A631.5.4.RB_FogartyShawn

            The most notable and successful organizational transformation I recall is that of Apple Inc. while under the leadership of Steve Jobs. The first computer I ever used was the Apple IIe with its 5.25” floppy drive and monochromatic monitor. The Apple IIe was also the only Apple computer I had used until I recently purchased a new Macbook Pro. This was largely due to the explosion of PC’s and the Microsoft windows operating systems throughout the late 20^th and early 21^st century. Apple was all but lost until Steve Jobs orchestrated an unimaginable system-wide change. He is credited with leading visionary system-wide change and steering Apple Inc. away from the gutter. Included within the change program was Job’s vision to establish Apple University, a professional development program that offers courses in leadership and management to educate employees in the company's culture, history, and values (Dilger, 2011). This is only a small slice of the pie in contrast to the overall program but an important one nonetheless.

            Organizations must evolve over time to remain competitive and adjust to changes within the external environment. The qualities and attributes of leaders can vary however they must incorporate the ability to establish and maintain relationships, foster teamwork, exhibit emotional intelligence. Most importantly, leaders must guide and refine the organizations culture. Steve Jobs vision including the establishment of Apple University works to codify and preserve the culture Jobs established at Apple (Dilger, 2011). An astute example of leadership about system-wide change programs. It is important to not only develop and implement change, but also keep the ball rolling long afterwards.

            Shifting focus to a much small organization, I reflect on my units failed attempt to transform into a learning organization. Historically, military aviation units are Type-A centric with ambitious, extremely organized, highly detailed and exceedingly status oriented individuals. The downfall to this mentality is everyone is afraid to make mistakes, let alone share or learn from them. The premise of transitioning to a learning organization was to capitalize on shared information across the organization. A learning organization would also foster a non-judgmental environment without barriers that permitted collaboration and cooperation (Brown, 2011, P. 277). The concept was ideal but poor leadership stifled the process.

            Two years ago, our former unit commander attempted to tear down the walls. He organized several meetings to clear the air, share stories, and utilize personal examples where he came up short. He offered opportunities for non-punitive information sharing at these meetings so people could learn from other’s stories. People held reservations about the program initially. They viewed it as a way for leaders to get dirt on their subordinates. However, despite initial reservation the system-wide change made progress. People would share stories and the rigid Type-A mentality had started to dissolve. The leadership behind this change program was supportive; they maintained a non-judgmental relationship and collaboration was allowed to develop.

            Sadly, the organization was challenged as an accident resulting in the loss of a life transpired. The leadership was perplexed and rather than incorporating this accident into the change-program our commander resorted to traditional ways. He isolated elements of his command team to protect them and himself from punitive or administrative reprimand. This one action destroyed the entire transition towards a learning organization. All the progress was otherwise thwarted. The leadership failed to maintain their commitment to the critical elements that support a learning organization. While the investigation was underway, the parties involved were alienated and were considered by leadership to be guilty until proven innocent. I recall the next meeting following the accident as a bitterly cold environment, a cattle prod would not energize anyone to talk or share. The attempt of a system-wide transition to a learning organization had failed.

References

Brown, D. R. (2011). High-Performing Systems and Learning Organization. In An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed., pp. 373-397). Boston, MA: Prentice Hall.

Dilger, D. E. (2011, October 6). Apple University revealed as plan to teach executives to think like Steve Jobs. AppleInsider. Retrieved from http://appleinsider.com/articles/11/10/06/apple_university_revealed_as_plan_to_teach_executives_to_think_like_steve_jobs

A631.4.4.RB_FogartyShawn

There has been a growing trend for companies to operate in a flatter, more horizontal profile in self-managed teams. This design offers several major benefits such as autonomous groups working independently while collectively achieving the organizations goals. There is an opportunity for Increased performance leading to incentives and rewards based on the team and individual performance. There is an increase in responsibilities shared by the team and team member often retain a higher job satisfaction from task identity and task significance (Brown, 2011, p. 349-352).

There are also several drawbacks of self-managed teams whereas individual privacy and independence is lost as information of all type is openly shared amongst the group. Individual are in constant interaction with team members and team have a high demand to cross train and understand multi-faceted position. Also, research has not conclusive found that self-managed teams work in long-run operations (Brown, 2011, p. 350-352).

I have but do not prefer to work within self-managed teams. I would much rather work within a high-performance team that tailored to a specified time window or specific task or objective. While I admire the benefits of offered by self-managed teams I would go nuts never being able to get away from my team. I find the climate of high-performance teams much more suiting to my preferred style of work and group interaction. I also prefer a clearly defined structure and the self managed teams are much more fluid than traditional structures.

