Chapter 1: The New Workplace

Chapter 1: The New Workplace

Copyright 2006. Based on Organizational Behavior & Management, An Integrated Skills Approach by Ramon J. Aldag and Loren W. Kuzuhara (2002), on slides prepared by the authors and Southwestern Thomson Learning, and on work by John Kevin Doyle.

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Characteristics of New Work World

The New Worldof Work

Complex

Ambiguous

Changing

Diverse

Global

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Today’s Organizations

Hierarchies are flatter. Deadlines are shorter. Teams are pervasive. Employees must manage themselves. Technology is transforming the nature, pace,

and possibilities of work.

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Demands of the Modern Workplace

Demands ofthe modernworkplace

Attention toethical behavior

Flexibility

CreativityCooperation

Politicalsavvy

Proactivity Speed

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Management Skills and Company Success

One study of manufacturing firms showed managers to be three times as effective in explaining company profitability as all other factors combined.

A study in the United Kingdom revealed management weaknesses to be the primary cause of insolvencies, with poor management being cited in more than 80 percent of cases.

These and many other studies of large and small firms are consistent in pointing to management skills as critical to firm success.

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Management Success Stories

Among the many examples of management success stories to be examined in future chapters are such well known ones as:

– Herb Kelleher’s development of a successful culture of fun at Southwest Airlines

– Mary Kay Ash’s inspirational leadership at Mary Kay Cosmetics– Jack Welch’s transformation of GE

Others we’ll consider, such as Aaron Feuerstein’s humane management decisions at Malden Mills, are less visible but no less dramatic.

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Critical Skills Across Business Functions

A study of financial staff found that, in addition to financial leadership, strategic thinking, effective communication, and leadership were identified as critical skills.

A survey of chief information officers found that more than three-fourths believe that more widespread use of technology will require IT workers to communicate more effectively and articulately. With more frequent information exchange, skills such as communication, diplomacy, and problem solving will grow in importance.

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Critical Skills Across Business Functions

“Sales Management Competencies for the 21st Century” identified critical competencies for sales managers: providing strategic vision, assembling teams of skilled employees, sharing information with employees, coaching, diagnosing performance, and negotiating.

The American Institute of CPAs Core Competency Framework identified communicating, handling personal relationships, and facilitating learning and personal improvement among competencies accounting professionals will need for success in the future.

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Skills Training in Organizations

American corporations spend more than $64 billion annually for the training of their workforces, about 85% of it in the area of management skills.

Dana Corp. requires all its employees to complete 40 hours of education each year. The company has three Dana University schools.

Merck & Co. spent 3.5% of its 1999 payroll, or about $100 million, on employee skills development programs.

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Skills Training in Organizations

Abbott Laboratories provides its employees with tuition reimbursement of up to $7,000 for undergraduate studies and $9,000 for graduate studies.

General Electric spends about $1 billion annually on education and training programs.

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Skills Training at AT&T Wireless Services

AT&T Wireless Services is using a process called Managing Personal Growth (MPG) to help employees identify key competencies or critical skills, develop them with resources available through the company, and translate them into day-to-day decisions and actions that help the company meet goals.

Employees must take responsibility for developing those critical skills on an ongoing basis, and talk with their supervisors to develop an individual development plan.

Employees’ job security is grounded in what they know and the value they can create around themselves.

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Status of Skills Training

A survey by the Conference Board showed that 98% reported that their skills training reaped significant economic benefits for the firm.

Studies show just 21% of companies were able to identify where employees want to be in terms of skill development in a year;

and 58% of managers had received no leadership training, 72% had received no training on giving feedback on performance, and 87% had received no training in stress management.

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The Need for Management Skills

The need formanagement skills

Managerialskills and

life success

Managerialskills and

hiring

Managerialskills in the

new workplace

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Managerial Skills and Hiring

Companies hiring for skills, including management skills.

A GAO report suggested: “Hire, develop, and retain employees according to competencies. Identify the competencies – knowledge, skills, abilities, and behaviors – needed to achieve high performance of mission and goals, and build and sustain the organization’s talent pool through recruiting, hiring, development, and retention policies targeted at building and sustaining those competencies.”

