The Strength of Corporate Culture

                “A strong culture is characterized by the organizations basic values being intensely held and widely shared” (Brown 2011). I read this statement from our text book and I was immediately reminded of Stanley McChrystal’s TED talk and my time which was spent in the military. I now knew why an organization such as the U.S. Military had been around for so long and successful for so many generations. From day one in the military you are sucked into the culture of this organization which you have joined, you are not only employed by the U.S. armed forces but you become one of them. A culture which is infused so deeply into your values that you are able to use these values for the rest of your life. Our text talks about how even organizations like these which have high turnover rates amongst the young remain strong because “new members can be strongly socialized into the organization” (Brown 2011).

                The type of leadership which Jim and Stanley are talking about in our weekly videos is the type of leadership which changes who you are; it becomes your second nature to go above and beyond to change the way you conduct yourself on a daily basis. Rather it be by using incentives like money or having to do less pushups, the want to succeed in these organizations runs very strong. Our text also talks about how “the more members share the basic values and the greater commitment to them, the stronger the culture” (Brown 2011). This is a very important quality for any organization to have and the reason why the U.S. Military is regarded as one of the most powerful organizations in the world; there are very few organizations which can instill pride in its members’ the way the Military does.

                I think that after Jim from Gallery Furniture read the book called “Influencer” he witnessed the power of developing his business and instilling pride and ownership in his employees. Jim cared about developing his employees and being nicer to them and his customers, Gallery Furniture knew that they were in trouble and they recognized the need for change. Jim read that there were six sources to change behavior sales; the important changes that Jim made to his organization created the culture which was needed for his furniture store to succeed.

 Jim improved sales prospecting, sales training, the incentive pay system, post data, and also recognition. In his organization Jim saw that they were losing customers, employees were not satisfied at work nor did they feel appreciated. Many of those problems were corrected just by investing time into the values of his employees, Jim made sure that his employees followed up with customers so they do not lose sales and he also made sure that when his employees did well they were recognized and rewarded for their hard work. As seen in our text through the relative strengths of corporate culture chart; an organization with strong member commitment to values and a high number of members sharing values, this can create a strong culture.

The importance of culture and values cannot be underestimated as we have studied organizations which have collapsed when these key concepts are missing. This week in our weekly class discussion we looked at “The Home Depot” and how their business was handled when newcomer CEO Bob Nardelli took over the company. At first things seem to go pretty well as he was cutting cost left and right and creating a larger flux of money for THD to invest into their stores. All seemed well except for the fact that Nardelli had cut cost by laying off some of his most experienced employees and replaced them with much cheaper labor. Nardelli had gotten rid of the backbone of his business; Nardelli had layed off those employees which were on the front line of carrying out the values which home depot had infused into their culture. After similar moves like these were made the culture of THD started to sink quickly and along with that came their profits. The hate for THD became so intense that a private contracting company created a website called “THDSUCKS” so that customers and employees had a medium to vent through. On this website customers can be seen saying things such as “"At-home installations". Yeah, like I'm going let one of those bozos within 20 feet of my house” (THDsucks.org). The values of this organization were lost and it took a lot of hard work from the next CEO who came along to put THD back on track and making profits again.

There is a lot of evidence which points at the important of creating vales that are made to be strong within an organization. We cannot underestimate the importance of creating a positive culture within our organizations and showing our employees and customers that we do care about them; I believe that this is the message which Jim and Stanley were trying to convey. Jim and Stanley during their talks made it very clear that any organization takes work to make them successful and having a great corporate culture is the way to create a great foundation for your organization.

Reference:

Brown, D. R. (2011). An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall.

HomeDepotSucks.org (n.d.) Home Depot sucks [Blog forum]. Retrieved from http://www.homedepotsucks.org/forum/ 

Leadership

If you watch this Apple commercial, you might conclude that progress is driven by only a few special people. Indeed, people who rise to the top of organizations often do so through powerful personalities, strong technical skills, and strong work ethic. Yet, we see that as people rise to the top, other leadership competencies become more important in companies that are striving for excellence. For instance, leaders need to get along with people, develop capabilities in individuals and teams, maintain connections with various stakeholders, and exhibit emotional intelligence. In short, some leaders need to unlearn some of the habits that got them to the top so they can succeed in their executive roles.