Leaders would need to develop several competencies in order be an effective external manager of a self-managed work team. As highlighted by the interview between Tesluk and Smith (2008) the primary goal of an external manager is to help develop team capabilities within the team to understand their unique strengths, roles, and responsibilities” (Tesluk & Smith, 2008). Once those elements are outlined, effective external managers need to be hands off. They should not try to solve or fix team problems but allow the team to fix them. External team managers are often challenged to be apart of the process but are confronted as they may start to micro-manage the team (Tesluk & Smith, 2008). Leaders need to be visionary, draw the outline, but let the team shade in the gaps with internal goals and processes. Leaders must allow team enough rope to hang themselves with and the flexibility to reach the desired end state as outlined in the vision. Sometime leaders must also allow teams to drift outside the lines in order to grow.

References

Brown, D. R. (2011). Work Team Development. In An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed., pp. 341-354). Boston, MA: Prentice Hall.

Tesluk, P., & Smith, R. H. (2008, September 22). Self-managing teams: debunking the leadership paradox [Video file]. Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GBnR00qgGgM&feature=youtu.be

A631.3.4.RB_FogartyShawn

            Our text transmits an understanding that constructive feedback is directly linked to positive affects regarding goals and performance. However, this was a broad stroke of the brush and further research suggests that feedback can have negative effects both on the individual and team levels. The incongruent nature between these conflicting ideas is representative of the many variables involved such as goal obtainability, nature of the task, cooperation involved, specific versus general feedback, and the manner in which feedback is delivered.

            In the article Four keys to goals and performance, a simple four-step process to effective goal setting for business associations was outlined. The authors broke these steps down into an understanding of business context, alignment of business objectives, effective measures that include feedback loops, and links to rewards (Kapel, Shepherd, 2004, p. 18). The feedback loops offer an opportunity to energize the individual throughout and after the task in order to maintain a high degree of productivity and superior performance. This supports the information presented by (Brown, 2011, p. 321) whereas “feedback on individual performance has positive effects on performance.”

            In association with individual performance, as outlined in Creating Performance Goals That Matter, the author presents a powerful statement, "Establishing meaningful, substantive goals is reflective of personal character and the determination to consistently prove and increase your value" (Adamson, 2012). Therefore, individuals with high determination for success are likely to prosper from feedback loops that highlight either positive or negative performance. Yet, individuals with low motivation and lack determination may conversely suffer from negative feedback, or feedback delivered in a non-constructive nature. This could perpetuate the downward spiral of the individual’s performance.

            Brown (2011) suggested contentions reside in the amount of feedback desired by employees respective to generational differences. I would support argument but further stress that there are many variable involved and this simple stereotype is too broad. The feedback loops in present day with the advancements in technology allow individuals to make more valid personal assessments today vice 50 years ago. The information individuals desired is now rapidly available rather than through lengthy assessments or management reviews. Since many organizational processes have been automated, we can further define individual success and failures about goal attainment individually, rather than from managerial feedback. The prescribed feedback required from a superior is simply outdated in some respects.

            On a separate note, respective of goal setting in teams, Nahrgang et al. highlights that combined research by Chen et al. (2009); DeShon, Kozlowski, Schmidt, Milner, & Wiechmann (2004); Weingart (1992) has found that goal setting, effort allocation and regulation, and particular feedback processes are similar at both the individual level and team level. However, recent studies prove otherwise (Nahrgang et al., 2013, p. 19). This recent study contrast several variables about team goal setting. First, team members must all agree and support the objective goals equally. Second, the goals and rewards from goal obtainment much equally benefit team members. Lastly, particular to the feedback loops, the feedback must be tailor to both the collective team and individually within the team. Simply providing general feedback to the team is less productive and does not improve team performance. There is a lack of accountability for individual performance from the team’s performance. Teams need to incorporate this aspect of accountability within performance reviews.

            In The Joint Impact of Achievement Goals and Performance Feedback on Information Giving findings concluded that individuals who received positive performance feedback gave less modified information about their task performance. Additional finding represent that individuals focused on mastery goals led to a stronger reciprocity orientation and a weaker exploitation orientation. Further, mastery goal individuals provided information of higher quality than performance goal individuals (Poortvliet, et al., 2009, pp. 197-198). 