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Sixteen Basic Skills

Knowing How to Learn Reading Writing Mathematics Listening Oral Communication Problem Solving Creative Thinking

Self-Confidence Motivational Goal Setting Personal and Career

Development Interpersonal Skills Negotiation Teamwork Organizational Effectiveness Leadership

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Ranking of HR Managers’ Perceptions of Criteria for Evaluating Business Graduates

Criterion Mean

Oral Communication Skills 4.6

Listening Skills 4.5

Resume 4.4

Interpersonal Communication Skills 4.3

Problem-Solving Skills 4.2

Work Experience 3.7

College Attended 3.1

Contacts within the Organization 2.2

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How Many Employers?

The Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that the average 22-year-old college graduate will have more than eight different employers before he or she reaches the age of 32.

That is a change of employers every 15 months.

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Managerial Skills in the New Work Environment

Managerial skillsand career success

Entrepreneurship

Growth in manage-ment positions

Downsizing anddelayering

Hiring for thesecond job

Self-managedwork teams

Job enrichmentand empowerment

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Hiring for Competencies at Merck

When Merck and Company needed to fill a large number of field representative positions, it decided to focus specifically on competencies.

Hiring managers were asked to identify the specific traits, skills, and behaviors most critical to job performance.

A process was then developed to screen for those competencies at various steps of candidate assessment.

Each candidate was then scored on the criteria to give a rating of his or her potential.

The process was more efficient than previous approaches, yielded greater consistency across regions, and increased diversity.

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Managerial Skills Sets

Technical skills include knowledge about methods, processes, and techniques needed to carry out specialized activity, ability to use related tools and equipment. Dealing with things.

Human skills deal with human behavior and interpersonal processes, communication, cooperation, and social sensitivity. Dealing with people.

Conceptual skills include analytical ability, creativity, efficiency in problem solving, and ability to recognize opportunities and potential problems. Dealing with concepts.

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Management Skills Needed for Success by Organizational Level

Conceptual

Conceptual

Conceptual

Human

Human

Human

Technical

Technical

Technical

Top-Level Managers

Middle-LevelManagers

First-Level Managers

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School vs. Business

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School vs. Career Success

A wide range of studies show that success in school does not well predict subsequent career success.

It is the growing evidence of this very weak link that has led many educators and managers to call for a greater emphasis on skills in the learning process.

The authors of a major study of management education sponsored by the American Assembly of Collegiate Schools of Business concluded that, “The challenge of how to develop stronger people skills needs to be faced by both business schools … and by corporations and firms in their management development activities…”

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The Knowing-Doing Gap

Simply knowing – recognizing or understanding what to do to manage an organization – is not enough for an individual to become a successful manager.

Pfeffer and Sutton became intrigued by the large number of managers and executives who knew what needed to be done but failed to implement it.

They referred to this phenomenon as the “Knowing-Doing Gap.”

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Causes of the Knowing-Doing Gap

Knowledge management efforts emphasize technology and the exchange of codified information; this does not address how the information can be used to make better decisions to enhance work-unit or organizational effectiveness.

Knowledge management tends to treat knowledge as a tangible thing, as a stock or quantity, and therefore separates knowledge as a thing from the use of the thing.

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Formal systems can’t easily store or transfer tacit knowledge. Tacit knowledge is information that is important for doing something effectively that cannot be captured, measured, or codified by formal knowledge systems in organizations.

The people responsible for transferring and implementing knowledge management frequently do not understand the actual work being documented.

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Knowledge management tends to focus on specific practices and ignore the importance of philosophy. People want to know “what to do” to solve problems they face in organizations.

If the knowledge acquired by the manager or business professional is merely a collection of practices without a coherent, overarching philosophy, then it becomes difficult to implement these practices, and almost impossible to transfer them to new situations.

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Bridging the Knowing-Doing Gap

Why before how: Philosophy is important. Make sure that all members of an organization understand and are committed to the way of thinking about how to achieve given business objectives.

Knowing comes from doing and teaching others how. Teaching through apprenticeships, coaching and mentoring helps organizational members how to “do the right things.”

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Action comes before elegant plans and concepts. The key is to focus on the bottom line of taking action and to ensure that talking about what to do is always coupled with specific actions.

