COMPANY OVERVIEW

Oracle is a provider of enterprise software and computer hardware products and services. Oracle is the world's largest enterprise software company. It has made its name in the software industry as the pioneer of relational database software, which lets businesses store and manage large amounts of data. Oracle began making software to organize data in the 1970s with their focus on relational database software. This software is used for storing data and relating different pieces to one another. The company's operations are separated into three divisions: software, hardware and services. Oracle's software licenses and software support have consistently brought in around 80% of their total revenue. The key segments Oracle operates in are as follows:
ORACLE
REVENUE-37BILLION$

SOFTWARE
77% OF TOTAL REVENUES

NEW SOFTWARE LICENSES
37% OF TOTAL REVENUES
SOFTWARE LICENSE UPDATES
40% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE
13% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE SYSTEMS PRODUCTS
8% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE SYSTEMS SUPPORT
5% OF TOTAL REVENUES
SERVICES
10% OF TOTAL REVENUES
CONSULTING SERVICES
MANAGED CLOUD SERVICES
EDUCATION SERVICES
ORACLE
REVENUE-37BILLION$

SOFTWARE
77% OF TOTAL REVENUES

NEW SOFTWARE LICENSES
37% OF TOTAL REVENUES
SOFTWARE LICENSE UPDATES
40% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE
13% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE SYSTEMS PRODUCTS
8% OF TOTAL REVENUES
HARDWARE SYSTEMS SUPPORT
5% OF TOTAL REVENUES
SERVICES
10% OF TOTAL REVENUES
CONSULTING SERVICES
MANAGED CLOUD SERVICES
EDUCATION SERVICES

Oracle develops and sells database and middleware as well as business application software and offers hardware and services related to the products. The company is one of the top 10 companies listed in the NASDAQ Composite index.

Corporate Strategy

Oracle’s mission is simply put as “simplifying IT”, which can be translated as simplifying structure and use of IT in order to help businesses innovate and grow. To make it successful Oracle has developed a strategy that focuses on growth by building a concise business structure that can provide a full range of products and services that meet customer’s needs. The outcomes of all that is best-in-class offerings “throughout the integrated stack of hardware and software (applications, middleware, storage and services), with every layer designed and engineered to work together according to open industry standards”. In order to achieve this, Oracle bases its strategy on four pillars: * Have the best of breed technology in every business it operates - Applications, Middleware, Database, Operating Systems, Virtual Machine, Servers and Storage. * Provide integrated IT solutions for customers. Because of its integrated solutions, Oracle is one of the few companies that can offer products and services in all areas regarding IT, from hardware and software to services. * Deliver cloud applications and solutions. Oracle is able to provide solutions that are capable and flexible enough to be plugged onto other systems by providing applications and cloud storage services. An example of Oracle Enterprise Performance Management that can easily be added to the PeopleSoft software and run at a cloud hard drive. What Oracle intends is that companies that want to enhance their IT capabilities will have an easier and faster integration process at a much lower cost than replacing them. * Offer industry-based solutions. Oracle wants to solve specific issues that differs from industry to industry. These four pillars can be viewed as a combination of goals in which each one of them is interdependent.

ORACLE’S BUSINESS SEGMENTS

Software
Oracle's total revenue is dominated by its software division, which pulls in roughly 80% of total revenues each year. Within the software group revenues are split between new licenses and renewals and product support.
The different layers of software manufactured by Oracle are as follows: APPLICATION LEVEL: Software with which users interact. Applications software is often tailored to fit the specific needs of a company MIDDLE WARE: Provides integration between the database and the applications that use the data stored in the database LOWEST TIER: Database software generally forms the lowest tier of a company's software infrastructure APPLICATION LEVEL: Software with which users interact. Applications software is often tailored to fit the specific needs of a company MIDDLE WARE: Provides integration between the database and the applications that use the data stored in the database LOWEST TIER: Database software generally forms the lowest tier of a company's software infrastructure

Oracle has been expanding its offerings in middleware and applications software as well as providing hardware support and hosting through its On-Demand unit. Oracle also sells off the shelf software products for businesses that provide services such as e-mail, file servers, and client resource management.

