Decision making

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Decision making
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Decision Making

• Much of what managers and supervisors do is solve
  problems and make decisions.
• New managers and supervisors, in particular,
  often make solve problems and decisions by
  reacting to them.
• They are "under the gun", stressed and very short
  for time.
• Consequently, when they encounter a new problem
  or decision they must make, they react with a
  decision that seemed to work before

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Decision Making

• It's easy with this approach to get stuck in a
  circle of solving the same problem over and over
  again.
• A a new manager or supervisor, get used to an
  organized approach to problem solving and
  decision making.
• Remember, not all problems can be solved and
  decisions made by the following, rather rational
  approach.
• The following basic guidelines will get you
  started.

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Decision Making

• Define the problem
• This is often where people struggle. They react
  to what they think the problem is. Instead, seek
  to understand more about why you think there's a
  problem.

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Define the problem

• Defining the problem (with input from yourself
  and others)Ask yourself and others, the
  following questions
• What can you see that causes you to think there's
  a problem?
• Where is it happening?
• How is it happening?
• When is it happening?
• With whom is it happening? (HINT Don't jump to
  "Who is causing the problem?" When we're
  stressed, blaming is often one of our first
  reactions. To be an effective manager, you need
  to address issues more than people.)

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Define the problem

• Why is it happening?
• Write down a five-sentence description of the
  problem in terms of
• "The following should be happening, but isn't
  ..."
• "The following is happening and should be ..."
• As much as possible, be specific in your
  description, including what is happening, where,
  how, with whom and why.

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Define the problem

• Prioritize the problems
• If you discover that you are looking at several
  related problems, then prioritize which ones you
  should address first.
• Note the difference between "important" and
  "urgent" problems. Often, what we consider to be
  important problems to consider are really just
  urgent problems. Important problems deserve more
  attention. For example, if you're continually
  answering "urgent" phone calls, then you've
  probably got a more "important" problem and
  that's to design a system that screens and
  prioritizes your phone calls.

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Define the problem

• Understand your role in the problem
• Your role in the problem can greatly influence
  how you perceive the role of others. For example,
  if you're very stressed out, it'll probably look
  like others are, too, or, you may resort too
  quickly to blaming and reprimanding others. Or,
  you are feel very guilty about your role in the
  problem, you may ignore the accountabilities of
  others.

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Look at potential causes for the problem

• It's amazing how much you don't know about what
  you don't know. it's critical to get input from
  other people who notice the problem and who are
  effected by it.
• It's often useful to collect input from other
  individuals one at a time Otherwise, people tend
  to be inhibited about offering their impressions
  of the real causes of problems.
• Write down what your opinions and what you've
  heard from others.
• Regarding what you think might be performance
  problems associated with an employee, it's often
  useful to seek advice from a peer or your
  supervisor in order to verify your impression of
  the problem.
• Write down a description of the cause of the
  problem and in terms of what is happening, where,
  when, how, with whom and why

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Identify alternatives for approaches to resolve
the problem

• At this point, it's useful to keep others
  involved (unless you're facing a personal and/or
  employee performance problem). Brainstorm for
  solutions to the problem. Very simply put,
  brainstorming is collecting as many ideas as
  possible, then screening them to find the best
  idea.
• It's critical when collecting the ideas to not
  pass any judgment on the ideas -- just write them
  down as you hear them

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Select an approach to resolve the problem

• When selecting the best approach, consider
• Which approach is the most likely to solve the
  problem for the long term?
• Which approach is the most realistic to
  accomplish for now? Do you have the resources?
  Are they affordable? Do you have enough time to
  implement the approach?
• What is the extent of risk associated with each
  alternative?

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Plan the implementation of the best alternative
(this is your action plan)

• Carefully consider "What will the situation look
  like when the problem is solved?
• What steps should be taken to implement the best
  alternative to solving the problem?
• What systems or processes should be changed in
  your organization, for example, a new policy or
  procedure? Don't resort to solutions where
  someone is "just going to try harder".
• How will you know if the steps are being followed
  or not? (these are your indicators of the success
  of your plan)

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Plan the implementation of the best alternative
(this is your action plan)

• What resources will you need in terms of people,
  money and facilities?
• How much time will you need to implement the
  solution? Write a schedule that includes the
  start and stop times, and when you expect to see
  certain indicators of success.
• Who will primarily be responsible for ensuring
  implementation of the plan?
• Write down the answers to the above questions and
  consider this as your action plan.
• Communicate the plan to those who will involved
  in implementing it and, at least, to your
  immediate supervisor.

