Designing Works Organisations

CASE ANALYSIS

APIGEE: People Management Practices

and the Challenge of Growth

Submitted by:
Section G

Group 9

SHWETA DAS | PGP34399

SPOORTHY N | PGP34404
ANANT SHILARKAR | PGP34305
AMBRISH RAIGONDE | PGP34303
SASHANKA PATIR | PGP34339
VISHAL BHATLA | PGP34346
RITTU PAUL | PGP3433

IIM Lucknow
Situational analysis:
Apigee is a well-known application programming interface (API) provider. It is a fast growing
firm in technology space. The company had been growing very fast in terms of its revenue. The
success for its growth is attributed to its unique DNA known as “The Apigee Way”. The
organisation was heavily employee focused as they believed in the “magic of people”. It was
based on a strong culture which exhibited behaviour of passion, a bias for action and respect. As
Apigee was poised to take big leap to become the leading API provider, Mr. Grandhi felt
whether the existing culture was fraught with risk.

Problem statement:
As the company is going global to be the leading API provider, the top management is concerned
about its culture and HR policy. Will the same culture thrive when the organisation grow? Were
they under the risk of providing excessive freedom and empowerment which may lead to lower
productivity?

Alternatives:
1) To continue with the same company culture concurrently with fast growth. And try to find
ways as to how would they guard against the complacency.
2) To impart their culture through an institutional process and focus to avoid betrayal of
autonomy and freedom.

​Criteria for evaluation:

1. Innovative ways of problem solving and products developed in given time period
2. Deviation in designed framework to preserve the organisational culture
3. Revenue generation for a period, as we are in a innovative market space where new ideas are
valued and sold, revenue generated will have direct correlation with employee complacency
4. Critical values of organisation
Analysis and decision:
As we are considering expansion, we must take into account the increasing quantum of
employees. Considering this following analysis is done.

Criterias /Alternatives Maintain Status quo Institutionalisation of Process

Criteria 01 Moderate High

Criteria 02 Moderate Low

Criteria 03 Moderate Moderate

Criteria 04 Slightly degrade Improved

​The rationale behind deciding above criterias are as follows:

01. As for companies like us who are in digital work space where innovations and new ideas
define the companies growth, number of new ideas are crucial criteria for evaluation. If
we are too open as we opt to maintain our status quo, there might be chances of
complacency. This might lead to drop in new ideas and innovations. But if we are
structuring the process with keeping current work culture intact may decrease
complacency and increase productivity.

02. As we go for institutionalisation of processes, we certainly can measure the deviation in

them. These may be norms for passing the culture to new joinees that will help them to
absorb the culture and indeed standardise it. If we go with former alternative, there will
be less deviation in the norms that we will follow.

03. Revenue generation is linked with the innovations we are bringing to the table. With both
the options there will be same effect on the revenue generation. But if we are restricting
freedom in terms of customer engagement, we might lose on revenue. Where option one
is better to go for.
 04. Following table depicts the effect of these alternatives on critical values of Apigee

Values / Alternative Maintain Status quo Institutionalisation of Processes

Passion Decrease Improved

Bias for Action No Change Decrease

Respect No change No change

Recommendation:
Based on the above observations we will go for the Institutionalisation of processes.