Services
Oracle maintains a separate business unit that helps customers take advantage of all the features and functionality of its software. Oracle provides services through consulting, education and on-demand software. These services are offered in a variety of different contexts including in-house services and service by telephone.

Hardware
Oracle announced that they would begin selling hardware (computer servers) at the end of their first fiscal quarter 2009.The company has partnered with HP to sell servers that come with Oracle database software pre-installed. Oracle claims that their servers can provide faster computing for businesses than other competing hardware providers.

THE INDUSTRY
COMPETITION
The enterprise software industry is made up of a large number of smaller companies that specialize in a specific area of the business and large companies that play across various segments of the business. Because Oracle has products in all of these areas they face competition from a large number of companies.
Database Software
Oracle's competition in the Database Software market includes large corporations like IBM and Microsoft along with many small database software companies like MySQL, Ingres, NCR and Progress Software. Oracle is however, the clear leader in this market with an estimated 45% market share. In line with their prediction of a more consolidated software industry in the future, Oracle has been strategically acquiring smaller, open source database software producers.
In an effort to become a supplier of everything, from chips and operating systems to databases and business programs, Oracle announced a $7.4 billion acquisition of Sun Microsystems in April 2009. This acquisition enabled Oracle to stifle its competitors in the database market since MySQL, one of its former competitors, is currently owned by Sun Microsystems.
Middleware
Oracle is attempting to further penetrate the middleware market through research and development and by acquiring smaller companies in the industry. As with the database software market, Oracle faces competition from a few large companies and a larger number of small companies. Competitors include IBM, Microsoft, Novell, TIBCO Software, WebMethods, Informatica, Borland Software, Cognos, Business Objects, and CA. Oracle's position in the middleware market is not nearly as strong as that of the database software market, but the company is making efforts to expand its middleware product offerings. Oracle holds an estimated 8% market share in the middleware business.
Applications Software
Oracle's acquisition strategy over the past three years has helped them in the applications software market. Through their acquisitions of smaller applications software providers, Oracle has grown their customer base significantly. Their strategy in this market has been lower licensing fees to compete with SAP AG, while keeping maintenance fees higher. As such, Oracle is hoping that their increased applications software customer base can bring in significant streams of revenue through maintenance fees. Oracle's competition in this market includes SAP, Microsoft, Salesforce.com, RightNow Technologies, Manhattan Associates and McKesson.

TECHNOLOGY ADVANCES AND ORACLE’S ROLE IN INDUSTRY
Open Source Influence on Premium Software Providers
Open source software refers to software for which the source code is freely available and distributable. Oracle competes with open source vendors and products, such as the Eclipse IDE, but it also benefits from their existence. Open source software is generally distributed free of charge or for only a small payment, and as such it can provide difficult competition for software producers like Oracle that rely on license fees to drive revenues. However, Oracle also benefits from some open source software. Many of Oracle's products are built on the open source operating system language Linux and as a result Oracle can take advantage of developments made in the open source community. Furthermore, open source extensions to Oracle's products frequently help to add to and experiment with functionality and extensions that are often later incorporated into Oracle's products.
Software Development Languages
Oracle has optimized its software to run primarily on UNIX and Linux based operating systems with most of the software functionality intended to be used through the Java programming language. In doing so, Oracle tied its future to the proliferation of Linux and UNIX based operating systems and businesses continuing to base their software on Java. Oracle has also made investments into developing productivity software for the Java platform, which further evidences its commitment to the Java environment. Oracle's acquisition of Sun Microsystems, the developer of the Java platform, in 2009 is a step towards securing its future on the Java platform.
While Java and UNIX/ Linux are the predominant platforms for business software and enterprise development, Microsoft is making a push into this segment. With its Windows Server Operating system and the .Net programming platform, Microsoft is offering a complete solution for businesses that is not based on Unix/Linux and does not rely on Java. The .Net platform is said to have addressed many of Java's shortcomings and businesses are adopting it because it can provide more productive development of business applications. For many businesses this productivity boost is reason enough to switch and is beginning to affect Oracle's market share. Since inception in 2002, the .Net platform has gained market share and represents approximately 4% of software development today. Java represents about 20% by comparison.

