Part A:

Ways in which AGL Energy Ltd can improve and monitor the performance of its employees:

Improving and monitoring the performance levels of a large workforce is a mammoth task to achieve. It requires precise efforts. If the higher authorities of AGL Energy Ltd wish to witness vast changes in the performance levels in their employees, they need to match the skill sets of their employees with their respective job roles. However, before implementing this step, it is critical to make adjustments in their training modules. It is highly recommended that the entire training structure of the company is modelled as unstructured; allowing the individual assessment process to facilitate. The training module should have basic behavioural assessment measures as well. Communicating and providing is a very effective way to improve the overall performance of the employees. The process of monitoring the employees should be done under the process of providing realistic matrices and making realistic expectations from the employees. This reduces the problem of going through mental burnouts among the employees that impacts the performance levels with extreme adversity (Ningsih et al. 2020). 

Best ways to improve the corporate culture of AGL Energy Ltd by identifying its key components:

For AGL Energy Ltd, the key elements of its culture are its vision and its employees. AGL Energy Ltd needs to adopt different measures to improve these two elements. For vision, it is thoroughly recommended that the higher authorities of AGL Energy Ltd are to understand it in the first place. Until the senior-most management of the company cannot understand its vision and commit to it, the can never channelize it among their employees. Thus a huge gap will be created. After this, it is important to articulate it with appropriate communication measures. To improve the quality of the people working for AGL Energy Ltd, it is important to make changes to the recruitment policy of the company. Along with this, AGL Energy Ltd should also prioritize the development of its people. Making these changes will dramatically improve the culture of AGL Energy Ltd (Sardjono 2020). 

Part B:

Introduction:

This section of the report focuses on the initiatives taken by AGL Energy Ltd to improve its organizational performance of its workforce and organizational culture. However, unlike section A, where the focus was on highlighting the aspects of performance and organizational culture, section B intends to provide adequate support to them. It has been done using two theories for each of the aspects. The two theories that have been provided to support the initiatives related to the performance of the employees of AGL Energy Ltd are Hannan and Freeman's theory and goal-setting theory. For the cultural aspect, the assignment has used Schein's model of organizational culture and Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument (OCAI). To illustrate the content with a broader spectrum, the project of solar energy has been used in this section.

Performance-related initiatives of AGL Energy Ltd: 

The initiatives taken by the higher authorities of AGL Energy Ltd that are aiming for improving its performance can be described using the following theories:

Hannan and Freeman theory:

• Constraints: The outlook of the energy-producing industry has been vastly altered since the last decade. This change can be considered to be a major constraint for AGL Energy Ltd. AGL Energy Ltd is now investing sincerely in producing energy from more environmentally friendly sources such as solar energy. However, the biggest challenge for the company is to producing at a larger scale and replacing the existing sources of energy 
• Adaption: AGL Energy Ltd is adapting its working framework in a manner that allows the company to makes profits from this venture. AGL Energy Ltd is replacing its demand for energy by installing better solar panels. 
• Inertia: As per this theory; organizational inertia is one of the biggest barriers that prevent a company from adapting to any changes. For AGL Energy Ltd, the organizational inertia is the lack of technology to produce solar energy at a mass scale. Moreover, it is very difficult to convince the targeted audiences about the practicality of solar energy.
• Selection: AGL Energy Ltd is now making changes in its workforces especially in its research and marketing team in lowering these inertias.   

It is very common for an organization to fail in its objectives even if it has massive potential simply it failed to engage its workforces with it (Lazzeretti and Capone, 2017). Lack of engagement in the organizational goal is a major barrier to overcome as it is known to impact the overall performance of the employees to a good extent. Hence, AGL Energy Ltd should follow the goal-setting theory to initiate better performance. The theory in the context of AGL Energy Ltd and its application in the workspaces of the company have been explained below:

Goal-setting theory:

Five main principles of goal setting theory are as follows:

• Clarity: It is critically important for the higher authorities of AGL Energy Ltd to make sure that they have set clear goals; only after this, they can distribute all the major information to the respective employees related to this project. Having clarity will also impact the overall budget of this project positively.  
• Challenges: The goal is not highly visionary; rather the challenging part of this project is to produce and supply it at a mass scale that can replace the traditional form of energy sources in Australia 
• Commitment: AGL Energy Ltd needs to make sure that it is initiating steps aiming at improving the commitment factor among its workforces. It is better to present the goal in a manner to the employees that improve the sense of purpose and importance among them. By doing so, AGL Energy Ltd can earn the respect of their employees (Winter, 2017)
• Feedback: Maintaining an effective platform of communication is critical for AGL Energy Ltd as it would facilitate the process of collecting and providing important feedback to the employees. This has been known to improve the performance of the employees (Landers et al., 2017).  
• Task-complexity: AGL Energy Ltd should understand the complexities of this project and not to expect any unrealistic standards from the employees. To lower the overall complexities in this project, it is better to segment the entire task in achievable timelines (The Hub., 2020) 

The primary goal of this theory is to improve the motivation levels among the employees. It is needless to state the importance of motivation on performance levels among the employees. This theory can help AGL Energy Ltd to deploy better initiatives in improving the performance levels of their workforces.