In your reflection blog, consider how difficult it must be for a leader to grow into a person who can lead a system-wide change effectively. Perhaps you remember leaders who attempted system wide interventions but failed because they were not capable of pulling it all together. On the other hand, you may know leaders who were able to do what you thought would be impossible. From your point of view now, what is required for a leader to be successful?

            Being a strong leader must not be easy, so much is required of you when you are in charge of guiding everyone else. You have to be fearless, intelligent or at least appear to be, and most of all you have to learn how to think outside of the box to create change. While I was watching this commercial I have to say that I was almost intimidated, as I pursue my degree in business leadership I ask myself “can I ever be as great as the people shown on this commercial?” I also ask myself if the people that we see in this commercial felt the same way as me. Maybe these people were different and it just came natural to them, these great people that led us to change in this world must have actually been the circle pegs in a square hole. I believe what separated these great leaders from everyone else is that they did not listen to the “rules” and they did things the way that they wanted to.

            After a year of work I find myself at the halfway point of my MSLD, it is an exciting time and I feel that I have grown so much through all of the different readings which I have done. Overall the one thing that I have noticed is that many successful people and organizations are the ones that are learning to do things differently. It is not the ones that will continue to run a business as they did fifty or sixty years ago but those that look for innovative ways to change the world.

            This video states that the “ones who are crazy enough to think they can change the world actually do”this sends a great message to think outside of the box. In business we see people changing the structure of organizations so that things can run in a much more effective matter which will be conducive to an organization’s goals. We can take for example Renis Likert’s system 4 management style of how to run an organization. “In system four organizations believe in down, up , and sideways communication, a great deal of support between subordinates and leaders, and a larger amount of rewards and support for everyone in the organization no matter what position you hold” (Brown 2011) . I believe that it is ideas like this one that change the way we view how business is done, in the past people might have considered this a crazy way to run a business; but today because of innovators like Renis Likert we find it to be extremely productive.

            I once read a quote that said we need to “resist our tendencies to make right or true that which is merely familiar and wrong or false that which is only strange” (Matthew Taylor). This is an amazing quote and I keep it posted in my study along with other quotes so that I may never forget it. What this quote is saying is that we need to break barriers as we become leaders in life, we need to resist the want to not be different. I believe that this goes beyond business and it is a quote which we can also use in life, it is important for leaders to look outside of the box. To me this quote lets me know that I need to stop and think about why I might think that something is wrong; I have to ask myself if I believe that “something is wrong only because it is what I find familiar?” Maybe if I think about certain situations from a different perspective I can also shed a new light on problems which used to be an open and shut case.

            To answer the question of “what I think is required for a leader to be successful”; I have to say that thinking outside of the norm is what can make a leader successful. A leader in my opinion has to give everyone and everything a chance before shutting the idea down. They need to listen to every person around them without judgement or discrimination, they need to view everyone as a peer because they are only as strong as their weakest link. A true leader will know how to bring the best out of every situation by understanding that the world is not as black and white as it may seem.

References:

- Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.).    Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.

- Taylor, M. (2015).

Self Managed Teams

• What do you see as some of the major benefits and drawbacks of self-managed teams?
• Would you like to work within such a team?
• What competencies would you need to develop to be an effective external manager of a self-managed work team?

If someone in the business-world told me that they feel like they are caged in when it comes to getting their ideas across because their boss never listens to them, I would recommend this person look into a self-managed team. Far too often I hear of people with great ideas not being able to say what is on their minds because they are afraid of what might happen to their promotion. Even though I have seen this most of my life I feel that nothing has ever been done about it; as a leader in the past I have always wanted to bring out others creativity but it is easier said than done. This is where the concept of self-managed teams would come into play, A self-managed team is an “autonomous group whose members decide how to handle their task” (Brown 2011).  