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Monitor implementation of the plan

• Monitor the indicators of success
• Are you seeing what you would expect from the
  indicators?
• Will the plan be done according to schedule?
• If the plan is not being followed as expected,
  then consider
• Was the plan realistic?
• Are there sufficient resources to accomplish the
  plan on schedule?
• Should more priority be placed on various aspects
  of the plan?
• Should the plan be changed?

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Verify if the problem has been resolved or not

• One of the best ways to verify if a problem has
  been solved or not is to resume normal operations
  in the organization. Still, you should consider
• What changes should be made to avoid this type of
  problem in the future? Consider changes to
  policies and procedures, training, etc.
• Lastly, consider "What did you learn from this
  problem solving?" Consider new knowledge,
  understanding and/or skills.
• Consider writing a brief memo that highlights the
  success of the problem solving effort, and what
  you learned as a result. Share it with your
  supervisor, peers and subordinates.

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Review
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Cross-Cultural Considerations A Closer Look

• Culture
• A system of shared norms, beliefs, values, and
  customs that bind people together, creating
  shared meaning and a unique identity
• Cultural Differences
• Geographic regions
• Ethnic or religious groups
• Language
• Economic

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Cross-Cultural Considerations (contd)

• Ethnocentric Perspective
• The tendency believe that ones cultural values
  and ways of doing things are superior to all
  others
• Wanting to conduct business only on your terms
  and stereotyping other countries as lazy,
  corrupt, or inefficient.
• Ignoring the people factor in other cultures by
  putting work ahead of building relationships.
• Adjustments
• Relativity of time and punctuality
• Culture-related ethical differences
• Personal and professional relationships
• Attitudes toward work and life

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Cross-Cultural Orientations

• Relation to Nature
• How people relate to the natural world around
  them and to the supernatural.
• Time Orientation
• The culture focus on the past, present, or
  future.
• Activity Orientation
• How to live being or living in the moment,
  doing, or controlling.
• Basic Nature of People
• Whether people viewed as good, evil, or some mix
  of these two.
• Relationships Among People
• The degree of responsibility one has for others.

Source F. Kluckhohn and F. L. Strodtbeck,
Variations in Value Orientations (Evanston, IL
Row, Peterson, 1961).
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Hofstede Cultural Dimensions Framework

• Individualism versus Collectivism
• Identifies whether a culture holds individuals or
  the group responsible for each members welfare.
• Power Distance
• Describes degree to which a culture accepts
  status and power differences among its members.
• Uncertainty Avoidance
• Identifies a cultures willingness to accept
  uncertainty and ambiguity about the future.
• Masculinity-Femininity
• Describes the degree to which the culture
  emphasizes competitive and achievement-oriented
  behavior or displays concerns for relationships.

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What is a manager ?

• Who is the person that best fit to become a
  manager?
• What skills should he/she have?
• What training / experience does he/she need to
  have?

Different perspectives and expectations by
different people in the organization
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Transformation of Identity
From To
A Specialist and Doer. Directly performs Technical Tasks A generalist and agenda setter. Orchestrates diverse tasks, including finance, product design and manufacturing or organization. Multi-Knowledgeable. Strongly identified with a business or the management profession.
An individual actor. Gets things done mostly through own efforts. Strongly identified as relatively independent A network builder. Gets things done through others, including subordinates over whom one has formal authority. Strongly identified as highly interdependent.
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New manager transformation

• Coping with stress
• Reluctantly letting go of habits
• Experimenting with new ways of thinking

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Different expectations

• Own expectations
• Subordinate expectations
• Supervisor expectations
• Peer expectations

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New mangers Stresses including- Role Strain-
Negativity- Isolation- Burden of leadership -
responsibility
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Managers new identity

• Facing new realities on their current position
  managers need to change their initial
  expectation, and work toward forging a new
  identity.
• Three critical areas made them rethink their
  managerial role
• Daily realities
• Subordinates expectations
• Superiors expectations

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Discovering Daily realities

• Workload and pace of managerial work
• More stress
• Coordination and work planning
• Solving problems
• Devoting time and support to subordinate
• Dependence on others
• Discovering the discontinuity between a
• producer and managerial role

