Sugar Coating

November 17, 2010 6 Comments


Listen to this postYesterday was my anniversary at work. I have been with the same employer for the past 30 years and I enjoyed most of the days I worked there. Now I am managing more that 700 employees and I have tried to be fair with them while meeting most of their needs, requests and demands. One of the best tactics the employees use for their complains is “Sugar Coating”. I am not saying that the complain is true or not, but the way it is presented to me is sometimes strange.

For example, an employee would take an appointment to see my Boss and then start his discussion by saying “This is not a complain, I just wanted to say…” and then he or she would exaggerate every negativity they experienced in the last 3 years! Another example is when the employee send an official complain to HR or my Boss, but then catch me walking by and start by saying “I wanted to talk with you about an issue I have … do you have a minute do discuss it?”

We all make mistakes and we should take our responsibilities to admit the mistakes and correct them. But using different ways to discuss the complain is not the best start to resolve any issue. Through my years at work I followed a good philosophy that goes something like this “Do not explain…and Do not complain” and it made my life very simple and peaceful. I am sure that my boss does not want me to explain to him why I made the mistake (or delay in an assignment). And I am very sure that nobody would like to set and listen to my complains. When I make a mistake I would admit it and do my best to correct it. If I have a complain or an issue with somebody, I would meet him or her and discus the issue face-to-face with them. Other than this … life is very simple.

Filed under Behavior, Leadership Tagged with , , , , , , , ,

Waiting For That Promotion

October 18, 2010 1 Comment

Listen to this postA time will come during our long careers when we would wait for that important promotion. Naturally, most of the promotions involve a decision to select you between different candidates. Office politics and favoritism may have some affect on the selection but finally the selection is made and you will know about it in one of the following ways:

  1. You are called into one of your Bosses offices and told that they have thought about the selection and how difficult was the decision to select between you and the others, but at the end you were the best choice. You tell your self “finally they noticed me, I don’t now why it took them so long?” If you are promoted then you need to gain new knowledge and learn new skills to fulfill the job requirement. What you have learn so far was enough to get you the promotion, but your current capabilities are not enough to survive and thrive. First you to learn what it takes to do your new job, and then you have to improve your skills and knowledge to be ready for the next promotion.
  2. You are called into one of your Bosses office and told that they have thought about the selection and how difficult was the decision to select between you and the others, but at the end you were not the chosen one. You blame everybody and everything (except yourself) for not getting the promotion. You have to understand why you did not get that promotion. What were the reasons for not selecting you. What was the selection criteria and in which part you were not competitive. Start immediately working on your weaknesses and get ready for the next opportunity.
  3. You are not called, or you don’t know about the selection process and you would be the last one to know that somebody else was promoted and you have missed the chance. You feel that you were cheated or stupid. If you were not aware of the opportunity then you need to improve your networking skills. However, if the opportunity was keep secret on purpose then you should consider changing your employer. Go ahead and find another employer who appreciate your work and give you equal opportunities with other candidates.
By the way, if you are not ready for a promotion or there are no promotions for you in the near future then you have to think seriously about your career.

Filed under Leadership Tagged with , , , , ,

Keiretsu

October 7, 2010 2 Comments

Minority networks of Japanese organizations have shares in the other organizations to create a larger network. The network collaborates to boost each other’s interest (Jones, 2007).
Financial Keiretsu link and group various companies which have their own large banks. The capital Keiretsu is used to manage input and output linkages between the small networks of organizations (Jones, 2007).
Toyota is using capital Keiretsu by owning as large as 40% share from the companies that supply it with inputs. With this share, Toyota is able to exercise good control on its resources (Jones, 2007). The Fuyo Keritsu is a financial Keiretus that has Hitachi, Nissan, Canon and many other companies joined by Fuji bank which provide the financial services to the group.
Just In Time (JIT) principle is part of the Keiretsu theory where companies depend on receiving the needed parts just in time for their use from a supplier that produce the right amount for the user. Keiretsu enabled Toyota to have the strong relation with its suppliers without the cost of owning and managing them. General Motors (GM) has full ownership of its suppliers than any other carmaker which made GM incur the cost of the supplier while the supplier running inefficient operations knowing that GM will buy their products regardless of their business efficiency.
Ford the car manufacturer formed its Keiretsu by owning minor share in its engine supplier, windows producers, body parts and wheels manufacturer. Ford also had notable ownership in the car rental company Hertz which use Ford’s cars only (Jones, 2007).

Filed under Management Tagged with , , ,

Giving Feedback: Positive or Negative

September 28, 2010 4 Comments

Listen to this postGiving feedback or confronting employees is one of the most difficult social task we face in our lives. Giving positive feedback is sometimes called motivation or encouragement, and many of us are sometimes doing it wrongly by generalizing the feedback by saying “you have done a good job”. A good feedback should be specific like saying “Your report has listed the major critical points that we did not notice before, thank you for reporting them to us.” We do similar or even worse mistakes when we give negative feedbacks. Sometimes our negative feedback has more destructive effect than the constructive change we hoped for. Reading the following pages will help you understand the types of feedbacks you may use at work or at home. Some valuable examples are given at the end for your reference.

