Right Selection of Members for Decision-Making

Question: Discuss about the Right Selection of Members for Decision-Making. Answer: Introduction A case study meeting has been studied and certain failures in terms of decision-making have been identified. This assignment will discuss about the differences in personality types that failed the meeting and evaluate the perceptions of individuals in terms of response. How an organization can manage individual differences and overcome strategic challenges will be discussed in this assignment through critical analysis. This assignment will mainly focus on enhancing strategic management in organization through case study analysis. Myers Briggs theories The types of personalities are examined in the following table: Extraversion and Introversion This style gives the idea of energy direction. Tokunbo Jegede is the marketing personnel who can be listed under this category. Sensing and Intuition This style indicates such people who deal with facts. Davido Banks is the operational personal who can be listed under this category. Thinking and Feeling This style indicates decision-making and Zainab Smith is the personal who can be listed under this category in design department. Judgment and Perception This style indicates planned lifestyle and organized preference for doing tasks (Poursafar, Devi and Rodrigues 2015). Therefore, Gloria Brown, who is the engineering personnel, can be listed under this category. Table 1: Personality types and identification (Source: Lloyd 2012) While reviewing the case study, it has been found that each of the personality types started to wrangle among each other, but only Gloria Brown did not try to keep her view aggressively as she knew that the team would never form with such diversified personality types. Therefore, while making decision, it will be best for the organization to select one type of personality trait. The most effective personality trait will be Judgment and Perception as this personality type indicates logical method of thinking and organized planning (Cohen, Ornoy and Keren 2013). In the case study, it has been found that none of the members thought of organized way of planning, rather each of them started to present their own views. Therefore, the best type of personality will be Judgment and Perception, as members will initially try to logically think about the facts while decision making and present the best organized and logical strategy at the end of the meeting. Attribution Theory According to Westwood et al. (2014), attribution theory deals with identifying the process by which people explain the causes and behavior of individuals. In this case study, it has been found that all the people were trying to blame each other, which can be referred as the interpersonal attribution. Each of the members was deviated by the response of the other personnel so that their own candidate could have been defended. On the other hand, Harvey et al. (2014) pointed out that common sense psychology observes, analyze and explain behaviors of each other, which is attributed by external attributions. This has been the same case for the respondents in the case study. Furthermore, Snead et al. (2015) pointed out that if individuals try to respond in such a way, where logical and rational attributes are entertained, then surely perception of other members will be changed. For this case, members must have thought of covariance. If the members could have allocated the reasons behind the poor performance of their best candidates, the management must have understood the reason behind such perception. On the other hand, Hareli (2014) pointed out that three-dimensional model of attribution theory gives the view that individuals will commit the same type of behavior if they act on the same situation in future. The CEO in the case study came to understand that none of the members had the potential to create the best decision in future and therefore, considering three-dimensional model, he would never hire the same personnel in future. Toluwa, Ralph, Suzzane, Emeka, and Temitope had their own view regarding the performance of the candidates and therefore, they never applied the distinctive information. If the members of the committee have applied the consensus information, then surely they would have acted in different stimuli, which would have given the best answer to the CEO. Managing individual differences at work Four ways by which managers can try to manage differences at work are communication, training, motivation and job allocation. Communication According to Gammack and Poon (2013), most of the projects in an organization fail because of the poor communication among of the members. Organizational projects require a lot of interactive communications among each other but often due to differences in authorities, expertise and knowledge among the team members, communication fails. As a result, project deliverables are not set within the deadline and even the qualities are hampered. On the other hand, Tjosvold and Tjosvold (2015) pointed out that communication is the way by which, mutual sharing of ideas can be processed in a meeting. Furthermore, Ghorbanhosseini (2013) opined that if the leader in a meeting or in a project take the initiative to restore interactive communication by reporting and collaborative interaction among the members from the initial stages, then surely effective deliverables will be reached within a couple of months. Training According to von Krogh, Rossi-Lamastra and Haefliger (2012), employees in an organization have different designation and expertise, but often organizations does not ensure the effective training process so that the employees can be bushed up to perform in the most optimized way. On the other hand, Dehmollaei, Jafari and Gholamipour (2013) pointed out that organizations try to reduce the cost of operation by limiting the longevity of training process, which ultimately hampers the quality of the outcome. When such inefficient employees work in a team for accomplishing a project, they fail to give the best outcome, and thereby hampering the total project output. Hell and Ershov (2014) opined that if the employees are trained prior to performance, then ambiguity and differences among the team members will be reduced. The team members will be able to deliver the best output only when they know about each other, which will be accomplished during the training session. Individual differences will be sorted out during the training session, members will come to know about each other, and according to that team leader will delegate responsibilities among the members. Motivation Motivation is the primary factor that reduces the feeling of indifferences among the team members. If an employee is motivated then, it will be reflected in their performance. A team is consisted of different types of expertise and therefore, it is quite natural that there will be differences