            On an individual and organizational level I aim is to provide meaningful feedback to my team through our after action review. This feedback process is tailored to each team as I work with several individuals, many have varying personalities, and all receive feedback in different ways. Some people you can lay out objective facts and allow them to make their own conclusions while others you have to connect the dots in order for them to reach a meaningful conclusion of events. Regardless, after every objective (goal), we conclude with an after action review. I use this feedback loop to also receive critiques about myself, asking how I can better provide support or information to my team for future objectives. This allows me to grow within my leadership style and learn more ways to adapt to individuals.

            My performance is usually improved when I have specific goals and receive feedback. As due most, I too enjoy the praise and accolades associate with meeting those goals by there suspense. I even enjoy constructive motivational or supportive guidance if I come up short. Regarding negative feedback, if I am able to gain something from the event, I still tailor that as a win. It is counter productive and frustrating when one only hears from their superiors when it’s negative against a failed goal or suspense. Feedback has to support both positive and negative events and supportive measures to improve a negative performance period.

            Although, one drawback that stems from too specific of goals is the loss of latitude or freedom to accomplish tasks and goals. If goals are drawn too specific it invites superiors to micromanage. This can be avoided if expectations are founded during the goal development stage and effective measures are discussed ahead of the performance period. Overall, I personally find constructive feedback beneficial as it allows me to modify my performance to obtain objective goals.

References

Adamson, M. T. (2012). Creating performance goals that matter. School Administrator, 69(11), 10. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.libproxy.db.erau.edu/docview/1272088338?accountid=27203

Brown, D. R. (2011). Goal Setting for Effective Organizations. In An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed., pp. 319-337). Boston: Prentice Hall.

Kapel, C., & Shepherd, C. (2004). Four keys to goals and performance. Canadian HR Reporter, 17(4), 18-19. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com.ezproxy.libproxy.db.erau.edu/docview/220819749?accountid=27203

Nahrgang, J. D., DeRue, D. S., Hollenbeck, J. R., Spitzmuller, M., Jundt, D. K., & Ilgen, D. R. (2013). Goal setting in teams: The impact of learning and performance goals on process and performance. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 122(1), 12-21. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.obhdp.2013.03.008

Poortvliet, P., Janssen, O., Van Yperen, N. W., & de Vliert, E. (2009). The Joint Impact of Achievement Goals and Performance Feedback on Information Giving. Basic & Applied Social Psychology, 31(3), 197-209. doi:10.1080/01973530903058276

A631.2.5.RB_FogartyShawn

After we had completed the team assignment, A631.2.4.LT, I would consider the group to be mutually interdependent team members. Each team member both supports and depends on the others to complete assignments. We operated completely opposite of the various divisions in the Exely Chemical Company since we had outlined and embraced that communication was the primary factor for success. Further, we aimed to provide positive communication to avoid the many intergroup operating problems as expressed in our text (Brown, 2011, p. 297-298).

The behaviors that helped our team successfully complete its task this week were positive communication and timely feedback. Since we’re relatively limited in mediums to communicate successful completion of each assignment, it is incumbent on individuals to routinely check for messages and reply accordingly. Also, the tasks are straightforward and some team members took initiative to get the ball rolling; this positive energy will make for healthy team collaboration on assignments in the future.

The factors that inhibited the group in decision-making or problem solving were limited, however, time was a factor. Our group consists of five team members and even with positive communication, there was still a momentary idle between the flash and bang. The team charter assignment was straightforward and not much time was wasted on decision-making and problem solving.

Information is shared principally online through the discussion threads throughout the team members. This worked well in the past and having been in previous groups with some individuals will likely be the way ahead on future assignments. Depending on the complexity, we have historically held teleconferences to expedite task orientation and individual functions. It is relative and dependent to the complexity of each assignment.

There have not been any issues of authority or power conflicts within the team. The only historical instances where this became a problem was with task orientation as a vague assignment had our team spinning our wheels aimlessly throughout the week. Saturday came and we hadn’t made much progress as there were disagreements as to the deliverable required which was clarified through the instructor in order to meet the requirements for the course. In hindsight, the third-party intervention was needed to allow us to move forward.

There was not an issue relating to competition influence, however, as far as collaboration, our team was flawless within discussion thread posts. I’m excited to move forward, and I suspect we’ll be very productive as an online and remote team.

There was a myriad of process interventions amongst team members. I was brought onboard a little late and received a warm welcome, which is a form of support. One team member in charge of consolidation had to question another as he likely inadvertently skipped a section by accident. Overall, the team mutually provided feedback and synthesizing (Brown, 2011, p. 203-204).

Brown, D. R. (2011). In An experiential approach to organization development (8th ed.). Boston, MA: Prentice Hall