Critical Incident 1: Changes Initiated By Management (Smart Goals) Essay Examples

Assignment

I. Case abstract
The case of PRME reflects the present day challenges faced by global organizations and their Managerial force whilst they are aiming to expand market share and product portfolio within set deadlines. The case is a classic example of change process in an organization and resistance to change by employees.
Ravi Verghese the mid 30’s ambitious go-getter with immigrant roots in South India is brimming with ambition and motivated to take on the challenge of growing market share for the organization he work’s for against all odds namely- Head Quarter relocation, pressure to meet ever increasing sales targets, technological changes, increase in travel to build clientele etc. He is optimistic about meeting or exceeding the target of 10% increase in sales set by his superiors and motivates his team for working towards this goal. Majority of senior managers employed in today’s MNC represents an entrepreneur at heart who is willing to solve bigger problems than just meeting team targets in an 8 hour corporate day. They are willing to take up bigger challenges persay- groom intellectual and human resources, explore uncharted waters and to some day get their organization’s enlisted under Fortune 500 or blue chip league.
In the case in hand, Ravi after consulting all available resources- sales statistics, appraisals, reviews, day to day sales reports, consulting his confidant senior sales associates, assimilates his thoughts and gut feelings and reconnects with his friend Portia Kingston, MBA student, author and an Organizational Behaviour teacher, who suggests he starts by studying every individual personnel-their capabilities, incapilities, background, lifestyle etc so as to give him a deeper understanding of why they re-act the way they do? This would easily help him manage and re-align these individuals converting weak performers into productive employees of PRME thereby paving a smooth path to attain the additional challenge conferred to him of bringing up PRMEsports’ sale by 10% by year end .
II. Critical incidents

The first critical incident is expansion and upsell targets set by PRME’s management.
PRME’s product portfolio increased from age related products developed for senior citizens to products catering to sport injury medical supplies for people of all ages, a result of the growing sports enthusiasts who have started integrating sports into their daily lifestyle.
Within 18 months of expanding its product portfolio the top management set incremental maket share growth assignment-launched under the name-‘Reach for the stars’. This would entail the sales force to up the maket share quotient by an additional 10% before end of the year.

Critical incident 2: Staffing Needs

No additional acquisition of sales employee to meet increased targets alongside facing simultaneous challeges.
Consecutive challenges- First the expansion of product portfolio from aged people products to medical injury products for people across all age groups. Secondly within a year and a half of the former change being handled the target to add 10% market share to the current market captured.

Critical incident 3: Work Life Challenges

Prevailing work life challenges a result of frequent changes and expansion in organization, relocation of organization’s Head Quarter, increased percentage of travel resulting from rising number of customer meetings lined to convert a longer list of clientele followed by the added pressure of newly acquired technological processes-fully integrate and maintain the newly launched electronic enterprise data system.

Critical incident 4: Employee Training & Development Needs

The need to retrain and upsell the existing workforce that is already facing the following hurdles-
Higher technological advances posing a disadvantage to old employees aged 50 and above to adapt and apply.
Stringent HR policies orienting work hours, tele-working, new formal dress codes, frequent meetings and reviews etc.
Rebuilding a sales pipleline from scratch involving redoing basic chores with added fervor example: cold calling.
Critical incident 5: Employee Assessment Needs
There is a need to identify the merits and demerits of every team member in the sales force, their capabilities, incapacities, background, lifestyle, individual unique characteristics and the way it impacts work, personality changes and work ethics . In addition to consulting all available datas, statistics and reports so as to realign every sales team member to attain the common goal of attaining an additional 10% market share before year end.
III. Recommendations
The most important challenge in the case study-Reach for the stars lies in keeping the sales force motivated against a very frequently changing business environment.

Employee Participation in Change Process

The sales force is under the acute pressure of attaining an additional 10% market share. In the current extremely competitive business environment a growth of 2 to 3 % is a daunting task as the markets are over populated with manufacturers and service providers manufacturing and servicing similar product lines. Herein achieving 10% growth would require manifold times effort and very many sincere work hours from every participant of the team.