THE INDUSTRY TRENDS AND FUTURE OUTLOOK FOR ORACLE
The software industry expanded in the early 1960s, right after the commercialization of first computers, providing them with pre-conceived programs such as applications, games, utilities, and operating systems. It then greatly rose in the mid-1970s after the launch of Personal Computers.
In 2012, the market size of the software industry was estimated at 37,2 billion euros, with an annual growth above 10% over the last 3 years. Main competitors are ranked in the table of appendix #.
Increasing demand for ERP (enterprise resource planning) and business intelligence software along with data storage and integration tools is expected to fuel the industry in the future. Worldwide enterprise software spending is projected to be $304B in 2013 in the latest forecast. Stronger demand for CRM, supply chain management and security are leading to accelerating market growth.
ERP spending worldwide is projected to grow from $26.03B in 2013 to $34.3B in 2017, attaining a CAGR in the forecast period 2012 – 2017 of 7%. Not so different from the number seen on the Business Intelligence segment which is projected to grow from $14B in 2013 to $18.6B in 2017, attaining a CAGR in the forecast period 2012 – 2017 of 7.3%. However, the future growth drivers are Supply Chain Management (SCM), which is expected to grow from $9.16B in 2013 to $13.6B in 2017, attaining a CAGR in the forecast period 2012 – 2017 of 10.4% and Data Integration Tools and Data Quality Tools which is projected to grow from $4B in 2013 to $6B in 2017, attaining a CAGR in the forecast period 2012 – 2017 of 10.3%.

As the macroeconomic environment continues to show incremental improvement, inflow of new contracts show customer readiness to consider net new spending initiatives in enterprise software, cloud storage and other supporting packages.
Along with this, customers also maintain a laser focus on driving efficiencies from those investments already in-house. New launches as well as ongoing monetization of acquisition-fuelled expansion into newer market segments have created opportunities for Oracle's direct sales team to engage with install base customers and realize growth in revenues.
Building from the strength provided by long-time database license and maintenance revenue leadership, Oracle is positioned to increase its market presence in applications and cloud segments, taking on long-time competitors like SAP, Microsoft and any newcomer.
With dedicated management, global presence, surplus cash and refined processes Oracle has a successful history of allocating sufficient capital that brings innovation in products and processes and this is one of the main competitive advantage over its peers.

M&A activity in the Software Industry Among all industries, the technology one specially has been subject to a growing number of merger and acquisitions (M&A) since the late 1980s. In 2012, more than 1 500 deals were announced, with a total value of 70 million euros, as shown in the charts of Appendix #.
Rationales of these M&A waves are to be found in the global willingness to spread all over the world, and maintain high competitive positions. Among the factors and synergies that are driving M&As, there are: * The expansion into new markets, by acquiring a local player, and develop, with the acquirer resources, the existing business in terms of products, customers database, suppliers / distributors network; * The research of new technology and workforce capacity in developing countries such as India and Malaysia where the technologies are flourishing and qualified applicants are numerous; * The pressure on decreasing costs and operating expenses, such as rents, administrative costs, energy cost, and of course, wages; * The possibility to work in less convenient environment regarding regulations and law.

