Exam 1 Prep

Learning objectives for chapter 1 1. Relationship b/w management skills and company success. Managers ability is 3 times as powerful in explaining company profitablility. Management weakness is a primary cause of poor company performance 2. Skills employers value in college students: - communication, problem solving, human relations over GPA and School 3. Success in school and success in business School is on and individual level and does not involve communication and team building. 4. 5 Causes of the knowing-doing gap - Knowledge management efforts mostly emphasize technology and the transfer of codified information. DOES NOT address the issue of HOW information can be used to make better decisions - Knowledge management tends to treat knowledge as a tangible thing, as a stock or quantity, and therefore separates knowledge as a thing from the use of that thing. DOES NOT address how knowledge will be used? just states it is obtained. - Formal systems can?t easily store or transfer tacit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is gained through experience and cannot be captured or measured. - The people responsible for transferring and implementing knowledge management frequently do not understand the actual work being documented. Designers of formal knowledge management systems DO NOT comprehend the key underlying business processes, and in turn, cannot build a system off them. -Knowledge management tends to focus on specific practices and ignore the importance of philosophy. Philosophy provides the framework for thinking about and implementing strategies. 5. 8 recommendations to bridge the knowing-doing gap. 1. Why before how: philosophy is important. 2. Knowing comes from doing and teaching others how. 3.Action comes before elegant plans and concepts. Focus on the bottom line? not elaborate things that cannot be implemented. 4. There is no doing without mistakes. You learn from your mistakes. 5. Fear fosters knowing-doing gaps. Fear prevents people from doing what they know they should do in organizations. 6. Beware of false analogies: Fight the competition, not each other. No need for reward systems and internal competition. Promote cooperation. 7. Measure what matters and what can help turn knowledge into action. Focus on a few critical measures of success for your organization. Watch them and improve them. 8. it matters what leaders do, how they spend their time, and how they allocate resources. 6. Effective action planning. Process must be systematic and actively managed. Clear understanding of objectives. Layer your approach? each employee involved should know what action steps they need to take. Ongoing systematic evaluation is important. Learning objectives for chapter 6 ETHICS. 1. Relationship between ethics and firm performance. Strong relationship. Consumers buy from firms with high ethical standards. 2. Whistleblowers Individuals who report to the press, government, or other parties outside the firm that illegal activity occurring in a firm. 3. Seven guidelines for ethical behavior. 1. Be honest, direct and open in your dealings with others. Competence, inspiring, forward looking, and honesty are all ingredients of positive ethical behavior. 2. Take ethical stands on difficult issues. The superior man understands what is right. 3.ask whether your actions reflect the rights of others, including such rights as due process, free speech, and privacy. 4. As if your actions are just. Equal treatment of individuals. 5. Ask how you would feel if the act was done to you. 6. Use your power in ethical ways. 7. Apply the sunlight test. How would you feel if your actions were brought to the light of day? 4. Nine guidelines for encouraging ethical behavior in others. 1. Promote, communicate and reward ethical behavior as a key value. 2. Model ethical behavior. Don?t be a hypocrite. 3. Speak out against unethical behavior when you see it. Behavior will continue. 4. Communicate expectations regarding ethical behavior. CODE OF ETHICS. 5. Make sure goals don?t push employees into unethical behavior. Lying, cheating, and stealing can often occur if goals aren?t reasonable. 6. Encourage ethics training. Make sure employees know laws, policies, expectations regarding ethical behavior. 7. Give employees ways to voice their ethical questions and concerns. Ethics hotlines. 8. Set up internal programs to resolve ethical conflicts. Clear routines for dealing. 9. Create a culture of ethics. Have strong ethical values with an emphasis on honest and openness. Learning objectives for CHAPTER 11 MANAGING TEAMS 3 basic teams in organizations. Functional Team ? also called a command team or vertical team, consists of a supervisor and his or her subordinates in the chain of command. Cross-Functional Team ? is made up of members from different functional departments in the organization. Such teams are formed to monitor , standardize, and improve work processes that cut across different parts of the organization. Self-Managing teams ? is able to make key decisions about how its work is done. Members learn all tasks and rotate from job to job. Advantages and disadvantages of teams. Provide many perspectives and increases acceptance and understanding of teams. Participation is empowering and working in teams is stimulates us to greater performance. Can have dominant or stubborn members, often focus on personal goals, may rely on other to carry the load. Optimal size for a team ? Five to seven members. 3 Types of team Roles. Task oriented roles ? needed to get the job done. Relation oriented roles ? are needed to keep the team healthy and its members satisfied. Keep the group harmonious. Self oriented roles ? are role the member adopts for personal gain. Often hamper team performance and cohesiveness. Identify and describe the five guidelines that managers can use to increase team productivity through the effective management of team roles. Encourage and reward members who adopt positive roles Recognize that both task-oriented and relations-oriented roles are critical to team performance. Identify and discourage negative team roles. Understand the roles you must play as team leader and those you need not play. Do all you can to minimize role ambiguity and conflict. Nine guidelines for dealing with problem behaviors. Choose team members carefully Offer training Provide clear goals Define member responsibilities clearly Use peer evaluations Reward superior performance Don?t let social considerations overwhelm concern with that task. Appeal to the ?Shadow of the future? you will be working again. Remove problem members Seven strategies for effective structure in team meetings. Distribute an agenda to all members