leading and managing people

SOUTHERN CROSS UNIVERSITY Southern Cross Business School

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Unit Name:	Leading and Managing People
Unit Code:	MNG03217
Student Name:
Student ID:
Local Tutor’s name:	Dr Brian Morris
Assignment No.:	2
Assignment Title:	Final Compilation
Due date:	31/07/2015
Date submitted:	31/07/2015

Declaration:

By including this form as part of the assignment document, it is declared that each member of the team has read and understood the Rules Relating to Awards ( Rule 3 Section 18 – Academic Misconduct Including Plagiarism ) as contained in the SCU Policy Library. Each member understands the penalties that apply for plagiarism and agree to be bound by these rules. The work the team is submitting electronically is entirely the work of members of the team.

Assignment 2: Part 1 (Chapter 10 - Leadership 2.0: Virtual Leadership)

.How would you lead this team of international employees and friends?

Through the adaption of principles of project management - in order to be able to establish a leadership role amongst the group it is first necessary to outline the mission/vision that is aimed to be achieved from the creation of the group. From this point, it is then ideal to establish and delegate tasks and role (i.e. as leader, I would establish myself as project manager) so everyone is clear of what they are responsible for and what is expected of them.

2. Is building “community” important in a virtual world? If so, what would you do to promote a sense of community among these team members?

In order to promote a sense of community among team members I would take the time to get to know each member of my team on a more personal level (i.e. their interests, motivations, what they aim to get out of working in the group) and advise that I am here for support and questions via mobile, Skype etc. as well as designating regular monthly times to undertake team meetings online and introduce everyone to each other as an icebreaker and face to face meetings where possible.

Response

Lynette, I certainly agree with you that communication is key, and certainly in your response to the first question that providing communication channels is vital when leading a team.

One of the very successful factors that I have witnessed as being part of a team is clear communication of the team goal and communication of individual responsibilities within the team in ensuring the goal is successfully achieved. We can certainly provide communication channels to promote team collaboration and in my experience I have witnessed the importance of a team first understanding and sharing a clear common goal to form the basis of these creative conversations to form from.

I also agree with your response to the second question. As a team member, trust, clear expectations and mutual respect are high values to me and I have witnessed success within many teams due to having these values. From your post, the leadership values you have presented are those of a leader I would agree with and support following.

There are certainly many virtual communication tools that you have also mentioned are available to this particular team. In my response I made mention of the success a discussion board would have in sharing the team’s ideas/problems/successes, especially considering the differing time zones of team members. Much like this discussion board we are using to share thoughts on Leadership.

Assignment 2: Part 2 (Chapter 3 - Leadership in a Global and Multicultural Society)

1: What challenges would you anticipate in creating a shared vision for this changed organization?

I suggest that there are mainly two challenges for the following. Firstly, conservatives who satisfy in the present condition will make a stand against a new vision. The new vision will be created by considering new four different countries’ perspectives and involve the condition of being inconvenient for these conservatives. Secondly, employees in new four countries will not convince the vision. To grater or less extent, my personal tendency of specific norms, behaviors or expectations will affect the new vision. Moreover, I have less understanding of the four countries’ those tendency than that of people in countries who have already joined us.

Q2: What internal and external environmental factors should you consider in carving out a multicultural leadership path that will support the success of your organization?

I should consider national culture, government policies, economic conditions, and standard of governance each countries as external factors. These factors must influence national cultural dimensions and a role of multicultural leadership is integrating or coordinating these cultural dimensions. While, it is significant to consider internal factors such as existing corporate policies and procedures. Personal attribute of employees is also internal factors which I should consider. Multicultural leadership should accept new cultural dimensions based on corporate culture which is built by these factors. Otherwise, the organization may lose its goal which they should achieve. I believe that an effective multicultural leadership path should be established that based on the respect of both national cultural dimensions and corporate culture.

Q3: How might you need to work differently to cultivate the organizational support within the different business units that is necessary to ensure the success of your multicultural leadership effort?