Most of the M&A deals within the software industry are successful, overstepping the several risks and threats that are significant. Security and privacy are strong concerns, closely followed by the fail in completing the integration of IT systems, operations and processes. The lack of long-term visibility is also essential to avoid leading to a misunderstanding of the mission and the managerial directions (“where are we going? How?”), and to a poor management.
Last but not least, human capital management and culture are likely to be the key success factors to meet the deal’s expectations. It has been observed that making efforts to enhance Human Resources Management (HRM) efficiency is directly linked to the performance of the firm. Indeed, attract potential talents; succeed in the job allocation, in individual career support to keep them, and in creating a environment where leadership and culture are co-existing; are key success factors to reach high motivation and performance levels.
Oracle’s Acquisition Strategy
From Oracle's standpoint, acquisitions have been a way to expand beyond the database software sector. For the industry as a whole, the consolidation trend can be attributed, at least in part, to a slow economy since mid-2007. Oracle can benefit from the consolidated software industry through strategic acquisitions that expand their customer base. The main benefit that acquisitions can provide for Oracle, beyond a more diverse product line, will be revenue provided by the maintenance fees that all Oracle customers pay. As their customer base grows, the numbers of clients that require their software service increases. With more customers, Oracle has been able to lower prices on software license by keeping software service prices constant. As a result Oracle is able to put pressure on competitors like SAP through lower license prices while growing revenues.
In 2004 Oracle acquired PeopleSoft, allowing them to penetrate the human resource management software market. They have also acquired Siebel Systems, a leader in customer relationship management software (CRM), Tetik who produces supply chain management software, and ProfitLogic, an India based banking software producer. Most recently, Oracle purchased BEA Systems, a producer of middleware, for $8.5 billion.
Oracle has been on acquisitions frenzy. These acquisitions have increased the number of customers that rely on Oracle for product support.. In 2005, Oracle purchased PeopleSoft Inc. for $11.1 billion. Oracle purchased BEA Systems for $8.5 billion in 2008. Oracle acquired Sun Microsystems for $7.4 billion dollars in January 2009, after receiving regulatory approval from the European Commission. Sun has transformed Oracle from a database and business-software company to a hardware company as well.
Oracle’s acquisition strategy has been one of the most important growth drivers in the last ten years as it can be seen on. To summarize, there are three main incentives for Oracle in acquiring other businesses: * Access to a wider customer base which can then increase revenues and market share. The acquisition of Peoplesoft brought to Oracle about 13 million customers. * Fill a market gap. For Oracle, this also means entering new segments. The acquisition of Hyperion gave access to the performance management software business. * Increase core capabilities. This is the main drive of Oracle’s acquisition. When buying new companies, Oracle also gains access to new technologies that can then be either implemented in its existing softwares or sell them separately.:
Through its mergers and acquisitions plans, Oracle is looking to “strengthen its product offerings, accelerate innovation, meet customer demand more rapidly, and expand partner opportunities”.

Key Objectives:
To remain a leader in the information and computer technology industry, Oracle’s acquisitions strategy has 4 clear objectives:

* Strengthen its product offerings
Must often, Oracle acquires companies that offer a complementary product to another already produced by Oracle.

* Meet customer demand more rapidly
Oracle prefers to buy a company producing a particular product or service instead of developing its own similar product from the beginning.

* Expand partner opportunities
By acquiring other companies, Oracle also acquires the social capital of the acquired company, made by its clients, partners and suppliers. Oracle can also expand partnership to its other products or services.

* Accelerate innovation:
Innovation is the key in the information and computer technology. Acquire a new company enable to share its projects and developing products with Oracle.

In order to achieve these 4 objectives, Oracle’s acquisitions strategy must consider post-acquisitions issues concerning alignment, renewal and execution. Indeed, large consultancies strategy (Bain, BCG, McKinsey, etc..) conclude that 50 to 85% of mergers & acquisitions operations do not achieve the stated objectives. Not taking into account integration and human resources issues is one of the main reasons to this low rate of success.