There is no doing without mistakes. Organizations that bridge the knowing-doing gap are able to learn and become smarter based on their successes and failures in the marketplace.

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Fear fosters knowing-doing gaps. So drive out fear. Manage must create a value system, organizational culture, and policies and procedures that do not punish individuals for doing the right thing even if the results are less than optimal.

Beware of false analogies. Fight the competition, not each other. Management must promote a cooperative work environment where everyone is committed to working together to achieve the same business objectives.

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Measure what matters and what can help turn knowledge into action. Management should identify a handful of critical measures of success for the organization and track them on an ongoing basis.

What leaders do, how they spend their time, and how they allocate resources, matters.

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The Social Learning Perspective

Pre-assessment

Conceptuallearning,modeling

Conceptual& behavioral

practice

Lifeapplication

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The “4 A’s” of Skill Learning

Skillsassessment

Skillsawareness

Skillsattainment

Skillsapplication

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Steps in the “4 A’s” of Skill Learning

Skills Assessment Get baseline measures on important skills and to foster interest in those skills.

Skills Awareness Discuss important background material, such as why the topic is important, key approaches to mastering the skill, and other relevant information.

Skills Attainment Through a variety of experiential methods, you develop the skill.

Skills Application Life application, such as using the skills in case analyses, life situations, and field projects.

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Mastering Management Skills

Take baseline(pre-test)

measures of thetarget skills

Master contentthat supports theapplication of the

target skills

Practice theapplication of the

target skillsin an exercise or

case study

Obtaindevelopmental

feedbackregarding thetarget skills

Practice theapplication of the

target skills inan organizational

context

Take post-testmeasures of the

target skills

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Global Perspective: Skills in the Global Labor Market

Firms and their management are becoming increasingly global.

A record number of foreign CEOs are now running major U.S. companies.

The number of international assignments is expected to accelerate in the next five years.

Many people fail in international assignments, and almost half say they would not work abroad again.

This all suggests that employees often lack the skills needed to succeed in international positions.

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The Management Skills Framework

The management skills framework focuses on human and conceptual skills.

We classify the skills as primarily:– personal – self-management and critical thinking.– interpersonal – communicating and resolving conflict.– managerial – leading, motivating, managing teams, strategic

planning, and creating a positive work culture.

The framework also considers three levels of effectiveness – employee, work unit, and organizational.

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Management Skills Framework

Organization

Organizational effectiveness

Work unit effectiveness

Employee effectiveness

Manager

Managerial skills

Interpersonal skills

Personal skills

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Action Planning and Implementation

Action planning refers to the process through which a manager formulates the specific steps that will be taken to address business problems and challenges.

The action plan becomes a blueprint or roadmap for actual implementation.

Guidelines for developing and implementing effective action plans include:

– The process must be systematic and actively managed.– Action planning requires a “layering” approach in which action steps

are translated into specific supporting actions in relation to each employee who will be involved in implementation.

– There must be ongoing and systematic evaluation of the results achieved after implementation of the action plan.

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Action Planning and Implementation

Identifykey

problems

Defineobjectivesassociated

with solvingthe key

problems

Identifykey

measuresof success

for eachobjective

Work withemployees

to formulateaction stepsto achieve

eachobjective

Assignimplementationresponsibility

for each actionstep to aspecific

employee

Clarify therole of eachemployee in

supporting theimplementation

of the plan

Providemanagementsupport (e.g.,

direction,budget,

training) foremployees

Evaluatethe results ofimplementing

the actionsteps against

your initialobjectives

Modify theobjectivesor action

stepsbased on

yourevaluation

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Lighten Up: Performance!

Companies are finding creative ways to develop their employees’ skills, and many are turning to literature, music, and the arts.

When management consulting firm McKinsey & Company wanted to develop its employees’ abilities to inspire, it hired outsiders to help the firm’s consultants and partners write and stage an opera in three days.

At Sears, Lockheed Martin, and Bristol Myers Squibb, a conductor and symphony orchestra rehearse Brahms to bring alive issues of leadership and teamwork for aspiring top managers.

Education

Chapter 1: The New Workplace