Employee Motivation

Organization is initiating technological changes, changes in HR policies and the organization is becoming a more stringent, formal business environment. This might appear hostile to many aged and experienced workers (example Tom) who were comfortable with following the old ways for a long time as well as to new entrants (example:Lydia in this case) who find it difficult to cope with robust system frameworks but is otherwise a go-getter in a flexible work environment. Thus PRME senior manager Ravi should refresh their objectives to suit Maslow’s self-actualization needs according to Maslow’s Hierarchy Needs Theory . At the end of the day only a happy employee who brings his every element to the table and is highly productive, is one who feels his initiatives are appreciated, has independence to be spontaneous and creative within the system and takes up challenges atleast once in a while to do something beyond the daily chores. He should not feel tied down within hefty technological bounations and frameworks.
According to Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory of Motivation Ravi needs to ensure the presence of hygiene and motivation factors in the workplace that ensures satisfaction and pacifies his employees to attain the target of achieving 10% market share despite frequent changes in the working environment . This is where Ravi the smart senior manager needs to ensure hygiene factors like good remuneration, employee friendly policies (work life balance), employee benefits (health care plans), good working ambience (work space cleanliness, maintenance of hardware, electronic equipment),healthy intra team relationship (off-sites, team luncheon, fun team activities), job security. He should assure presence of Motivation factors eminent for maintaining the go getter attitude of sales team and spreading positivity and enthusiasm by ensuring career growth path of each employee, rewards and recognitions plans, relevance of the work assigned to each employee and involvement, ownership of each employee towards the work he is assigned to do.

Participative Leadership

Thirdly Ravi can introduce a bi-weekly meeting dedicated to sharing of fresh instinctive ideas or experiences acquired by older employees. In this meeting employees can volunteer and share there path breaking ideas and creative means to break into the market besides the usual cold calling, client meeting fixing route. Similarly employees who are older in the system may share their stories as to how they resolved a complicated complaint case in the past and satisfied customers. This intra-team exercise besides exchanges of ideas and learning will let team members feel their independence, spontaneity in the system and make them feel more involved and empowered.

Employee Rewards

Fourthly to keep an up beat sales team against continuous micro and macro level challenges it is extremely important to gratify your internal customers i.e. employees from time to time. As explained in Adam’s Equity Theory every individual validates his inputs, hard work and labor with what he gets in return from the organization . In the case in hand we can see our token old white guy, Tom grumbling over bonus, incentive, sales wellness-counseling programs, free gym memmberships and knick tickets. While the exact reason of his displeasure is not explained we can arrange an exercise within the sales team wherein members can pen down benefits and gratifications that are of relevance to them and then share it in the drop box so that the senior managers can go through them and sync the suggestions into benefits, rewards and recognitions.They may keep their names anonymous if they are shy or not comfortable about disclosing the same.

Cross-Cultural Teams

Fifth, every individual in the system has some positives and some drawbacks. In the case Jamal who is intelligent and well educated, lags behind in complying with maintaining reports and records or Brad who is extremely tech savvy finds it demotivating to continually build a pipeline through cold calling and misses exercising his prowess on interacting with customers on new softwares. So a buddy training program can be put in place where two members with contrasting skills and weakness can work together for a week and teach their respective skills to their partner thereby increasing the overall productivity of the team.

Management by Objectives (MBO)

Whilst implementing Management by Objective Ravi clearly needs to define the objective of his sales team and then monitor and evaluate his team’s performance as this will aid him in setting realistic corporate objectives and strategies ensuring continuity of a healthy performance and team’s growth in the long run .
IV. Learning Outcomes

This case study helped me in the following ways:

Develop an understanding of change process in an organization right through need for change till change implementation and feedback.

References

Baker McClearn, D. J. (2010). Absence management and Presenteeism. The pressures on employees to attend workand the impact of attendance on performance, Human Resource Management Journal.
Experts, M. (n.d.). Herzberg’s Two-Factor Theory of Motivation. Retrieved January 10, 2015, from Management Study Guide: http://www.managementstudyguide.com/herzbergs-theory-motivation.htm
Griffin, E. (n.d.). A First Look at Communication Theory. Retrieved from http://www.afirstlook.com: http://www.afirstlook.com/docs/hierarchy.pdf
Grimsley, S. (n.d.). What Is Management by Objectives (MBO)? - Definition, Advantages & Disadvantages. Retrieved January 10, 2015, from Education-portal.com: http://education-portal.com/academy/lesson/what-is-management-by-objectives-mbo-definition-advantages-disadvantages.html
John Walter Jones, B. D. (1991). Applying Psychology in Business: The Handbook for Managers and Human Resouce Professionals. New York, USA: Lexington Books.
Ray French, C. R. (2011). Organizational Behaviour. New York, USA: John Wiley & Sons.