Dissertation

Cardiff Metropolitan University

This dissertation aims to identify to what extent corporate events and conferences impact upon an organisations corporate culture using Unipart Manufacturing Group as a case study. Unipart was selected as a case study due to the scale of the organisation and the close link the researcher has within the organisation. It was deemed the ideal organisation to explore the impact corporate events and conferences can have upon an organisation, as well as the organisations corporate culture. Within this dissertation an extensive literature review was conducted, as well as a breakdown of the methodological choices which have been justified, and a results and discussion chapter which relate back to relevant theory to the research study. With regards to the data collection, the researcher opted for a mixed-method approach including semi-structured interviews and questionnaires. This mixed-method approach enabled the researcher to gain a more in-depth understanding of the participant’s event experiences, motivations, views on networking, corporate culture, mission statements and the type of events they typically attend, in order to gain an insight into the effectiveness of these corporate events and how they reflect Unipart’s corporate culture. The key findings within this research study is that corporate events can be source of communication, networking, motivation and learning and developing, which all reflect Unipart’s strong corporate culture of The Unipart Way. The Unipart Way is a system in which engages employees in order to motivate and equip them with the necessary skills in order to diagnose issues and create innovative solutions. The research study found that through the participant’s experiences corporate events and conferences provide networking opportunities, individual development as well as staying current within innovation. As corporate culture is a strong factor that determines an organisations behaviour, Unipart’s corporate events and conferences allow an opportunity to share these beliefs through achieving the organisations key objectives through these events.