Culture related initiatives of AGL Energy Ltd:

Organizational culture is one of the most critical factors that impact the entire business on an unbelievable scale. AGL Energy Ltd is also no exception. It is the duty of the higher authorities of the company is taking serious initiatives that lead to improving its existing working culture. One of the best theories to support the initiatives that are directed towards improving the culture of AGL Energy Ltd is Edgar Schein's model of organizational culture. The theory has three levels that are illustrated below:

• Artifacts: In simpler words, it is the visible part of AGL Energy Ltd's culture that is noticed by both the employees as well as the visitors. As per this theory, the interior arrangement of any company describes the culture of the company (Hunt, 2019). This form of "space" has been noted to impact critical factors such as motivation, self-engagement, etc. at the workplace. AGL Energy Ltd is thus known to put good efforts in making physical changes at its workplace which is evident from the employee reviews (Indeed, 2020). Language is also an important artifact. Although the official language of AGL Energy Ltd is English, however, the senior management of AGL Energy Ltd does not make any discriminatory among non-English speaking employees (Hunt, 2019). The company is also notable for acquiring sophisticated technology to reduce any accidents at the workplace, however, it is making significant changes in its technical arsenal to support its human effort; allowing them properly execute its new business goal 
• Values: The quality of organizational values it mostly reflected in the aspects it values. AGL Energy Ltd is known to practice strict anti-discrimination policies in the workplace. Moreover, the team leaders working for AGL Energy Ltd are trained to construct a team that surpasses the professional aspect; the team leaders are known to establish personal relationships with their subordinates that facilitate the process of internal communication allowing the team members to freely discuss their issues.  The higher management of AGL Energy Ltd has taken initiatives in improving the level of innovation and creativity at the workplace to allow the business to sustain its current position even in the face of executing difficult projects and goals 
• Basic assumptions: This level in the theory is mostly directed towards the new candidates who have recently signed an employment contract with AGL Energy Ltd. A new candidate might have several assumptions towards the management and the working atmosphere of the company; it can be directed towards the type of leadership, levels of workplace politics, work-life balance, and many more. Here, AGL Energy Ltd cannot simply expect that the newly joined candidates will always have positive assumptions towards their senior until the current culture of AGL Energy Ltd is positive.

Another useful theory to assess the initiatives undertaken by AGL Energy Ltd directed towards the improvement of its working culture is the Organizational Culture Assessment Instrument also known as OCAI. As per this theory, there are following ways that can assess the quality of the culture that exists in AGL Energy Ltd as per this theory:

• Dominant Characteristics: It includes the values, expectations from the employees, and the way it is extracted from them. When it comes to extracting the contribution from the employees, it is thoroughly recommended that the pace of extraction should be mutually agreed by the senior management and the employees 
• Leadership: Quality of leadership has impacted organizational culture traditionally. AGL Energy Ltd mostly follows a transformational leadership style allowing the company to adapt to sudden changes (Hunt, 2019)
• Managing the employees: AGL Energy Ltd mostly on anti-discrimination policies and proper feedback mechanisms when managing its workforces (Data Centre, 2020). 
• Strategic emphasis: AGL Energy Ltd has been known to use innovation as its primary strategy to run its business 
• Criteria of success: AGL Energy Ltd provides metrics to individual employees as criteria of success. The overall rating of the employees allows higher management to decide success (Wong et al, 2020).

Conclusion:

The problem for AGL Energy Ltd lies not like the project as it is not highly innovative. Almost every individual in Australia is familiar with solar energy. The biggest challenge, however, lies in creating an effective channel that can distribute solar energy in every household in the country. Overcoming this barrier will be a major challenge for even the most experienced employees working for AGL Energy Ltd. It is important to understand that, the success of this difficult project lies in the ability of the higher authorities of AGL Energy Ltd to successfully execute the values of its working culture and monitor the performance of the employees associated with the project.