Agenda for Session

1
Agenda for Session 3

• Review chapter concepts
• How are these concepts relevant to your role as a
  manager?
• Review case attack sheets and guidelines for
  reports
• University Art Museum -- what are the issues?
  What should the Dean do now?
• Next session In basket exercise, bring course
  package

2
Goals

• Two broad categories of goals?
• Official and Operative goals
• Whats the difference?
• Official goals (Mission)--legitimacy
• Operative goals --employee motivation, measures
  of performance, decision making
• 6 types Overall Performance, Productivity,
  Resource, Employee Development,Market, Innovation

3
Goals

• As a manager, which operative goals would you
  like to have your performance measured against?
  Why?
• Overall performance
• Resources
• Market
• Employee development
• Innovation
• Productivity

4
SBE Mission

• The School of Business and Economics develops
  leaders with skills in management and economics
  for a rapidly changing and complex global
  environment. I t seeks to advance knowledge and
  practice in these areas by supporting both
  theoretical and applied research. Further, the
  School strives to serve business and its
  community by fostering mutually beneficial
  alliances with leaders at the local, national and
  international levels.

5
Role of Top Management

• According to Daft, what is the role of top
  management in the strategic planning process?
• Scan the external environment for
  opportunities/threats
• Know and monitor the organizational environment
  for strengths/limitations to work with the former
  and work around or correct the latter
• Set official and operative goals, develop
  strategy
• Refer to Exhibit 2.1, p. 26 in Daft
• Should the CEO be solely responsible for this?

6
Porters 3 Competitive Strategies
Low Cost Leadership Differentiation Focus
7
Porters Competitive Strategies

• What are examples of organizations which exhibit
  these competitive approaches?
• In the computer industry, coffee and food
  retailing, grocery stores, clothing and sporting
  goods?

8
Strategic Orientation

• If you cannot clearly link organizations
  strategy to one of Porters 3 generic strategies,
  then frame your analysis in terms of strategic
  orientation
• Examples -- close to the customer, fast
  response time, clear business focus
  ...others??

9
Models of Organizational Effectiveness

• System Resource Approach
• Internal Process Approach
• Goal Approach
• Stakeholder Approach
• What would be good measures of effectiveness for
  Wilfrid Laurier University using each of these
  approaches?

10
Goals and Your Performance Evaluation
Put yourself in the role of a senior manager.
Considering the various goals and measures of
effectiveness discussed, which ones would you
be Most comfortable being evaluated on?
Why? Least comfortable? Why?
11
The Dilemma of the Warm Fuzzies
Warm -- corporate ideals that few managers
could take exception to Fuzzy -- because they
are so difficult to measure and managers are
uncomfortable having their own performance
evaluated against them Source Blenkorn, D.,
Gabor, B. (1995). The use of warm fuzzies to
assess organizational effectiveness. Journal of
General Management, 21(2), 40-51.
12
Richard Branson

• What is the role of Richard Branson and other
  members of the management team of Virgin Group in
  setting direction for the organization?
• What is Virgin Groups competitive strategy?
• What structural and contextual dimensions does
  Virgin Group exhibit?

13
Case Attack Sheets

• Use to stimulate thinking about cases

14
University Art Museum

• Statement of the Problem
• Analysis of the Causes of the Problems
• Decision Criteria and Alternate Solutions
• Recommended Solution, Justification, and
  Implementation

15
Statement of the Problem

• The immediate problem confronting the Dean and
  his team is the need to choose a new Museum
  Director, but the basic problem is that we lack a
  clear vision for the museum
• Symptoms of the lack of vision include the
  absence of any official or operative goals or
  organizational structure
• The Dean must decide on a process for developing
  a Mission, operative goals, competitive strategy,
  and organizational design for the University Art
  Museum

16
Analysis of the Causes

• The root cause of the problem is the lack of
  strategic leadership of the University Art
  Museum.
• There is no evidence of anyone guiding the Museum
  or its Director
• Miss Kirkhoff suggested on her retirement that
  what was required was careful thinking
  regarding its direction, its basis of support,
  and its future relationship with the university.
• The elder statesman of the faculty suggests no
  one has taken responsibility for the mission,
  the direction, and the objectives

17
Decision Criteria

• A process which includes relevant stakeholders in
  the creation of the Mission, operative goals, and
  organizational design
• A clear Mission, goals, and structure for the
  University Art Museum
• Clarity regarding the roles and responsibilities
  of the Dean and the Museum Director
• Timely resolution of the issues surrounding the
  Art Museum

18
Alternate Solutions

• The Dean should assume a leadership role and
  devise a process that represents stakeholders and
  will lead to clarity regarding the Direction of
  the Museum and the skills and qualifications of a
  new Director. The Dean will want to get the
  Committee to step back and design a good,
  representative process. This will help us to
  achieve all the criteria, although there is a
  danger of this becoming a long drawn out
  discussion because the committee is not composed
  of relevant stakeholders.