Giving feedback or confronting employees is one of the most difficult social task we face in our lives.Giving positive feedback is sometimes called motivation or encouragement, and many of us are sometimes doing it wrongly by generalizing the feed back by saying “you have done a good job”. Agood feedback should be specific like saying “Your report has listed the major critical points that we did not notice before, thank you for reporting them to us.”We do similar or even worse mistakes when we give negative feedbacks. Sometimes our negative feedback has more destructive effect than the constructive change we hoped for. Reading the following pages will help you understand the types of feedbacks you may use at work or at home. Some valuable examples are given at the end for your reference. Read more …

Click here to download the full material as PDF file.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Filed under Behavior, Management Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Explicit or Implicit Knowledge

September 27, 2010 2 Comments

Listen to this postDyer and Hatch (2004) stated that knowledge is two types, explicit and implicit. The explicit knowledge can be recorded and shared easily without losing its value during the transfer (Dyer & Hatch, 2004). An example of the explicit knowledge would be the market’s facts and figures that make most of the general information shared by any trade. The implicit knowledge is the pragmatic and complex knowledge that results from experience or experimental learning (Dyer & Hatch, 2004). Implicit knowledge is the hidden and most people do not know that they have it in them. An example of the implicit knowledge would be the required know-how to change and organization culture. The culture change would be done mostly by unfelt skills and knowledge. Implicit knowledge is difficult to imitate and considered as a competitive advantage for the organization over its rivals. Implicit knowledge is thought to be the base for innovative products and processes. One of Dells implicit knowledge examples is the technology that mixes mass customization; just-in-time and customer focus in one strategy and executes it flawlessly (Magretta, 1998).

References:

Dyer, J., & Hatch, N. (2004). Using supplier networks to learn faster. MIT Sloan Management Review, 45(3), 57-63.

Magretta, J. (1998). The power of virtual integration: An interview with dell computer’s Michael Dell. Harvard Business Review, 76(2), 72-84.

Filed under Behavior, Management Tagged with , , ,

Skilled Workers Vs. Cheap Labor

September 23, 2010 1 Comment

Listen to this postInternational producers, like China, are exporting  their products to sell them at or lower than the production cost (Vandenbussche & Zanardi, 2008). Local companies can compete with the low-cost labor by making the costly labor more efficient to produce the same product in less time and with less waste (time and material). Klempa (2006) states that productivity can be drastically improved when the roadblocks are removed. Productivity improve by improving management planning, making productivity a strategic initiative, aiming high, measuring progress and making changes as needed (Klempa, 2006). The same worker might cost more but he or she would produce high output with less reworks. Local business would face stiff competition from the international producers if the same quality could be produced with cheaper labor.

References:

Klempa, M. (2006). Eliminating productivity roadblocks. Financial Executive, 22(8), 32-35.

Vandenbussche, H., & Zanardi, M. (2008). What explains the proliferation of antidumping laws? Economic Policy, 23(53), 93-138. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-0327.2007.00196.x

Filed under Marketing Tagged with , , , , ,

The Personnel Policy

September 18, 2010 2 Comments

Listen to this postMost of the medium and large organizations has a written personnel policy. The size and effectiveness of such policy depend on the organization size and culture. The bigger the organization the more detailed is its policy. The policy start small and simple but grow up and get more complicated with time. New procedures or rules are written frequently to cover the organizational needs. Expansions and new ventures require new rules and regulations; however, most of the new procedures are written to regulate or organize new situations that led to or going to lead to a problem. This fact explain why most of the personnel polices are complexed and confusing. The personnel policy was written in a reactive (or firefighting) mode. Some of the rules in policy are not applicable now or could cause more damage that it can regular and prevent. Some internet sites offer a ready-made “cookie cutter” policy that the starting companies can use with some customization. I doubt that a policy written for specific culture in a specific industry would be useful for anther culture and industry, but unfortunately, sometimes this happens! The best way to write a personnel policy is to have a specialist in Organizational Behavior to study the organizations culture and nature of work then write the full policy. The policy would be updated as needed but the specialist or consultant should be called whenever the organization anticipate change at work. The policy would need periodic revisions to rewrite or drop some of the old rules and regulations.

Filed under Behavior, Management Tagged with , , , , ,

Should We Outsource Pharmaceutical Products?

September 14, 2010 1 Comment

Listen to this postOutsourcing became almost a must for most of the organizations. The electronics producers are a good example for outsourcing where most of the parts are outsourced or sometimes the products is completely manufactured by a different company. If you flip you iPhone and check the writing on the bottom of the phone you will notice “Designed by Apple in California, Assembled in China”!! Outsourcing eelectronic is more acceptable than other products like pharmaceutical products. The risk in outsourcing pharmaceutical products is very high because of the products nature. Melamine-laced mile products were responsible for the death of six babies and  poison contaminants in cough syrup were responsible for the death of more than 100 people in Panama. About 80% of the prescription drugs sold in the U.S are made outside the U.S. (“Outsourcing safety,” 2009). Risk management is very important to overcome the risk in pharmaceutical products (Fiscus, 2009). Product liability lawsuit could wipe out the cost saving from outsourcing the product and have a permanent scare in the firm’s brand (Fiscus, 2009).