There are four steps to develop the effective organizational support as a multicultural leader. To begin with, it is necessary to improve my understanding for the cultural influences and biases of the organization. And then, I should support others to establish their own view of the multicultural environment. It helps multicultural leadership by sharing the vision and environment of the organization with others. Thirdly, these diversity efforts should be assessed systematically because the degree of cultural maturation is mostly invisible although a little part of them are clearly observed. At last, I should analyze and use the data to be an effective multicultural leader who has significant knowledge and skills of the organization’s diversity efforts and supporting these efforts.

Response

I agree with Michelle Moffat, it is a huge challenge to provide virtual leadership to a virtual organization because face to face interaction and communication is missing. Not only that but leadership has to be provided for people with variety of cultures, norms, way life, language, customs etc. The important thing is to bring everyone under the same page. Workout ways to suit the organization the best method of communication so that everyone can interact through the communication framework, there will be some setbacks. Training of staff is essential because by training employees, you are actually naturing them to do the right things, especially to those staff who are not familiar with the organizational work processes and procedures. Teaching the staff about how one should conduct himsef or herself at the work place is essential, especially if you are working remotely and how to attend to work and do what he or she is assigned to accomplish will strengthen the organizational workforce. Since employees are drawn globally, it is wise to understand other people's cultures and values as their values and cultures are brought into the organization and if this issues are not looked at, it might affect the organization. Try to promote team spirit amonst the workers and if the team spirit is strong, the culture of the organization will also be strong and perfomance output of organization will be good.

Assignment 2: Part 3 (Chapter 6 - Psychology II: Motivation and Communication)

What should she do?

When planning this meeting, it is important for Carol to recognise that each person in her team have different skills to offer. While one person may be interested in managing an area of “SpringFest” the skills that this person have may not necessarily coincide with what they are after. I think Carol should take time before the meeting to talk to each individual and see what SKILLS they can bring and place them in a suitable role, perhaps letting them have an input into any relevant hobbies to “SpringFest”. At the actual meeting she should then delegate tasks to individuals and nurture open communication between any groupings of individuals as they share ideas.

Does each person need to be motivated and communicated with differently? Can this be done in a small team? How about a large team?

Each person is an individual, we aren’t robots, with different needs and different ways in which each person encodes and decodes communication. Each person also has different motivations to succeed, both in studies, life and relationships. In this particular scenario Carol needs to be dynamic in her motivational approach and possibly employ many strategies to motivate each individual. Carol, just as an example, would need to show empathy in relation to Tom to gain an understanding as to whether his output has slowed because he did not get the chairperson’s position. Employing different communication and motivation strategies can work in both small and large groups, and the more people that are in a group the greater the variance of motivation and communication styles that are in place.

If you were a member of this group, what type of communication and/or motivational approach by Carol would be most likely to result in your working at your highest level?

If I was a member of this group I would appreciate if she approached me individually in an informal environment beforehand, so I can express my ideas to her without the ‘noise’ of other people. To me, this would show a great amount of professionalism (something which I look for in a leader) and she can incorporate my ideas into the meeting. I would be happy with this arrangement, as I am the type of person that does not really like recognition.

In terms of motivation a lot of positive reinforcement would motivate me to perform my duties within the group. I also like a challenge and strive to challenge myself every day. It would be detrimental to me, and the group, for me to be given tasks that I would consider to be remedial and repetitive.

Response

Robert I agree with you, similar to my approach I felt that Carol needed to meet with the team one on one first before holding a team meeting. Spending time with each of them individually she could ask them about their preferred communication style, how often they needed to meet and how a one on one meeting could work effectively for each of them. She could also gain an understanding into their skills, areas of interest and gauge their current levels of motivation. Carol could also ask questions around what would make them feel more engaged in the process and what motivates them.

I also agreed with you with regards to motivating and communicating differently in small teams and large teams. I think it is imperative for a leader to be able to alter their communication style in order to meet the demands of the specific situation. In certain situations certain types of communication strategies can be more effective than others. I believe in small and large groups your communication strategy needs to meet the collective group rather than the individual. You can always follow up with the individual post a group session tailoring the communication style to meet their needs.