A Bank of America Experience

This paper presents a critique of this writers experience as a member of the Bank of America organization. Bank of America became the first coast-to-coast bank in the United States. In recent years, Bank of America has been very active in acquiring other financial services organizations as a part of a strategy to become the largest financial institution in the United States.

Consumer and Small Business Banking is Bank of America's largest operational segment. These activities provide deposits, credit cards, insurance, loans, treasury services, and financing of car, boat, and RV dealerships. Global Corporate and Investment Banking provides brokerage, advisory services, and capital markets services to corporate and institutional clients.

Bank of America claims market share leadership in the key markets as California, Florida, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and Washington State. The Bank also owns an equity interest approximating 25 percent of one of Mexico's largest banks. Bank of America is targeting Mexican Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese clients in the United States.

In September 2003 Bank of America's mutual fund chief Robert Gordon was among several employees who left the firm amidst a New York attorney general's investigation into hedge fund client Canary Capital Partners, which may have had access to Bank of America's trading platform to make illegal after-hours trades of Na

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of the organizational structure characterizes it as horizontally complex. The branch banking structure of Bank of America causes its organization to be spatially complex. Bank of America is also centralized in many of its management decisionmaking activities. While local managers may exercise significant flexibility in hiring/firing, and in granting loans at relatively low levels, centralized decisionmaking authority prevails with respect to major loans and the establishment of organizational goals and strategies. The degree of professionalism found in the bank's organization depends upon the hierarchical level. For most of the bank's employees, professionalism requirements are not high. In the managerial levels of the organizational hierarchy, however, professional requirements are quite high. In the context of personnel configuration, Bank of America has a high clerical ratio, and a high directtoindirect labor ratio. People and activities in the bank are, to some extent, organized along product/service lines. At the same time, a functional organization, with respect to support services, is also in place. Power at Bank of America is highly centralized in the Board of Directors. Over the past several years, profita
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Approximate Word count = 3059
Approximate Pages = 12 (250 words per page)