References:

Fiscus, P. W. (2009). Global risks for drug manufacturers. Risk Management (00355593), 56(4), 50-54.

Outsourcing safety. (2009). Editorial, Nature Medicine, pp. 221-222. Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=a9h&AN=36818298&site=ehost-live

Filed under Management, Marketing, Thoughts Tagged with , , , , , ,

International Trade Policy

August 28, 2010 3 Comments

Listen to this postTrade policy is a set of standards, rules and regulations that govern the country’s trade. A good trade policy would maintain or improve the country’s trade by regulating the tax, tariffs and  inspections regulations. Countries would look for a set of trading standard or regulations to smooth out the trading between both of them. A strategic trade policy would affect the firms strategic interactions in international oligopoly (Sen, 2005). A business can push for a trade policy that give it more advantage of over the international competitors. For example, if two producers of the same product are competing in the local market but one of them is national producer, the national producers should ask for tax or tariff put on the international producer to give it the price advantage in the local market. The U.S. entered in three free trade agreements. The second agreement was with Canada and the third was the North American Free Trade Agreement which is known as NAPTA (Taylor, 2009). The three agreements were set as a result of the U.S. experience in the globalization and multilateral system. Free trade agreement would be the best agreement the business may bush for because it lefts taxes, tariffs and quotas. Globalization would be faster and more effective between countries who agree on the free trade because the products can have fair opportunities in participating countries and the best product would be available to the consumer at the lowest price.

References:
Sen, S. (2005). International trade theory and policy: What is left of the free trade paradigm? Development & Change, 36(6), 1011-1029. doi: 10.1111/j.0012-155X.2005.00447.x

Taylor, C. O. N. (2009). Of free trade agreements and models. Indiana International & Comparative Law Review, 19(3), 569-609.

Filed under Management, Thoughts Tagged with , , ,

Preparing a Code of Ethics

August 21, 2010 3 Comments

Listen to this postTseng, Duan, Tung, and Kung (2010) analyzed 85,000 cited references of 3,059 articles from three business ethics related journals. The researchers found three concentration of interest in the cited references. The concentration was around the following:

  • Ethical and unethical decision-making
  • corporate governance and firm performance
  • Ethical principles and code of conduct

Comparable study was conducted by Forster, Loughran, and McDonald (2009) on a sample of firms listed on the Standard & Poor’s 500 showed similar sentences in their code of ethics. The repeated phrases are covering law obedience, acting with integrity, commitment to integrity,  commitments to treating others with fairness, exercising citizenship rights and remaining committed to the organization’s values. Messikomer and Cirka (2010) stated  honesty, respect, integrity, quality, neutrality and responsibility as the code of ethics principles for the organization (Messikomer & Cirka, 2010).

The list of important rules and principles above are a good guideline to write most of the organizational code of conduct. The process can start with identifying the organizational values and learn for the past experiences when the organizations had ethical problems or when employees violated the organizational values. The employees should be involved in writing the code of conduct, however representatives from each departments or sections would be enough when the organization has many employees that could not be assembled in one locations to discuss such intangible issue. The key stakeholders comments would be valuable for writing the code of ethics because the stakeholders are directly affected by the organizational ethics. The code of ethics history shows that the code writing was reactive to the international ethical violations (Messikomer & Cirka, 2010). Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) of 1977 was set to control the supply side corruption by imposing anti-bribery provisions and accounting provision. The act had limited success in the anti-bribery practices according to Darrough (2010), but the ethical users relatively subsided after issuing the act (Messikomer & Cirka, 2010).

Read also in this blog: Ethical Management and  Starting New Business Ethically

Share/Bookmark

References:

Darrough, M. (2010). The FCPA and the OECD convention: Some lessons from the U.S. experience. Journal of Business Ethics, 93(2), 255-276. doi: 10.1007/s10551-009-0219-5

Forster, M., Loughran, T., & McDonald, B. (2009). Commonality in codes of ethics. Journal of Business Ethics, 90, 129-139. doi: 10.1007/s10551-010-0380-x

Messikomer, C., & Cirka, C. (2010). Constructing a code of ethics: An experiential case of a national professional organization. Journal of Business Ethics, 95(1), 55-71. doi: 10.1007/s10551-009-0347-y

Tseng, H.-C., Duan, C.-H., Tung, H.-L., & Kung, H.-J. (2010). Modern business ethics research: Concepts, theories, and relationships. Journal of Business Ethics, 91(4), 587-597. doi: 10.1007/s10551-009-0133-x

Enhanced by Zemanta

Filed under Behavior, Management, Thoughts Tagged with , , , , ,

← Older posts

Newer posts →

%d bloggers like this: