Question 1
1.1
The culture influences to a great extend determines the personality of an individual. Victor has been influenced by the culture making him a great leader in the society. He grew in a family in which the parents were hardworking and this has influenced him a great deal. At school he works very hard making him successful in both academics and games. The hardworking spirit in him does not die even after he completes academics as he advances his studies and games talent. He is clearly a determined person who works hard to become successful despite the family issues of divorces of his parents. His father has also impacted some skills on him as he keeps on reminding him of importance and value of democracy and freedom of thought. The background of Victors have had great leadership teaching on him which has changed his life. In school he has been a captain and academics leader looked upon by all the students as a role model. In his leadership he has no disputes with other students indicating that he is a democrat and allows others to speak their minds before making the final decision. Definitely cultural influences have had a lot of impacts to the life of Victor.
1.2
Victor’s father-in-law Anaru is a great leaders who has influence to many people. He had moved from being tribal leader and advisor of Te Puni Kokiri to holding a very high position in the ministry of Maori affairs. He is a charismatic leaders and these quality would be of great help to victor. He hopes to get this leadership quality from his father-in-law in order to attract many people to what he is doing. Charisma is a gift that what is born with but one can also learn with time and attract people to himself. People are always attracted to people who have good performance and have leadership style. Victor is hardworking and he is becoming successful thus he is attaining charisma. Therefore, with the trend he will be able to attract people who will acknowledge him as a leader.
1.1: The Influence of Culture on Victor’s Personality
2.1
Victor is an IT systems manager who is under a section managers of the IT systems. However as a manager he has some powers to report to managers in the other sections as they are equal to his section manager. He should report to the following persons regarding the following issues;
- Staffing of his department
The matter of staff is dealt with by the human resource department which deals with the employees’ welfare. Therefore, issues of staff needed in the IT department, Victor can talk to the manager in his section who in turn will talk to the chief operating officer. The COO will take the case to the HR department who will evaluate if there is need for more staff or reduction of staff.
- Budgeting within the department
Budgets of the various departments are sorted out by the finance department after all the departments forward their budgets. Therefore, Victor to budget well within the IT section he should consult the manager in his section so that he may forward it to the chief finance officer. The officer would therefore forward the budget to the president of the company who will consult with the board of directors. The top management is the one which has the authority to make decision of approving the budget which then is taken to the chief financial officer for implementation.
- Systems processes, protocols and procedures
Victor should report to his section manager who has the authority to help him know well the systems, protocols and the procedures he should follow as a manager. The section manager can also direct him to seek the help of the chief operating officer in case of any disputes.
- New development and initiatives
Victor as the IT system manager should inform his section manager and go ahead to inform the Chief executive officer who has the duty of making managerial decisions in the firm. However, the manager must consult with the firm president and the board of directors before making final decision regarding new development and initiatives as advised by Victor.
2.2
The leadership skill that Victor has is creativity and hardworking. He works hard to ensure success in the area he manages despite the problems he faces. In order to ensure growth and development in his area he is able to come up with strategies. Before the job he left many other IT jobs because they were not challenging to him and giving him opportunity to find new ways of execution of job. Therefore, Victor is creative and innovative in the IT systems as he has vast knowledge in the sector.
1.2: The Charismatic Influence of Victor’s Father-in-law
3.1
It is important to note that Victor is democratic and wants to work after consideration of all other employees’ views. These characteristic makes him not want to ‘dominate and assert power’ as it would make him a dictator. Workers are the drivers of any organization success and they like freedom to do what they want. In this case they will be able to exercise their creativity and innovative leading to the firms’ success. Victor know very well that he does not want to be a dictator since success of the department needs the efforts of all the stakeholders. His way of leadership will make the employees feel a sense of belonging and be their own boss through the delegation of work and minimal supervision.
3.2
Synergy is the cooperation among the employees and the manager of the department in ensuring achievement of the set goals and objectives. These creates goodwill among the employees and motivates them to perform thus making the organization meet its set goals. Victor knows well if he dominate and assert power employees will view him as a dictator and try to oppose his leadership thus resulting to failure of the department.
3.3
Victor has noted that the team leaders’ leadership styles varied and to some extend did not achieve their targets. He chooses to empower them will entails training and developing them in seminar and meetings to enable them know how well lead the employees under them. These strategy is good as it is cost effective compared to sacking them and putting new team leaders. It is the fast way to ensure fast change as the employees are conversant with the leaders.