Review progress to date and establish task of meeting Get a report from each member with a preassigned task. Ensure fair participation. Summarize what was accomplished at the end Make public and clear each member?s assignment for the next meeting. Self managing work teams? why? Self managing work teams are crucial because they decentralize the decision making and are more agile than non self managing companies. Individuals can use their personal creative and intellectual strengths to help the company. Seven leader roles in self managing Becoming a self leader ? leader must develop behavior and cognitive self management skills. Modeling self leadership ? others learn from a model Encourage self set goals ? goal setting is critical in effective motivation Creating positive thought patterns ? allows employees to get rid or their doubts and fears Developing self leadership through reward and constructive reprimand. Promoting self leadership through teamwork ? learn self leadership from regular and varied team meetings. Facilitating a self leadership culture ? develop a pervasive, integrated organizational culture. Five way to gain acceptance of new techniques Just do it. Take charge and announce you?re going to handle the meeting differently today. Explain why you?re going to do something different. Point out that these are widely used, effective techniques Treat this as a skill-building experience for both yourself and colleages Point out that mastering more group tools adds further to a teams resources. Learning Objectives for APPENDIX A STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT Name the 6 Environmental domains and give one example of each. Economic Domain ? interest rates, trade deficits, inflation rates, are factors that influence the ability of managers to get resources needed to produce goods and services Political Domain ? laws and regulations passed by governmental domains. Social Domain ? societal values, attitudes, norms, customs, and graphics. Technological Domain ? the application of knowledge to the production and distribution of goods and services. Competitive Domain ? Monopoly, Oligopoly, Monopolistic Competition. Physical Domain ? Weather conditions affect activities in a firm. Four approaches to organizational effectiveness. Internal Process Assessment ? organizational health such as employee satisfaction, levels of conflict, coordination of departments. Unhealthy organizations cannot be called effective regardless of profitability. Systems Resource Assessment ? considers whether an organization is able to acquire the resources it needs to survive and prosper. Funding/Materials Strategic Constituencies assessment ? looks at groups inside or outside the organizations that have a take in it such as customers, stockholders, creditors. Goal Assessment ? Whether an organization is reaching its growth, sales, profitability or other goals management has set. SWOT analysis and its role in Strategic Management Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities, Threats. Permits managers to develop a strategic profile of the organization and assumes an org will achieve success by increasing strengths and opportunities and lessening the weaknesses and threats. Three types of Grand Strategies. Growth Strategy ? Focus on growth and gaining external opportunities. Dangerous because firms may fail to pay attention to efficiency and needs. Stability Strategy ? Protect the existing market share of the firm from external threats. Increase the internal strengths within a firm. Retrenchment Strategy ? Declining performance due to internal weaknesses and external threats. Cut back hiring, lay offs, reduced salaries. BCG Portfolio Matrix Star ? a business unit that has both a high market growth rate and a relatively large share of the market. Need quick cash, increase sales, and generates large amounts of profit in future. Cash Cow ? large share of market with little growth. Amounts of surplus cash are milked from cash cow and channeled into stars. Question Marks ? rapidly growing market but have a small market share. Decide whether to invest more or divest it. Very risky. Dog ? poor performer because of little growth in market and small market share. Sell unit or liquidate assets? cash drain. GE Matrix Industry attractiveness ? market size, market growth rate, seasonality, types of competitors, technical complexity. Business Strength - Profit margins, market share, quality of management, manufacturing technology. Based on where the business unit is located, one of three basic strategies is recommended. Investment growth. Selective Investment Divestment Four types of Organizations based off of the adaptation model Defenders ? when management seeks or creates an environment that is stable. Managers will emphasize protecting the market share gained. Prospectors ? Seeks or creates an unstable environment in the form of rapid change and high growth in the market. Exploit opportunities. Analyzers ? adapting solutions from both defenders and prospector strategies to the three problems. Consistence is maintained by identifying two areas of activity for the organization. Reactor ? One that has suffered strategic failure. Three types of competitive strategies Overall Cost Leadership ? requires management to formulate and implement a strategic plan that will lead to construction of efficient facilities; attainment of cost reductions; tight cost and overhead control. Ideally have a high market share, access to raw materials, wide line of related products, service to all major customers. Differentiation ? product is unique in relation to other products produced in the industry. Strong marketing. High market share is sacrificed, superior product. Focus ? pursues either strategy above by focusing on a narrow customer group, product line, or geographic market. Provides products to a niche. *Ombudsman ? an old norse term for people?s representative? is a neutral third party designated by the firm to check out and help resolve employee complaints. *Whistleblowers ? An employee who goes outside of a firm to report unethical activity. *Social Presence effects ? When we work in the presence of others, our adrenaline levels increase, stimulating us to greater performance. *Social Loafing ? Members who rely on others to carry the load. *Risky Shift Phenomenon ? groups tend to make riskier decisions than individuals. *Polarization ? The tendency of groups to make initial group tendencies more extreme. *Role ambiguity ? when team members don?t know what?s expected of them *Role overload ? when role expectations are simply overwhelming. *Role Stress ? causes dissatisfaction, absenteeism, turnover, poor performance,illnesses.