Paper 26 - No Plagiarism - URGENT

IS YOUR TEAM UP TO THE JOB?

Regardless of whether you are the head of a nursery or of a national sports team, or whether you want to set up a company or a fund-raising

committee, you will be asking yourself the same questions: Do I have the right people for this project? Do our skills correspond to our goals? Are

we capable of doing what we want to do?

This team model will help you to judge your team. Begin by defining the skills, expertise and resources that you think are important for carrying out

the project. Note the skills that are absolutely necessary for the job. Distinguish between soft skills (e.g. loyalty, motivation, reliability) and hard skills

(e.g. computer, business and foreign-language abilities). For each skill, define where your critical boundary lies on a scale of zero to ten. For

example, an acceptable level of fluency in French might be five. Now judge your ‘players’ according to these criteria. Connect the points with a line.

What are the team’s weaknesses, and what are their strengths?

Even more revealing than the model itself is the subsequent self-evaluation by the team members. A good team is one that can correctly judge its

own capabilities.

Beware! Real strength lies in differences, not in similarities.

The best executive is the one who has sense enough to pick good men to do what he wants done, and self-restraint enough to keep from meddling

with them while they do it. Theodore Roosevelt

(Based on England’s 2010 World Cup performance.) Create new criteria that apply to your team’s objective and evaluate each team member

against them. Afterwards, ask the team members to evaluate themselves. How do the curves compare?

THE GAP-IN-THE-MARKET MODEL

HOW TO RECOGNISE A BANKABLE IDEA

The goal of every new business is to discover and occupy a gap in the market. But what is the best way of proceeding? The gap-in-the-market

model helps by depicting a market in a clear, three-dimensional way. Draw three axes that measure the development of your market, your

customers and your future products.

Say that you want to launch a new magazine. Then:

• The x-axis is Cost-effectiveness – how economical is your product?

• The y-axis is Prestige – how well-known is the product?

• The z-axis is Awareness – how ‘loud’ is your product?

Position your competitors’ products on the graph. In areas that are dense with competitors, you should enter the market with your business model

only if it has the potential to be a ‘category killer’. For example, Grazia was able to conquer the already crowded women’s weekly market by combining sophisticated fashion news with strictly A-list gossip. Look for a niche, an area that has been overlooked and that is not yet occupied.

Beware! If an area is completely empty, you should check whether there is a demand there at all.

Positioning is like drilling for oil. Close is not good enough.

This model helps you to identify gaps in the market: position your competitors according to the three axes (e.g. prestige, cost-effectiveness,

awareness). Where is there a niche?

THE HERSEY–BLANCHARD MODEL (SITUATIONAL LEADERSHIP)

HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY MANAGE YOUR EMPLOYEES

Over the last hundred years, organisational theory has taken many different turns. Man is a machine and should be treated as such (Taylor, Ford).

Paying attention to social factors, and not objectively regulated working conditions, leads to the best results (Hawthorne). Organisations can

regulate themselves (Clark, Farley). And strategic management, i.e. the division of organisations into primary and secondary activities, leads to

success (Porter).

A rather different theory was put forward by Paul Hersey and Ken Blanchard, who suggested that the most important thing is to adapt one’s style of

leadership to the situation at hand. This ‘situational leadership model’ distinguishes between:

1. Instructing. When they are starting a job, employees need strong leadership. When they are new their level of commitment is usually high, but

their level of expertise is still low. Employees are given orders and instructions.

2 . Coaching. The employees’ level of expertise has risen. Because of stress and the loss of the initial euphoria at starting a new job, their

motivation and commitment levels have fallen. The employees are asked questions, and they look for the answers themselves.

3. Supporting. The level of expertise has risen sharply. The level of motivation can vary: either it has gone down (employees may resign) or it

has gone up as a result of being given more independence (employees are encouraged to come up with their own ideas).

4. Delegating. Employees are fully in control of their work. The level of motivation is high. They are given their own projects and lead their own

teams.

Lead your employees in such a way that you yourself become superfluous. And lead your employees to be successful, so that one day they will be

in a leadership position themselves.