Ataraxia Burns City University of New York School of Professional Studies Organizational Behavior Week 5 1. Which of Schwartz’s ten values are driving the behavior of managers at Bain & Co. , Home Depot, and Best Buy? Provide examples to support your conclusions. Response: In the case of Home Depot, Benevolence and Universalism was one of the most salient values being exhibited – there is loyalty on behalf of Frank Blake towards is team in wanting to take care of them during the market downturn by lowering the sales and profit targets that hourly employees were to meet to receive bonuses.
It translated in a great response that generated a higher amount of achievement by the staff than ever before, here we see Security at play since there is a reciprocity (“ You take care of me, I take care of you”). At Best Buy, Universalism. Employees are asked to be a part of the solution; it shows appreciation for their contributionsand concern for their welfare. Finally, at Bain, I would say Stimulation – things are on a downswing and you can keep doing the same thing or do as Steve Ellis did and take on the challenge finding ways to expand while others contract.
Self-Direction is also driving his behavior as he is creative about finding ways to use up and coming talent while also recruiting veterans to a new field. 2. How would you describe Steve Ellis’s affective, cognitive, and behavioral components of his attitude toward managing in a recession? Be specific. Response: Affective: Ellis feels positive about the prospects in consulting and its growth possibility in emerging markets and corporate turnarounds.
Cognitive: He believes he can continue to grow his company’s consulting business by bringing on bot experienced consultants and recruiting at Business School. Behavioral: He acts by aggressively recruiting at Business schools as well as reaching out to former financial services consultants. 3. How are Home Depot and Best Buy trying to increase employee involvement? Response: Both companies do not hide from the issue of a downturn in business. They acknowledge it by addressing it with their employees. In both cases, there is communication happening.
Home Depot does it by boosting morale via the extension of restricted stock grants to assistant store managers – this level of management normally has no access to these grants; it helps get a broader section involved – the people on the sales floor who in turn can deliver the news of , lowered sales and profit targets for their hourly employees; Best Buy sets up online surveys soliciting ideas for cost cutting and involving their team in the solution. 4. Use Ajzen’s theory of planned behavior (Figure 6-3) to analyze how managers can increase employee performance during a recession.
Be sure to explain what managers can do to affect each aspect of the theory. Response: To increase employee performance during a recession, managers need to modify their teams behavior by recognizing that it is through intentions that their behavior can be modified. By changing their attitude (intent) – reinforcing their sense of job security, their ability to prosper at the company helps a great deal. When a team is faced with uncertainty, many opt to leave or just give up and be difficult.
The next step is to allow the employees have a say in changes in job processes to enahce performance and even in determining goals. Finally, having the team understand that their performance is in their control brings about a change in their intent and ultimately behavior. 5. . Based on what you learned in this chapter, what advice would you give to managers trying increase employees’ organizational commitment and job satisfaction in a recession? Be specific. Response: Communication is the fundamental action to maintain at the forefront.
Organizational commitment is lost quite quickly when decisions are made in a void and upper management/ownership is not forthcoming about challenges or shows disregard for the concerns and needs of the rest of the team. Companies can aggravate their vulnerability by not paying heed to those basic needs. I would advise managers to listen to what concerns their maybe and even prompt employees for their thoughts. When addressing projects or changes, it would be advisable that a manager find a way to involve their team in creating solutions via forums, surveys or brainstorming sessions.