Since we have all these considerations to tackle and since we identified areas for improvement in our OHI outcomes analysis above, our recommendations to achieve the 4 Oracle’s acquisitions objectives are:

* Accountability, Culture & Climate: * Increase new employees involvement into Oracle’s objectives. * Leadership: * Spread Oracle’s managerial dynamic to acquired companies. * Innovation & Learning: * Increase sharing of information between Oracle’s and acquired companies * Expand talent development rapidly to acquired companies * Achieve financial return objectives * Create value and maintain a leader position * Achieve financial return objectives * Create value and maintain a leader position * Strengthen product offerings * Meet customer demand more rapidly * Expand partner opportunities * Accelerate innovation * Strengthen product offerings * Meet customer demand more rapidly * Expand partner opportunities * Accelerate innovation
… for 2 final objectives
… for 2 final objectives
… in order to meet acquisitions objectives…
… in order to meet acquisitions objectives…
Key issues for a successful integration…
Key issues for a successful integration… * Increase new employees involvement into Oracle’s objectives * Spread Oracle’s managerial dynamic to acquired companies * Increase sharing of information between Oracle’s and acquired companies * Expand talent development rapidly to acquired companies * Increase new employees involvement into Oracle’s objectives * Spread Oracle’s managerial dynamic to acquired companies * Increase sharing of information between Oracle’s and acquired companies * Expand talent development rapidly to acquired companies

OHI Model

Alignment Cluster

Direction
Oracle has a clear vision and perfectly knows where the organization is heading. Despite its multiple activities: database software, cloud computing, solutions, corporate services and even hardware; the mission of the company is to be the leader in providing companies the tools they need to solve their business issues. It is clearly claimed on Oracle’s website, they have a top-down approach to gather its employees to this vision: goals and strategies are cascaded to every level of the company, enabling employees to understand their impact on achieving success and aligning their action accordingly. One can thus talk about a shared-vision and a strategic clarity when it comes to defining Oracle’s Direction practices.
Employees are clearly aware about the objectives of the company and the way they are supposed to achieve them. However, they are not involved around this vision: they are not asked to think about it, they only have to follow.
Oracle thus does pretty well in sharing its direction but may have improvement to do when it comes to have its employees committed to the mission.

Culture and climate
Despite the lack of information on this point, some trends can be revealed.
Employees’ reviews reveal that people enjoy working in the company because it is the best place to learn about top-of-the-line technologies and to work on innovative projects. They also enjoy the good work life balance.
On the other hand, many employees feel in competition in their job and admit that the working environment becomes more hostile and stressful in times of hard competition in the industry. Employees are asked to give their best, that is understandable but they seem to be too much monitored by the management and that no part of initiative is let to them. Oracle Corp. appears as internally competitive and operationally disciplined. Standards are high; the management controls teams’ results. Such a strict management can be explained by the numerous acquisitions and consolidations Oracle had to face: the only way to keep its work force gathered around a same vision is to impose some standards and to make sure everyone follows it.

Leadership
One cannot discuss about Oracle’s leadership without thinking about Larry Ellison. The charismatic co-founder and CEO of Oracle is embodies the company. Larry Ellison is tough and passionate and expects the same involvement from his employees. He is known for hiring only “the best one”: smart people action-oriented, most of the time his friends or ex-colleagues he can trust in. Management and leadership is thus key at Oracle: managers are experimented people who have to lead their teams and communicate the passion for the business. Quite hierarchical, one can talk about an authoritative leadership.
Oracle also trains its future top management: there is a leadership program, similar to the program of General Electrics. The program is based on the international bestseller The Leadership Challenge written by J. Kouzes and B. Posner. Potential leaders collaborate among peers, they have special trainings in virtual classrooms and practical exercise. The company also implemented a “leadership awards” system: every year, employees from Finance, HR, Marketing and Supply Chain are selected and elected according to specific criteria; the most important being the impact of their leadership on a transformational project. They are then trained are proposed career opportunities within the company.
This is thus a challenging way to manage future leaders but on the other hand, “non selected” employees feel underestimated by their management. “Work very hard, you will be rewarded” could be the slogan of the elitist system Oracle put in place. It is clearly in line with Larry Ellison vision of leadership.