            Many times a SM team will be brought together for short projects or they could stay together for long term team work which can span out as long as the external mangers allow it to. This is a concept which breaks the barrier of the business world, when I think about an SM team I think about a sandlot baseball team. It seems that everyone makes decisions and at some point everyone can be the boss, this is why I think that there are so many benefits to a SM team. In a SM team there are benefits which could spark immense creativity, responsibility, and accountability. A SM team has many responsibilities which include setting work schedules, budgeting, making job assignments, developing performance goals, and hiring and selecting team members; this list of task can be modified to basically whatever the team feels that they need to do. To truly understand all of the benefits I believe that one would have to see this type of group looking from the outside in, the freedoms which a group like this has will spark ideas which might have never been mentioned before as we remove certain barriers which the typical employee might encounter.

            Now although I do see plenty of benefits I can also see where the drawbacks of a SM team would stick out like a sore thumb. The important piece to self-managed teams is that everyone in your team needs to know that it is a privilege and they need to understand that they will have more responsibilities. If there are certain members who do not want to comply with this platform things can get ugly very fast. Many times if someone is not motivated because the company is not providing them with an “incentive or advancement opportunities, companies might find trouble within these types of groups” (Brown 2011). We have to remember that working in teams does take a lot more work and employees can quickly be discouraged if it only helps the organization but does little for their career.

            As I am learning about SM teams I actually feel a bit jealous that I have not participated in one of these myself. As an ex-military member I am very accustomed to having a rank structure, this rank structure never seemed to fit my ideal job setting which is why I chose to leave the military. I do believe that I would like to be in a SM team because more than anything I sense that there would be high moral and employees would experience greater satisfaction from their job. If I were in a SM team I would be able to surround my team with people that are a good fit, I would be able to speak my mind, and I would be able to have a say when I have to work. It is as if I would be running my own business and I would be doing something which I have a real passion for. I believe that these are qualities which any employer would like to see out of their employees, a strong team translates into a strong organization.

            Organizations which have strong performances not only turn in high profits but they also attract prestigious awards which can be a great recruiting tool also. Companies with exemplary performance in the past have been known to receive awards like the “Malcom Baldrige National Quality Award”. The “Baldrige award is given to companies by Baldrige examiners which observe achievements and improvements in all seven Baldrige core values and concepts” (nist.gov). These seven concepts consist of leadership, strategic planning, customer and market focus, measurement analysis, human resource focus, and business results. An organization which receives this type of award should feel very proud of all of the work which was dedicated to making their organization one of the best amongst their competitors.

            So since I believe so much in SM teams the goal would one day be to put together my own team so that my organization can also flourish. SM teams are generally put together by “external leaders”, these leaders are the ones responsible for selecting these teams and giving them task. I believe that to be a good external leader you have to be good at just stepping back and let your work speak for itself. As an external leader your work is putting the team together and knowing that they will succeed, knowing who to add to your team is an important part of your job. As an external leader you will have to be someone who can spot talent, take advantage of your resources, and believe in the power of diversity. What an external leader wants is to create an all-star team of people which you know can handle the job. Aside from all of this you need to know that micro management is not good for a SM team, once you set your team free you need to let them work unless there is an emergency and you have to step in.

            If I ever do have my own organization I know that this is the type of team that I would like to have in place and taking my business to the next level. I do believe that there is something special that happens when you take good employees and unleash their full potential. If people are able to implement their own ideas and have some sort of control over the situation I believe that natural leaders will be born and the results will definitely help any organization.

References:

- Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.).    Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.

- Baldrige Performance Excellence Program. (2014, May 14). Retrieved April 19, 2015, from http://www.nist.gov/baldrige/award_recipients/index.cfm

    

Goals and Feedback

On page 321 of your Brown textbook, you will find a passage called Feedback and Goals Improve Performance. Review the section and also search the Hunt Library for 3-5 additional resources on how feedback and goals relate to performance. You don't have to cite all of the resources as some may not relate to your reflection. As you are completing this exercise, refer to A631.3.5.CM.

In a well-written blog, describe your understanding of the importance of feedback and goals to performance. What are your thoughts regarding Brown's contention that there are generational differences in the amount of feedback desired by employees. How much feedback do you generally give and receive? Have you found that for you personally, having specific goals and receiving targeted feedback has led to more engagement, higher performance, or any other benefits (or drawbacks)? What are the implications of your reflection?