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Discovering the realities of managerial work

• There is a huge discontinuity between producer
  and managerial roles and between realities and
  expectations
• Managers Work Load and pace
• 50 more work than doers
• Endless job responsibilities
• Management as dependence not authority
• No direct control over results

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Discovering subordinates needs

• Involvement vs Interference
• Managers are problem solvers.
• Making decisive decisions
• Bonuses and positive feedback
• Managers must adapt themselves and work
• toward meeting their subordinate expectations

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Develop and refine the interpersonal judgment

• Accept subordinates diversity
• Respond to subordinates diversity
• Manage the problem subordinate
• Delegation and control

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SELECTING NEW MANAGERS

• Criteria for Selecting Managers
• Managerial candidates should have technical,
  human, conceptual, or analytic competence, find
  managerial intrinsically rewarding, and exhibit
  the managerial character.
• On-the-job learning should let them display these
  attributes self-insight and a penchant for
  learning.
• People who enjoy learning actively seek
  opportunities for personal growth and
  development, they show resilience under stress.

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• How to Select Managers

• Career histories represent the experiential base
  from which managerial candidates could have
  developed competencies, qualities, and
  developmental relationships critical for
  management.
• The candidate need not be a star individual
  contributor, but should demonstrate above-average
  proficiency at the technical task.
• The new managers relied upon their technical
  background in three ways
• The expert knowledge
• A source of self-confidence
• A base upon which to build credibility and
  exercise influence
• Human and conceptual competencies must also be
  considered.
• Examine how those candidates achieved those
  outcomes
• Did they display good interpersonal and
  conceptual judgment or instincts?
• Try to choose candidates who seem to have
  managerial character and the motivation and
  ability to learn from experience.

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• Previewing Managerial Work

• Providing managers with management internships.
• Potential managers were asked to assume some
  managerial responsibilities for at least a year
  before being promoted.
• Each site can observe the other, the candidate
  experiences management in action, executives can
  assess whether the candidate has what it takes.
• Potential managers can begin to form a managerial
  perspective and managerial knowledge and skills.
• An ideal management internship would encourage
  establishing developmental relationships. At
  least candidates would be matched with positive
  role models.

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SUPPORTING THE NEW MANAGER

• Help managers capitalize fully upon on-the-job
  experience to provide the resources, attitudes,
  and skills so that they can effectively learn
  form experience.
• Ensure that newcomers have access to the people
  and relationships they need to help them embed
  and amplify their personal effectiveness.
• Developing the New Managers Superiors
• To provide senior executives with training on how
  to be better coaches.
• Preparing senior executives for their
  developmental function is updating or upgrading
  the senior managers conceptions of management,
  senior managers rarely received training.
• Leadership and the skill of exercising influence
  without authority to build partnerships both
  within and across units are more important.

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• Encouraging Developmental Relationships
• Relationships should be encouraged between new
  and veteran managers both formal and informal
  channels can be used to expose new manages to
  competent peers and superior managers.
• New managers more clearly see themselves as part
  of the larger organization. They experience the
  perspectives of constituencies with whom they
  must interact.
• Corporate Training
• Training provided the new managers with a
  framework for thinking about appropriate ways of
  handling common dilemmas, corporate resources to
  help tackle those dilemmas, much-needed feedback,
  and network or relationships.

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Exercising Influence Without Formal Authority

• Organizations consist of interdependent
  individuals (and groups) with divergent
  interests.
• Managers have to figure out how to balance or
  reconcile these competing interests.
• The managers must establish anew their
  credibility as managers able to get things done
  through others.
• They must become political i.e., understand
  the political dynamics of organizations and build
  the power and influence necessary to navigate
  them.

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Power Dynamics in Organizations

• Powerful is not equate power simply with formal
  authority.
• They often view politics as inherently bad.
• New managers responsibilities include growing
  their own power and influence in order to manage
  key interdependencies and relationships.
• Power and influence are the mechanisms by which
  the inevitable political conflicts in
  organizations get resolved.

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Power Dynamics in Organizations (contd)

• Managers who understand political dynamics will
  have the potential to shape their environments.
• Political conflict is at the heart of how
  organizations function.
• Political conflict is legitimate disagreements
  about what is best for the organization.
• All managerial decisions involve trade-offs the
  need to balance complex and ambiguous issues that
  generate political conflict.