19
Alternate Solutions

• The Dean could assume a directive leadership role
  rather than a facilitative role in devising a new
  process. The Dean simply designs a good process
  which he then recommends to the faculty council
  meeting a month from now. This committee is very
  badly structured and contains strong-willed,
  potentially uncompromising, members.
• The Dean could lead the committee through a long,
  meandering debate which produces a list of
  disjointed recommendations. (which they appear
  to be doing)

20
Recommended Solution and Justification

• The Dean should assume a facilitative leadership
  role and guide this committee in outlining a
  process for creating the Mission, goals and
  design of the Art Museum
• The Dean should take this to Faculty Council in 1
  month for approval
• Council then strikes a representative committee
  of stakeholders to devise direction for the
  Museum and recruits a Director within 2 months

21
Downside Risk and Contingency Plan

• The Dean may have to assume a more directive
  leadership role if this fractious,
  unrepresentative committee cannot devise a good
  process for moving forward before the next
  Faculty Council meeting. If this occurs, the
  Dean will develop such a plan himself and take ti
  to the Council meeting with a recommendation for
  approval.

22
The Work of Leadership

• companies today face adaptive challenges change
  in society, markets, customers, competition and
  technology
• mobilizing an organization to adapt its behaviour
  in order to thrive is critical
• in order to make change happen, leaders have to
  break a long standing pattern of their own,
  providing solutions to others
• responsibility for problem solving must shift to
  the people in the organization

23
The Work of Leadership

• adaptive change is distressing because people
  need to take on new roles, values and
  relationships
• instead of providing answers, leaders must ask
  tough questions, let people feel the pinch of
  reality, challenge the way we do business
• Principles for leading adaptive work
• Get on the Balcony
• Bobby Orr was great because he played hard while
  keeping the whole game situation in mind, as if
  he stood on a balcony above the field of play

24
The Work of Leadership

• business leaders have to be able to view the
  larger patterns of play as if they were on the
  balcony
• they should give employees a strong sense of
  history, as well as an idea of the market forces
  at work today
• Identify the Adaptive Challenge
• Colin Marshall, CEO of British Airways,
  recognized the need to transform an airline
  nicknamed Bloody Awful into an exemplar of
  customer service
• the essential adaptive challenge was creating
  trust throughout the organization

25
The Work of Leadership

• Marshall and his team held up a mirror to
  themselves recognizing that they embodied the
  adaptive challenge facing British Airways
• Regulate Distress
• leaders must realize that people can learn only
  so fast
• because leaders must strike a balance between
  having people feel the need for change and having
  them feel overwhelmed, leadership is a razors
  edge
• a leader protects people by managing the rate of
  change

26
The Work of Leadership

• Maintain Disciplined Attention
• a leader must get employees to confront tough
  trade-offs in values, procedures and power
• get people on the executive team to listen and
  learn from one another
• get conflict out in the open and use it as a
  source of creativity
• when sterile conflict replaces dialogue, the
  leader steps in and puts the team to work on
  reframing issues

27
The Work of Leadership

• Give the Work Back to the People
• encourage responsibility by trusting others and
  decentralizing authority
• a leader has to let people bear the weight of
  responsibility
• the key is to let people discover the problem
• the leaders most important role is to instill
  confidence in people
• they must dare to take risks and responsibility
• back them up if they make mistakes

28
The Work of Leadership

• Protect the Voices of Leadership From Below
• giving a voice to all people is the foundation of
  an organization that is willing to experiment and
  learn
• whistle blowers and creative deviants get smashed
  and silenced in organizational life
• leaders must rely on and protect those who raise
  questions that indicate an impending adaptive
  challenge
• Ronald Heifetz and Donald Laurie, HBR, 1997