            Goals, they are in my opinion what drives many people to keep getting better at what they do. Fortunately for many humans they are never truly satisfied with where they are in life and they continue to strive to create and reach new goals. This is an important human trait which I believe has gotten us to where we are at in today’s technologically advanced society. Of course goals are essential to the success which we have had but it would be much harder to attain goals if we did not get constructive criticism from those which we look up to or the those in-charge of us. Feedback and goals go hand in hand with each other; our society strives off of these two very important factors in the business world and also in our personal life.

            Every time I reflect on my life’s accomplishments and current status I am reminded of how important it is to have goals. For me the discussion of goals and feedback has had a very big influence in my life, ever since I graduated from High school I would find myself asking “how can I improve myself?” This is the mentality that has gotten me to the MSLD program and still to this day has me craving more. Raising a very big family at a very young age has made me push myself to do things that I would have never thought possible, if I could see the person I am today a decade ago I would not recognize the person that I am looking at.

            Making it this far did not come easy, I am reminded of an article which I read called “Using Goal Setting and Feedback to Increase Running Distance (Crawland, K.A)”. My life has not been a short race but more of a marathon which I keep pushing towards to reach the finish line. The Author of this article talked about an experiment which they used for runners to increase their running distance, the key to this experiment was to utilize the power of short term goals and feedback. The runners created short term goals and received extensive feedback which pushed them to reach goals which they thought were unattainable. I can see how this is very similar to my life because when I started my adult life I always thought that many things were unattainable.

            When I started my adult life I was eighteen years old working in a shoe store earning minimum wage, I thought that this would be enough money for now and I would slowly promote my way to the top. After six months I was promoted to assistant manager and received a fifty cents per hour raise, the first thing to come to my mind was “that is all I get after working so hard for six months?” To make matters worse I can recall a moment when I received my new title and my manager looked at me and said “if you keep up the hard work maybe one day you can be just like me”. This comment made me feel sick, at this point I knew that I needed change but I also knew that it would take time. I began to set short term goals like join the military, enroll in college, and take a couple of classes while I am on deployment. My life was finally starting to shape up; because of my short term goals and feedback from many people which mentored me and guided me I became the person I am today.

            Being mentored and accepting feedback was never an issue for me, in the military you learn to take feedback and make the most of it. In our text it states that “fifty percent of older workers do not like taking feedback (Brown, 2011)”; I made it a point to observe these behaviors and commit myself to learning everything I could from people which were much more experienced than me. Without feedback I would not have learned to stop making excuses for myself, learn accountability, and to understand that I have to keep pushing myself.  In the article called “Goals and Feedback: Partners in success (B. Deveau, 2013)” it talk’s about the two important forms of feedback. The author of this article says that “feedback has two forms the things that you are doing well and want to repeat, and what you are doing wrong and want to change (B. Deveau, 2013)”. There were certain people in my life that gave me this type of feedback; these people encouraged me to stay in school no matter how challenging it got, and they led me away from the reckless behavior which I involved myself in when I was just a young man experiencing the world for the first time overseas.

            As I am writing this paper I am quickly realizing that the moral of the story is that no one is perfect; goals pared with good feedback are what will make us as humans and future business leaders much better. In one decade I have gone from living well below the poverty line in the city limits of New York to being able to raise my family in a beautiful suburb outside of Dallas. I know that my work is not done, I have goals which I am still striving for and I am sure that there are new goals left to create. I am proud of what I have done but as I stated before many humans are never satisfied. There is always a new goal to reach so that I can continue to elevate myself far beyond anything which I would have even thought was possible. I can definitely see how goals and feedback do improve performance, it is a good lesson to learn from this week’s reading and knowledge which I can hold on to for a lifetime.

