Under Armour

Under Armour
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Under Armour
Under Armour, Inc., is an American company headquartered in Baltimore, Maryland which is one of the leading organization that deals with the innovation, distribution, and marketing of branded athletic clothing, footwear, and related accessories. With a global presence worldwide, the company distributes athletic apparel to various countries. The company was founded by Kevin Plank in 1996. Its products include but are not limited to, hoodies, jackets, shorts, leggings, t-shirts, bags, pants, caps and gloves. As of 2016, the company had employed more than 14,000 employees with half of them being part-time workers. Under Armour, Inc., mission states “To make all athletes better through passion, design, and relentless pursuit of innovation” (Under Armour, Inc., 2016). This paper will provide a critical analysis of the impact of the company’s mission statement, strategies, vision, and goals on its performance management systems.
According to Zeleny (2005), performance management systems refers to a logical process in an organization’s human resource management which involves the employees, either as on personal basis or in groups, in the company’s effectiveness and success in accordance to its objective, strategies, goals and the mission statement. As mentioned earlier, Under Armour Inc., is a business which applies high-tech innovations to design and produce athletic apparel which is best suited for the sports people. In this case, the company has employed several ways in the human resource management to integrate the concept of performance management systems for improvement of its products and services to their consumers.

The concept of performance management systems in this company’s management is a key part that has influenced its success and competitiveness in this industry over the years since its foundation. The company is highly focused in innovativeness. Thus, there is a great need for the employees to understand the company’s goals of creativity and innovative capacity to realize its objective through improved organizational efficiency. For this case, Under Armour Inc., goals and mission are based on its innovativeness and expansion capabilities in the market. Therefore, the company’s goals help in the formulation of its business strategy, communication of the company’s goals to the employees and encouraging personal accountability in the workplace. Also, these goals objectives provide a basic platform in which the company can evaluate the individual and organizational performance at the end of each task accomplished. To counter the current competition and at the same time meet the increasing consumer demands, the company ought to employ high levels of innovativeness in their production and customer service to increase sales and foster sustainability as outlined in the Under Armour Inc., mission statement. As a result, every employee is tasked with a significant responsibility of ensuring these objectives are realized. Therefore, organizational goals, mission, values, and strategies have a significant impact on the company’s performance management systems. (Under Armour, Inc., 2015).
Individual and group performance is an essential aspect towards realizing the company’s overall success and organizational effectiveness. Under Armour Inc., productivity and profitability depend on the ability of its employees to perform their duties and responsibilities up to their full potential. This can be achieved through individual or group basis. In an attempt to counter the competition in this industry, Under Armour Inc. has formulated organizational mission, objectives, and goals which are more productive, smart and relatively cohesive than its competitors. In this case, these goals are communicated from the company’s management to the employees in a systematic manner to ensure that every individual understands what needs to be done and the respective objectives that need to be achieved either on an individual level or as a group. Goal and objective management in an organization plays a key part in the employee and group performance in the company. Under Armour, Inc., linking strategy begins from the executive management and trickles down the employees at various levels of the organizational structure. The individual and group performance are conveyed back to the organizational structure in a systematic manner. As such, this provides the company’s management team with an evaluation method to monitor the performance of the employees. In this process, employee’s efforts either as an individual or a group are connected and directed towards the organization success.
Under Armour, Inc., vision, mission, goals, and strategies give the company a clear overview of the what needs to be done to achieve organizational effectiveness. In this case, the company’s performance management system ought to be designed to reflect these goals, objectives, and strategies. For instance, it should reflect on the firm’s innovative capability, customer service, and productivity. Additionally, the performance management systems should provide a clear assessment of how these aspects have been achieved through the company’s activities. Performance management systems are designed in a way that it is intended to realize specific goals in the business practices. The company’s objectives and goals are outlined in its mission statement which signals the importance of developing the performance management statement in line with the Under Armour Inc. mission statement. It is also important to note that the goals and objectives state what is expected to be achieved by the organization. In this case, the performance management systems should reflect this accurately.  
References
Under Armour, Inc. (2015). 1-29.
Under Armour, Inc. SWOT Analysis. (2016). Under Armour, Inc. SWOT Analysis, 1-8.
Zeleny, M. (2005). Human Systems Management: Integrating Knowledge, Management, and Systems. Hackensack, NJ: World Scientific.