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Sources of Power

• Power the potential of and individual (or
  group) to influence another individual or group.
• To influence is to change the behavior,
  attitudes, and/or values of that individual of
  group.
• One big piece of having influence on people is
  being able to establish credibility with team.

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Sources of Power
Managers power

• Sources of personal power
• Expertise
• Track record
• Attractiveness
• Effort
• Sources of positional power
• Formal authority
• Relevance
• Centrality
• Autonomy
• Visibility

• Relevant knowledge and skills
• Relevant experience and accomplishments
• Attributes that others find appealing and
  identify with
• Expenditure of time and energy
• Position in hierarchy and prescribed
  responsibilities
• Relationship between task and organizational
  objectives
• Position in key networks
• Amount of discretion in a position
• Degree to which performance can be seen by others

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Building an Effective Team

• Managing the team itself
• Managing one-on-one is not the same as managing
  the team
• Building blocks of team management
• What is an effective team?
• Designing The Team
• Facilitating the Team Process
• Managing paradox

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The Acculturation Curve
Positive
Even be better
Positive
Good as before
Remain negative
Negative-
1Euphoria
2 Cultureshock
3Acculturation
4 Stable state
Phase
Time
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Sachs Excerpt Successful Interviewer

• Prepare
• Needs and Wants
• Exact Job Responsibility
• Responsibility Qualification and Skills.
• Personality Type.
• Resume achievement claims, job changes,
  Relocations, References.
• Know and Don't Know.

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Schs Excerpt Successful Interviewer Cont.

• Process
• 3 R's Repeat, Rephrase, Require.
• Silence
• 45 Minutes

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Performance Appraisals

• Two main reasons for performance appraisals
• Justify many human resources decision.
• Pay raises
• Promotions
• Demotions
• Terminations
• Selection validation.
• Maintain a competitive edge.

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Why Employees and Managers Dread the performance
Appraisal

• Employees
• They are being judged.
• It does not take account of their perception of
  their true worth.
• Uncertainty about managers checkmarks that go
  into their permanent record.
• Their word is less important than their boss
  opinion.

• Managers
• People do not like to judge other people.
• Risk of offending an employee.
• Poor performance appraisal systems set by the
  company (theory vs. reality).
• Evaluation of employees with whom manager has
  little contact.
• Appraisal systems that are new for the managers.

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Appraisal Methods

1. Global essays and ratings.
2. Trait rating.
3. Peer ranking.
4. Organizational Records.
5. Critical incidents.
6. Behaviorally based scales and behaviorally
   anchored rating scales (BARS).
7. Objectives and goal-setting procedures.

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Performance Appraisal System

• Keys to an effective Performance Appraisal
  system
• Clearly defined purpose for appraisals.
• Employee/manager involvement in appraisal system
  design.
• User-friendly job related rating forms and
  procedures.
• Properly trained personnel.
• Effective performance planning.
• Ongoing appraisals and coaching.
• Motivated raters to conduct effective appraisals.
• Top management support / appraisal practice.
• Link of appraisal outcomes to performance
  ratings.
• Ongoing systems review and corrective action.

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Common Appraisal Errors

1. Inadequately defined standards of performance.
2. Over-emphasis on recent performance.
3. Reliance on gut feelings.
4. Miscomprehension of performance standards by
   employee.
5. Insufficient or unclear performance
   documentation.
6. Inadequate time allotment for the discussion.
7. Too much talking by manager/supervisor.
8. Lack of follow-up plan.

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Employee Recognition Reward

• Reasons for recognition
• Support culture change in organization.
• Maintain workers interest about the job.
• Reward employees fairly if project fails without
  their fault.
• Strengthen behavior changes made by
  unsatisfactory performers.
• Recognition types
• Extrinsic rewards.
• Intrinsic rewards.

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Behaviors Worth Recognition

• Learning new skills.
• Pitching in to help coworker.
• Mediating a conflict.
• Volunteering for grunge work.
• Giving a customer extra attention.
• Mentoring a new employee.
• Tackling a problem in a fresh way.
• Making people laugh in a stressful situation.
• Sharing information.
• Taking notes in meetings.
• Perfect attendance.
• Adapting willingly to change.
• Cross-training another employee.

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Additional material

• Email etiquette
• Meeting Management
• Team building
• Speaking in front of an audience
• Hiring process
• The Interview
• Performance evaluation
• Termination
• Conflict management
• Sexual harassment