in performance. Performance of one member will be different from the other, which will surely affect the performance. Therefore, if a team leader motivates the poor performer irrespective of his performance, then surely the candidate will try to deliver better output. In this way, a team will be formed that will have the best members who are always committed to perform well and achieve more, leading to the better outcome of project. Finally, it can be said that motivation is the factor that gives rise to achieve organization goal. Job Allocation According to Durand and Paolella (2013), individual differences in a team, occur mostly due to inappropriate job allocation. Team members are having different skills, expertise and knowledge and according to that team leader is supposed to delegate tasks. Cheng and Humphreys (2012) pointed out that often it is found team leader does not have the knowledge of its members and therefore, it is the team members who have to suffer. If team leader does not have the knowledge of its members and their ability, then surely they will fail to perform well. On the other hand, Menon et al. (2015) argued that the team leader deliberately creates differences among the team members by giving inappropriate tasks. Therefore, the management has to take care of the type of team members who are present in a team and according to that needs to make sure of the tasks that are to be allocated among the members. This will help in restoring the best outcome for any king of project, as any sort of differences will be resolved prior to initiation of project. Strategic Goal In the case study, the main marketing goal is to create advertising to market their new mop. The four departments that are associated with the strategic goal are operations department, marketing department, design department and engineering department. The key functions of the each of the departments are given in the following table: Departments Functions Operations department Budgeting: Cost related options will be identified and configurations for reducing the operational expense will be determined. People: Operations manager has to take care of the type of people who will be associated with the project. The manager will need to allocate adequate amount of employees for operational improvement and product designing. Leadership: Operation manager has to ensure transactional leadership style so that employees feel free to communicate with the manger regarding shortcomings and requirements. Marketing department Strategy: Marketing managers will try to responsively create strategy by setting in line with overall corporate objectives Sales Support: Manager has to support the sales team by high quality leads and communication system. Create Advertisement strategy: Marketing manager has to identify the appropriate marketing strategy such as event management or online sales promotions. Design department Product Uniqueness: Though the product is new to the market, but the demand is not so high, therefore, design department needs to create distinctive feature for the product and attractive design so that sales is achieved at the highest rate. Product Packaging: Packaging is the part of design and therefore, design department has to restore attractive packaging so ensure consumer provocation. Engineering department Develop: The engineering department needs to develop the product in terms of features, shapes, configurations and technical requirements. Construction: A manager in this department needs to ensure desired yield quality and organize personnel. Production: Equipment selection, economic and human factors will have to be selected by the engineering department Table 2: Key Departmental Functions (Source: Dehmollaei, Jafari and Gholamipour 2013) Each of the departments needs to work in the most efficient way and communicate with each other. The managers will need to identify the strategy, which will be suitable for both the organization and for the stakeholders. Operation manager will need to identify the process, people and budget that will be required for the whole project. After the process has been identified, the design and engineering department will communicated regarding their concerns. The marketing manager and operation manager will discuss about the cost and benefits of the strategies and finally, the project will be executed. The main objective has been to create advertisement strategy and for that, each of the departments will need to address their concerns regarding the type of information that will be provided in the advertisement. Two Challenges for organization Personality Difference While developing the strategy for advertisement, the management has thought of selecting the right departments and right members but somehow each of the departments were not aware of identifying the right personality traits. According to Cohen, Ornoy and Keren (2013), one of the most important criteria for team development is to select such members who has the adequate cohesion power. Therefore, the organization must have selected Judgment and Perception personality trait. Such personality would have given the best-organized and logical strategic output within the given time frame. Communication According to Harvey et al. (2014), if a team in an organization does not have the adequate number of trained and behaved employees, then surely communication factor will prove to be ineffective. This has been the same condition for this organization. In the meeting, from the very first stage, each of the members started to prove why they were right, and never listened to each other. Therefore, communication was not effective for the members. Communication gap and placement of ideas were lacking among the team members, which led to dissolve the team. Conclusion While concluding, it can be said that the organization did not have right selection of members for decision-making. It has been found that Judgment and Perception is the best personality trait that will logically organize the team building and strategy creation. It has even been found that attribution theory gives the idea of individuals perception while evaluating performance and how external perception responds with individuals stimuli. For managing individuals performance at work, the four most factors that are to be taken care are communication, training, motivation and job allocation. Finally, it can be said that with the active participation of employees, an organization can surely implement its strategies in future. Reference List Cheng, M.M. and Humphreys, K.A., 2012. The differential improvement effects of the strategy map and scorecard perspectives on managers' strategic judgments.The Accounting Review,87(3), pp.899-924. Cohen, Y., Ornoy, H. and Keren, B., 2013. MBTI personality types of project managers and their success: A field survey.Project Management Journal,44(3), pp.78-87. 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