Execution cluster

Accountability
As was mentioned above, Larry Ellison requires highly demanding performance from its employees. The whole organization of the company is thus made to make them accountable to what they deliver through performance management. This is especially true for the Sales teams. This might actually go even too far as Oracle’s CFO Safra Catz is « obsessed with Oracle’s margins ». According to a former employee of Oracle’s sales team, Mrs Catz instituted last year a plan that "over assigns" quotas and bonuses. So, to get their full bonus, sales operatives had to overachieve by 10%. This measure cut their pay by about $30,000 apiece.
Larry Ellison created a competitive environment among the employees where only best performers are rewarded. If this can be an advantage for productivity, it is a double-edge sword, as employees tend to compete against each other instead of working together against outside competition. This trend is accentuated by the constant new acquisitions, which bring additional competition inside the firm. Indeed, when a former competitor selling another product than Oracle is bought, there is right away a cannibalization. The time of adaptation to Oracle is thus sometimes long.
Another aspect of Oracle’s search of performance is the flexibility it provides for its employees. In order to improve its employees’ personal ownership, Oracle developed a working from home program. Much more than a way to reduce costs for offices, it is a way to show that the company has confidence in its employees to do their job, in the environment that suits them best as long as they deliver what is required from them. Again, this flexibility, only driven by higher performance results, goes hand in hand with a consequence management system, where employees get more if they deliver more.

Capabilities
The first aspect of a company’s capabilities is its ability to acquire and develop talent. As a fast growing and innovative company, Oracle has an expansive policy to get highly qualified employees. The first aspect of this talent acquisition is through the acquisition of companies themselves by Oracle. By retaining highly qualified employees, who already proved their ability to deliver, Oracle is constantly improving its number of talented employees. This is especially important for a technology company such as Oracle, which needs to be constantly aware of new techniques and new ways of thinking.
The second aspect is the high policy of hiring. Indeed, as a fast growing company, Oracle is hiring more and more highly qualified employees to sustain its growth.
Nevertheless, Oracle is not only willing to put the means necessary to acquire the best talents; it wants to make its employees grow in their respective domains. Thus Oracle provides extensive training opportunities and a supportive environment that fosters career self-management.

Control, Coordination
The second aspect of a company’s performance is its ability to coordinate all undertaken measures in the firm so that they are as performing as possible. And as a company that develops information systems considered as the best on the market, Oracle has a very efficient information system, which enables it to properly manage its more than 100 000 employees. Thanks to this integrated ERP, Oracle can constantly assess its performance and risk in HR, operational and financial domains.
Nevertheless, as Oracle is growing very fast through acquisitions, the best ERP system is not sufficient to have instantly the best practice. Indeed, a few months or years are necessary to integrate the newly acquired companies in the system. For example, numerous lacks of coordination were noted between the hardware and the software sales team after the acquisition of Sun by Oracle. Some employees of these departments complained about the hardware sales leadership which had no influence in the organization compared to the software’s which instituted whatever they wanted. Employees reported different Sales teams to be secretly undercutting each other on every deal, instead of competing against external competition, such as IBM, Microsoft, HP or SAP. And when a new client was gained, it was a rip off to decide which department was getting the money from the deal. This bad coordination even led to harmful multiple actions towards the customers, which made them feel over pressurized.

Motivation
The last aspect of a company’s performance is its ability to motivate its employees so that they feel compelled to deliver as much as possible. The already discussed aspect of internal competition tends to entice people to deliver, but if some employees feel highly motivated by a challenging and competitive environment, a large number feel over-pressurized and stressed, which is the end can lead to a counter performing result. In the same logic, the career and development opportunities can be very high but are reserved to the very top performers. The motivation has sometimes been low for the employees of newly acquired firms, whose performance culture was not as strong.
The overall satisfaction of Oracle’s employees is rather mitigated. Indeed, the turnover of the firm is rather high, with some employees complaining about Oracle’s culture of pressure and performance assessment. However, the company was in year 2012 named the “Best Place to Work” in 10 countries. The flexibility for the employees to reach their performance is especially appreciated.