3.4
Businesses have standards of the goods and services they offer to the potential customers. The strategy of Victor of establishing clear service standards will act as a guideline to the employee during their execution of services. They will hold them responsible for their actions and enable them work and achieve the target quality of services by the firm. It will also reduce losses of the firm caused by disappointed customers who do not return for more goods and may paint wrong image to others customers of the firm.
Question 2
3.5
Victor to be able to bring his team leaders into common goal he do the following:
- Allow the leaders give their views on how the department can be run.
- Enable them make meaningful contributions through his help.
- Ensure that the leaders are talking of things that the department have the ability to execute.
- Guide the team leaders to give relevant contributions.
- Ensure that the involvement of the team leaders is within a time frame.
- Finally take all the contribution of the leaders and pick the best and ensure he explains categorically to the leaders the reasons for picking them.
- Listen to the leaders’ disputes and settle them before making them execute the decisions agreed upon.
3.6
The change victor intends to implement in the department are incremental as they intend to better the existing standards, protocols, make the team leaders more productive through empowerment and discipline the bad staff with no benefit to the firm. The change as little effect to the firms’ processes and it is cost effective.
4.1
A manager cannot wake up and dismiss an employees as this would be unethical. Therefore, before dismal the manager should follow the following things;
- He should report the matter to the section manager who would then transfer the matter to the HR department.
- HR department must investigate the issue to ensure that it if true because new managers have the tendency of sacking old employees to employ their friend who are loyal.
- The HR department should then offer the employee severance package if it is found that he should be dismissed to enable him be able to support himself while looking for another job.
The employees that HR department should look for replacement must be responsible, Honest and hardworking. They should be people willing to work hard without lateness of work with lame excuses. The failure of one employees can make the whole firm fail in execution of its duties. The new replacements must be people with self-drive to work who do not need supervision to perform their duties accordingly.
4.3
Victor should carry out training and development of the remaining employees to ensure that they achieve the set goals of the services. These will ensure they are updates with the current technology and ways of job execution. These can be done in seminars, education scholarship to the employees, meeting etc.
5.1
Victor project proposal should be accepted by the firm due to the following benefits it brings;
- It will reduce delays by non-performing employees ensuring the firms executes its services in timely manner.
- It will reduces unnecessary costs in the department hence increasing the overall profit margin.
- It will lead the firm is updated with the current technology hence better execution of duties.
- It will equip the employees with current skills thus increasing their productivity.
- It will bring the issues of employee involvement in decision making thus this will increase their job satisfaction.
- The employees will have high productivity as their creativity and innovative levels will be high as they feel sense of belonging to the firm.
- It will give the firm a competitive edge in the market over its competitors thus increasing its profits.
5.2
Yes, I would be involved with victor in the project management.
The roles, skills and expertise needed will be better management skills like responsible, creative and innovative, hardworking, committed etc. The departments to be represented are the human resource and the finance department as the proposal requires dismissal of some employees and recruitment of new ones. The finance department is necessary to help in ensuring the proposal is realistic In terms of the money it needs to be viable. The firm should have such money and not remove it from other departments disrupting their operations to ensure the proposal succeeds.
5.3
Change implementation process entails;
- Identification of the need for change in the firm; check whether it is necessary.
- Preparing for the change in the organization by notifying the affected stakeholders.
- Developing a proposal
- Consultation with the other members
- Making changes to the proposal with other stakeholders
- Taking the proposal to the CEO for consultation with the presidents of the firm and other board of directors.
- Implementation of the change.
- Checking the operation of the changes and carrying out any amendments if necessary.
5.4
Change in the organization in always accepted in the organization. Some of the barriers to change are;
- Cost – change in organization may require large amount of finances to execute. These may lead inability of the firm to implement the change. Victor change strategy is cheap as it is incremental change not radical which involve overhaul of a department or the firm businesses.
- Time- time is of great essence when carrying out change in a firm. Wrong timing may results to losses to the firm and these means that managers should carry out intensive research. These would define the appropriate time to carry out changes in a firm.
- Employees resistant- change means new ways of execution of business aiming at increasing the profitability of the firm. These does not always come easy as it involvement requirement of new skills by the employees. Therefore, employees’ are dismissed or trained to be able to perform the new duties. Employees fear change as they think they will lose their jobs or will go back to school in which some are reluctant.
5.5
Change management must include the following essential elements;
- Intensive research- these will ensure that the latest technology is adopted meaning that the change will bring increase the profit margin of the firm.
- Consultation of all the stakeholders- to avoid resistance the manager must assure the stakeholders of continuity of their jobs despite the adoption of the change.
- Change also requires creative and innovative manager with knowledge of the process he is undertaking to avoid losses to the firm which may lead to its failure.
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