Build an “organisation” structure chart to show the hierarchy of the company.