Renewal Cluster

External Orientation
Oracle Corp. is attentive to the external environment. First, the company is strictly customer focused: its mission is to provide its clients the experience they are looking for. The objective is to give a solution to their rapidly evolving business needs. This is the reason why a part of the IT budget has been invested in the marketing departments: the goal is to understand their different types clients. As the company cannot give a personalized solution to each client, and tend top standardize its products and services, they invest a lot on marketing in order to understand the principal trends in their clients’ businesses. The acquisition of smaller companies may thus be a double-edge sword: some RightNow customers suffered from a lesser client-centricity and adaptability.
Oracle also relies heavily on its partners’ relationship. Its major partners are resellers and managed service providers. The company expect strict standards to its partners but once the deal is made, they receive a lot from Oracle: advice, a dedicated partner portal, meeting events (Oracle Partner Days), joint marketing campaigns, technical support, sales trainings and workshops. As is the case for the training of tomorrow’s leaders, Oracle requires a lot but give also a lot to the best ones. Their partners network is thus very strong and precisely organized.
The company partners with some of their indirect competitors such as HP or Microsoft. Their goal is to make a win-win deal; the partnership with Microsoft (June 2013) should lead to deploying Oracle software on the Cloud where Microsoft excels.
However, it is mandatory to note that Oracle has not always been fair play with its important partners. Indeed, as Oracle has been constantly going to new business on new sectors, former partners became more and more direct competitors. One of the best examples would be with Salesforce.com. Oracle used to sell combined offers of its core services with Salesforce.com’s CRM system, but is now developing its own CRM tool, which is directly competing with Salesforce.com’s one. Another example is that after an agreement with HP, HP rightfully sued Oracle for not having respected HP’s trade secrets.
Oracle organizes business events in many countries: there are innovation competitions and forums where small and medium businesses, but also entrepreneurs can excite their innovative skills and learn about new technology businesses. It enables Oracle to stay close to dynamic and willing business communities.

Innovation and learning
Oracle has a competitive advantage compared to its main competitor SAP: it innovates through acquisition whereas SAP mainly innovates at the core. Indeed, the multiple acquisitions enabled Oracle to capture ideas from its ex-competitors but also from different industries (example: the recent acquisition of the hardware provider, Sun). The knowledge is then rapidly shared across the organization. The way the innovation and learning is shared is thus a top-down approach: it goes from one business unit to another through management and is then spread to lower levels. No special support is given to encourage employees’ participations in the development of new initiatives or improvements.
Archetype of Oracle:

Leadership Driven | Execution Edge | Market Focus | Knowledge Core | Career Opportunities * | Knowledge-sharing | Bus. Partnerships | Talent acquisition | Open and trusting | Creative/entrepreneurial | Customer focus | Role clarity | Performance contracts | Employee involvement | Competitive insights | Consequence mgt. | Inspirational leader | Talent development | Gov’t/community rel. | Rewards and incentives | Strategic clarity | Internally competitive | Financial mgt. | Personal ownership | People perf. review* | Personal ownership | Capturing external ideas | People performance rev | Operational mgt. | Bottom up innovation | Process-based capability | Career opportunities | Operationally disciplined | Top-down innovation | Shared vision | Performance contracts | Consultative leadership | Meaningful values | Outsourced expertise | Professional Standards | Consequence mgt. | Consequence mgt. | Strategic clarity | Financial mgt. |

*: for potential tomorrow’s leaders only

Oracle is a mix of Knowledge core, Leadership driven and Market focus entity. Indeed, to sum up Oracle’s organization, it relies on a charismatic leader which is defining a clear strategy for the company very much understood and followed by its employees. Oracle is trying to meet customers’ requirements as close as possible, by constantly acquiring new businesses and technologies which keep Oracle at the top of innovation. The employees are encouraged to outperform trough an internal competition and performance assessment.

Employees motivation program
The organization health analysis highlighted a deep human resources failure at Oracle. The elitist system avoids the large majority of employees to feel empowered and considered by the management.

Career development programs
Only the most competent ones can access to leadership programs. Those programs seem very productive, but in view of the size of the company, they could clearly be accessible to everyone.
To do so, training programs, workshops and assessment sessions should be adapted to every business unit of Oracle, in most of the department and at different responsibility levels. It will definitively be costly and time-consuming. However, Oracle is currently loosing important human wealth: employees learn a lot at Oracle but are not encouraged to stay. A large majority of them think about applying or even accepting a new position with a competitor, after a few years. Retain them by developing their internal career would save not only tomorrow’s leaders, but also smart brains at lower levels.