References:

-          Deveau, B. (2013). Goals and feedback:: Partners in success. National Dragster, 54(14), 28. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.libproxy.db.erau.edu/docview/1409285107?accountid=272

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-          Wack, S. R., Crosland, K. A., & Miltenberger, R. G. (2014). USING GOAL SETTING AND FEEDBACK TO INCREASE WEEKLY RUNNING DISTANCE. Journal of Applied Behavior Analysis, 47(1), 181-5. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.libproxy.db.erau.edu/docview/1517530254?accountid=27203

-           Brown, Donald R. (2011, pg. 321). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.).    Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.  

MSLD 631 MODULE 2 BLOG

1. What behaviors seemed to help your team successfully complete its task?

Motivation, organization, team-work, experience, and integrating behaviors all helped my team complete this task in as easy a way as possible. Right off of the bat team one had one of our team members decide that she wanted to take charge this week since she recognized that she would be a lot busier during the end of the term. The rest of the team followed suit by picking weeks to take the lead, this automatically gave us a start so that we all knew our roles and what we have to accomplish throughout the next nine weeks.

A large portion to us knowing that we needed to take the lead on certain weeks can be attributed to the experience that we all have thus far; this is not the first class for any of us so we are very accustomed to working in teams. Experience and team work can make any project very simple when everyone can recognize that we all need each to support each other and we all need to take the lead at some point. These types of actions all correspond with integrating behaviors which are a positive to have when working with teams. We all have a high concern for our self and for others, the integrating style is concerned with problem solving; “it uses openness, sharing of information, and the examination of differences to reach a consensus solution” (Brown, 2011).

2. What factors inhibited decision-making or problem-solving?

When working with long distance teams there are any factors which can inhibit a team. The first concern between all of us is of course the way that we have to communicate, we do not see each other in a classroom on a daily basis. Many people would have considered this a challenge which is hard to overcome but as technology has taken communication to a new level distance teams are not much of a challenge at all.

                In an article by Natalie burg from Forbes magazine she states that “As it turns out, the answer to all of the complaints about the evolving workplace wasn’t to abandon technology for a more human way of working, but to evolve technology to make the new way of working more human”( Forbes).  With this technology which has been provided by Embry Riddle University we have made communicating with our group very easy and personal; all I have to do is log in to my account to see the latest work and message from one of my team mates. 

3. How much time was spent on decision-making and problem-solving?

Surprisingly enough for this assignment I believe that there was minimal time spent on actual decision making. The experience which our team has with working in this environment helps us recognize a task and tackle it with out to much conflict or problem solving. I would say that within the first day we all knew what we had to do and got straight to work.

4. How was information shared among team members?

Information was shared via either the post or on a customized file exchange board where we are able to post all of our latest work for others to review online. I am sure that in the future if necessary we have other platforms which are available such as email and our phones which where all shared through the team charter.

5. How did issues of authority or power affect the team?

It seems as though we have a very compromising team, I did not get a sense of anyone person having a dominating type of personality. This is important because I do not think that we will have any conflicts among our teams. I see that we are all on the same level and are for the most part people that are very easy to work with. I have heard in the past that sometimes teams will need a third party to intervene with issues that may arise in the group; I have had experience with these current team members in the past and I do not see that being an issues as we proceed ahead.  As we have read in our text third parties are used for “ensuring mutual motivation, achieving a balance in situational power, and coordination confrontation efforts” (brown, 2011); I do not see either of these problems being an issue with our team.

6. How did collaboration and competition influence the outcome?

The only type of competition that I could see apparent in my group was who could claim the lead for certain weeks as soon as possible. I do not yet know if people were just anxious to take the lead or perhaps wanting to be the first to grab the weeks which where the easiest to be in charge of. Only time will tell what the outcome will be for the certain weeks which I assigned myself to take the lead on. 

7. Did team members make process interventions?

As a team we did make some process interventions as to what we all expect from each other and some of the ground rules which will be important for the success of our team. I believe that these type of interventions right from the beginning help set a positive atmosphere and one of accountability also. I do feel the need of making process interventions and I think that for the time being we have done so appropriately.

References:

- Brown, Donald R. (2011). An Experiential Approach to Organization Development (8th ed.).    Upper Saddle River, New Jersey: Pearson Education, Inc.  

-Burg, N. (2015, April 4). How Technology Has Changed Workplace Communications. Forbes.