MASTER’S PROGRAM IN BUSINESS ADMINISTRATION
CASE I
A DIAMOND PERSONALITY
Ask Suraj bhai about the dot-com burst and he may grin at you as if to say, ``What burst?’’ Suraj bhai, a 38-year-old entrepreneur, owns an Internet business that sells loose diamonds to various buyers. Business is becoming for Suraj bhai. In 2004, he had sales of INR 3,500 million. Needless to say, Suraj bhai is optimistic about his business venture.
The future wasn’t always to bright for Suraj bhai, however. In 1985, Suraj bhai moved from his native town Suraj, to New Delhi, with little ability to speak English. There, he attended language courses and worked at the local mall to support himself. After graduation, his roommate’s girlfriend suggested that he work at a local jeweler. ``I thought she was crazy. I didn’t know anything about jewelry,’’ says Suraj bhai, who took her advice. Though he worked hard and received his Diamonds and Diamonds Grading certification from the Gemological Institute, he wasn’t satisfied with his progress. ….
in INR 25 million a year. I am not in debt, and the business is breaking ever. I care about the company. I want to keep everything even until we take off, and then it may be another ball game.’’
Questions:
1. What factors do you think attributed to Suraj bhai’s success? Was he merely ``in the right place at the right time’’, or are there characteristics about him that contribute to his success?
2. How do you believe Suraj bhai would score on the Big Five dimensions of personality (extroversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability, openness to experience)? Which ones would he score high on? Which ones might he score low on?
3. Do you believe that Suraj bhai is high or low on core self-evaluations? On what information did you base your decision?
4. What information about Suraj bhai suggests that he has a proactive personality?
CASE II
BULLYING BOSSES
It got to where I was twitching, literally, on the way into work,’’ states Carrie Clark, a 52-year-old retired teacher and administrator. After enduring 10 months of repeated insults and mistreatment from her supervisor, she finally quit her job. ``I had to take care of my health.’’
Though many individuals recall bullies from their elementary school days, some are realizing that bullies can exist in the workplace as well. And these bullies do not just pick on the weakest in the group, rather, any subordinate in their path may fall prey to their torment, according to Dr. Gary Namie, director of the Workplace Bullying and Trauma Institute. Dr. Namie further says workplace bullies are not limited to men-women are at least as likely to be bullies. However, gender discrepancies are found in victims of bullying, as women are more likely to be targets.
What motivates a boss to be a bully? Dr. Harvey Hornstein, a retired professor from Teachers College at Columbia University, suggests that ….
bully’s grip. `stick with the substance, not the process, and often it won’t escalate,’’ he states. Of course, that is easier said than done.
Questions:
1) Of the three types of organizational justice, which one does workplace bullying most closely resemble?
2) What aspects of motivation might workplace bullying reduce? For example, are there likely to be effects on an employee’s self-efficacy? If so, what might those effects be?
3) If you were a victim of workplace bullying, what steps would you take to try to reduce its occurrence? What strategies would be most effective? What strategies might be ineffective? What would you do if one of your colleagues was a victim of an abusive supervisor?
4) What factors do you believe contribute to workplace bullying? Are bullies a product of the situation, or are they flawed personalities? What situations and what personality factors might contribute to the presence of bullies?
CASE III
THANKS FOR NOTHING
Thought it may seem fairly obvious that receiving praise and recognition from one’s company is a motivating experience, sadly many companies are failing miserably when it comes to saying ``thanks’’ to their employees. According to curt Coffman global practice leader at Gallup, 71 percent of U.S. workers are ``disengaged’’, essentially meaning that they could care less about their organization. Coffman states. ``We’re operating at one-quarter of the capacity in terms of managing human capital. It’s alarming.’’ Employee recognition programs, which became more popular as the U.S. economy shifted from industrial to knowledge-based, can be an effective way to motivate employees and make them feel valued. In many cases, however, recognition programs are doing ``more harm than good’’ according to Coffman.
Take Ko, a 50-year-old former employee of a dot-com in California. Her company proudly instituted a rewards program designed to motivate employees. What were the rewards for a job well-done? Employees would receive a badge which read ``U Done Good’’ and, each year, would receive a T-shirt as a means of annual recognition. Once an employee received 10 ``U Done Good’’ badges, he or she could trade them in …
when praising employees for a job well-done, managers need to ensure that the praise is given in conjunction with the specific accomplishment. In this way, employees may not only feel valued by their organization but will also know what actions to take to be rewarded in the future.
Questions
1) If praising employees for doing a good job seems to be a fairly easy and obvious motivational tools, why do you think companies and managers don’t often do it?