Assimilation and knowledge sharing program
Another issue Oracle is facing currently is due to its massive acquisition policy. Employees enter the group without really wanting it. They did not take the time to get accustomed to the corporate culture and may not want to make efforts to do so. This is thus Oracle’s duty to force the assimilation of new employees. It will include culture presentation sessions, meetings with charismatic figures of the company, recreational discovery of former products marketed by the firm but mostly adaptation of the new acquired company’s culture to Oracle’s one. The last initiative will be the most difficult to implement, as it will be different from one company to another. It will be HR’s role to work on finding what particularities Oracle can keep and even spread to the whole group. This practice will encourage new employees to accept the acquisition and make them proud of their new integration.

Sales people coordination improvement
Oracle is a sales-driven company. However, the company is facing troubles. Once again, the difficulties are due to the multiple acquisitions the group made.
Oracle sales force is over-trained to do their best, to make the best results each month. The system was highly competitive before the wave of acquisition the group decided to do.
Indeed, sales people coming from different companies have not been totally integrated to the group and go on selling the products of their former entity. It leads to counter-productive internal competition. Sales people try to sell different products to the same client, without collaborating with each other. The client may feel lost and switch to another supplier that will appear better organized and thus, more dedicated to the client.
Oracle has to review the way its sales force work: the solution may be to integrate the whole sales people into one department, with people more specialized on some product lines. Each client should have one account manager, who will be the main contact and will draw the deal entirely (from hardware to services, through software, solutions, etc.). In this way, the client will feel supported by Oracle. The specialized sales people will then take over from the account manager for technical questions of the deal.
The business analysts also have to review the way quotas are set: overlaps have to be avoided. This multidimensional work will enable sales people to work freely, without obliterating other sales people’s interests.

Trustful partnerships
- Better fidelity with long term partners, so that new potential partners are not afraid of partnering with Oracle, which means communicating some of their core technologies.

| Practices | Health assessment | Recommendations | Direction | Shared visionStrategic clarity | Able | Boost employees involvement | Culture and climate | Operationally disciplined
Internally competitive | Able | Encourage intrapreunerial initiatives | Leadership | AuthoritativeChallenging | Able | Involve/empower “non elitist” employeesChallenge employees at lower organization levels | | Practices | Health assessment | Recommendations | Accountability | Performance contractConsequence managementPersonal ownership | Able-Elite | More flexibility for employees of acquired companies to adapt to this performance system, with better role definition for them in order to avoid counter-productive internal competition | Capabilities | Talent acquisitionTalent development | Elite | | Coordination, control | Financial managementProfessional standards | Able | Better coordination of existing businesses with newly acquired business | Motivation | | Able | Career development opportunities for higher number of employees |

| Practices | Health assessment | Recommendations | External Orientation | Customer focusBusiness partnershipsCompetitive insightCommunity relationship | Able-Elite | Avoid competition/business betrayal with important partners | Innovation & learning | Capturing external ideasTop-down innovationKnowledge sharing | Able-Elite | Could encourage bottom-up innovation, but may not be in line with their global innovation strategy |

APPENDIX

Sources oracle.com ebsco.com forbes.com glassdoor.com (employees review) indeed.com (employees review) businessinsider.com Performance Measurement & Benchmarks
Based on the above key objectives, the performance measurements for each are as follow: Increase new employees involvement into Oracle’s Objectives | Monthly survey during the first year after the acquisition to measure how new employees have integrated Oracle technology, the corporate culture and objectives. | Spread Oracle’s managerial dynamic to acquired companies | Efficiency of operations involving acquired company. | Increase sharing of information between Oracle’s and acquired companies | Rate of goals achieved for projects involving acquired companies. | Expand talent development rapidly | Monitoring the evolution of carriers of acquired employees into Oracle’s management team. |