Task 3: Describe how two businesses are organised (P3)
1. Provide an organisational chart of Volkswagen AG and describe how the company is
organised using the following elements
Geographical area
Volkswagen AG is headquartered in Wolfsburg, Germany. Volkswagen AG has factories in 20
European countries and in other 11 countries in the Americas, Asia and Africa. They sell their
products in around 150 countries.
Functional areas
Volkswagen AG has the finance, marketing, production, customer service, sales and human resource
department. The financial department of Volkswagen AG keeps records of financial activities and
provides managers with information that they can use in decision making. The marketing
department of Volkswagen AG is responsible for identifying, anticipating and satisfying customer
requirements. The marketers of Volkswagen AG have an important say in deciding: the products that
Volkswagen AG produces, the prices charged, the promotion to encourage customers and the places
where the goods are sold. The production department of Volkswagen AG organises who makes the
products, how and when they are made. The customer service department of Volkswagen AG is
concerned with looking after their customers at all the stages of their relationship. The sales
department of Volkswagen AG is responsible for their customers to buy what they produce. The main
responsibility of the department is to create orders for products and services. The human resource
department of Volkswagen AG is responsible for all aspects of people management in their
organisation.
Product group
Volkswagen AG supply products and services. They divide their products in categories. They sell
different kind of vehicles of different brands. They belong to Volkswagen Group, but each brand of
the vehicles has an own name e.g. Volkswagen, Audi, Seat, Bugatti and much more. They have a
financial service division. They have dealer and customer financing programmes. You can lease
vehicles. There is also an insurance program where you can insurance your vehicle. The main
products are the twelve vehicle brands of Volkswagen Group. By dividing their products in categories,
they have a clear view. Each brand has its own department e.g. sales department, production
department etc.
Customer type
Volkswagen AG has two different type of customers. They are a business-to-business company and a
business-to-consumer company. They supply vehicles to both customers. They divided their services
and products, because the products and services are different for the business customers and the
daily customers. They have simple customers who buy one car and they have for example lease
companies who buy thousand cars. The approach to that customers are different. Volkswagen AG put
less effort in the customer who buys one car and more effort in a customer who buys thousand cars.
So being organised with customer type helps Volkswagen AG to reach each purpose and aim, because
they are more efficient effective and therefore more successful.
At the following page, you can find the organizational chart of Volkswagen AG!