2) As a manager, what steps would you take to motivate your employees after observing them perform well?
3) Are there any downsides to giving employees too much verbal praise? What might these downsides be and how could you alleviate them as a manager?
4) As a manager, how would you ensure that recognition given to employees is distributed fairly and justly?
CASE IV
WILL GEORGE W. BUSH BE A GREAT PRESIDENT?
What does it take to be a great U.S. president? A survey of 78 history, political science, and law scholars rated the U.S. presidents from George Washington to Bill Clinton. Here are the presidents who were rated ``Great’’ and ``Near Great.’’
Great
George Washington
Abraham Lincoln
Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR)
Near Great
Thomas Jefferson
Andrew Jackson
James Polk
Theodore Roosevelt
Harry Truman
Dwight Eisenhower
Ronald Reagan
Among recent presidents, Presidents Nixon, Ford, and Carter were ranked ``Below Average’’ and Presidents G. H. W. Bush (the first President Bush) and Clinton were ranked ``Average’’.
So what explains these ratings? The following are some qualities of presidents who have stood the test of time.
1. Great presidents are transformational leaders who engender strong emotions – that is, you either love them or you hate them (it’s hard to hate someone who made little difference). And great presidents enact a vision that may not respond to popular opinion. Lincoln and FDR were beloved, and hated, by millions.
2. Great presidents are bold and take risks, and almost all great presidents emerge successfully from a crisis. A great president is perceived as ``being there’’ when a crisis emerges and taking bold action to lead the nation out of the crisis – for example, Lincoln in the Civil War and Roosevelt in WWII.
3. Great presidents are associated with a vision. Most people, for example, are able to associate the great presidents with defining moment where a clear set of principles was articulated – for example, FDR’s speech ….
of the 2004 election (Bush received 51 percent of the vote and Kerry received 48 percent) suggests that Bush may not have overwhelming support.
Questions
1. How would you rate President George W. Bush on the four characteristics outlined at the beginning of the case? How would you contrast his reaction to Hurricane Katrina with his reaction to the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001? What do you think his handling of these two events says about his leadership?
2. Do you think leaders in other contexts (business’, sports, religious) exhibit the same qualities of great or near-great U.S. presidents?
3. Do you think being in the right place at the right time could influence presidential greatness?
Case V
A UNIQUE TRAINING PROGRAM AT UPS
Mark Colvard, a United Parcel manager in San Ramon, California, recently faced a difficult decision. One of his drivers asked for 2 weeks off to help an ailing family member. But company rules said this driver wasn’t eligible. If Colvard went by the book, the driver would probably take the days off anyway and be fired. On the other hand, Colvard was likely to be criticized by other drivers if he bent the rules. Colvard chose to give the driver the time off. Although he took some heat for the decision, he also kept a valuable employee.
Had Colvard been faced with this decision 6 months earlier, he says he would have gone the other way. What changed his thinking was a month he spent living in McAllen, Texas. It was part of a UPS management training experience called the Community Internship Program (CIP). During his month in McAllen, Colvard built housing for the poor, collected clothing for the Salvation Army, and worked in a drug rehab center. Colvard gives the program credit for helping him empathize with employees facing cries back home. And he says that CIP has made him a better manager. ``My goal was to make the numbers, and in some cases that meant not looking at the individual but looking the bottom line. After that 1-month stay, I immediately started reaching out to people in a different way.’’
CIP was established by UPS in the late 1960s to help open the eyes of the company’s predominantly white managers to the poverty and inequality in many cities. Today, the program takes 50 of the company’s most promising executives each summer and brings them to cities around the country. There they deal with a variety of problems- from transportation to housing, education, and health care. The company’s goal is to awaken these managers to the challenges that many of their employees face, bridging the cultural divide that separates a white manager from an African American driver or an upper-income suburbanite from a worker raised in the rural South.
Questions
1. Do you think individuals can learn empathy from something like a 1-month CIP experience? Explain why or why not.
2. How could UPS’s CIP help the organization better manage work-life conflicts?
3. How could UPS’s CIP help the organization improve its response to diversity?
4. What negatives, if any, can you envision resulting from CIP?
5. UPS has 2,400 managers. CIP includes only 50 each year. How can the program make a difference if it includes only 2 percent of all managers? Does this suggest that the program is more public relations than management training?
6. How can UPS justify the cost of a program like CIP if competitors like FedEx, DHL, and the U.S. Postal Service don’t offer such programs? Does the program increase costs or reduce UPS profits?
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