This article discusses elevator pitches for the topics of planning and customer service, as well as case discussions on shaping organizational culture and designing organizations, and organizational change. The article provides responses to questions and highlights management competencies in a VUCA world.
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Running head: ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Elevator Pitches and Case Discussions Name of the Student: Name of the University: Author Note:
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1ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Part A: Elevator pitches: Elevator pitch for topic:Is Planning Dead? Response to the Question: In a globalized and competitive market planning based on the market and its needs is essential for the survival of any business. A fast-changing market makes planning that much more important as the company needs to know how to not only meet up with the demands but also accurately gauge the future demands and thereby creating a larger market for their products (Wrenn & Mansfield, 2014). Sophisticated neural networking and other adaptive learning algorithms can predict rather accurately the consumer needs, trends and the most effective way to reach the clientele (Khoreshok et al., 2016). Based on these predictions the corporation can more efficiently allocate economic and human resources to minimize future uncertainties as well as ensure customer satisfaction. Short and long-term planning makes it possible for companies to set and achieve realistic objectives necessary for their growth. Elevator pitch for topic:Walking both sides of the street Response to the Question: The first step to ensuring clientele moving away from brick and mortar retail is to focus on and improve the one feature that is still rather lacking in the online markets, i.e., customer service on a personal level. Every store that intends to stay in competition with the online giants will have to provide the best personal services to their customers starting from assistance in the choice of products from a knowledgeable employee to the receipt of a returning customer with a concern by the friendliest personnel (Basoglu, & Hess, 2014). The other feature that is yet to be fulfilled by the online shops is the product experience of the customer before purchase. Physical stores need to provide every possible opportunity for the customer to try out the products on sale so as to ensure a continuing and growing business.
2ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Part B: Case discussion activity CasediscussionactivityforTopic:ShapingOrganisationalCultureAndDesigning Organisations Case name:Can a strong culture be too strong? Response to Question: 1 The case of Parivar is an interesting case that showcases how there should be a clear distinction between the professional and the personal, and how overlapping these two aspects will drive away employees and increase the rate of employee turnover. The conflicting values that are evident right from the beginning are the shadowing system which the IT company enforces on its employees. The vision of the company is that the experienced employees would act as a friend, philosopher and guide to the newly joined employees and guide them throughthewholeprocessofworkwhiledroppingthemadvisesimprovingtheir performances. However, it did not go as planned with employees leaving and raising a voice against the shadow system in their exit interviews. The senior managers of the company believe that employee turnover is not a bad thing because it just brings in more skilled people and passes on innovative ideas within the company (Ambrose, 2014). Unfortunately, the HR department does not agree and remains a sceptic with such a statement. The company’s vision of fostering a fraternity culture by assigning a big brother or shadow to each employee has intimidated the employees who are often met with criticism which is unnecessary and harsh. Besides, the promise of the company to the employees about giving them more exposure in front of the CEO of the company is not being successful as some entrants believe that clearly nepotism and favouritism takes over. Response to Question: 2
3ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS To suggest a resolution for Indira Pandit and Sudhir Gupta, it would be wise to advise that they should focus on implementing the people support strategy in a favourable way. The biggest problem with the support group is that they are coming as of intrusive rather than like big brothers, which the CEO of the company had the original vision for. As suggested by the employee Amal, favouritism also makes the support system a weak one. The HR department should endorse a support system with young managers who are well trained to have a sharp listing ear to the employees which would eventually foster trust within them. Besides, the young managers would have the experience and knowledge of a senior manager but would come as far less intimidating (Espinoza & Ukleja, 2016). Any kind of retaliation from this particular support group will always make the employees feel subordinated if not enslaved and they will choose to leave. On the contrary, a support system that is enriched with enthusiastic individuals would drive the employees by motivation along with helping them out with expert advice from time to time. Response to Question: 3 The case highlights certain management competencies which are important for any leader-manager in the VUCA world of the 21st century. A successful leader manager must have the skill to motivate the team by constantly passing on advice as well as plans that would match their vision with the vision of the company (Lawrence, 2013). To elaborate, the leader must foster faith and trust relationships which are fuelled by the vision of growing together, where the company and the employee both grow together with the aspects of money and experience. Besides, the leaders must also focus on building effective teams (Bolman & Deal, 2015). For Parivar, the leaders failed to build an effective support team, which instead on increasing employee retention, increased the rate of employee turnover. A perfect team can only be made when the junior-most and the senior most of the team are both valued equally and are bonded to each other in the background of a positive environment.
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4ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Case discussion activity for Topic: Organisational Change Case name:Welcome aboard (But don’t change a thing) Response to Question: 1 Having a look at the Welcome Aboard(But Don’t Change A Thing) case, it is evident that the six months old authority of Cheryl Hailstrom is not welcome by most of her subordinates and colleagues. Cheryl has been a part of the Lakeland Company for quite a long time, in fact, she has grown in respect and position with the same company. A family business that is intertwined with her service experience, Cheryl finds it difficult for her encouraging views to get successful fruition due to the retaliation she is getting from the colleagues and other contemporaries in the same company. Cheryl has been frustrated because she stands in support with her own aggressive midmarket growth plan which is further supported by key indicators. Lakeland has a massive customer account which appeals for an urgency. The company has only a few months before its holiday season. In these few months, the company has to design new toys, manufacture them and also deliver it to the client in order to completely get done with the order. According to Cheryl, it is important that the company takes major proactive steps to secure offshore production and operations, be ready to address branding issues amongst other things rather than clinging to the same old business model that most of her opposition supports (Shields et al., 2015). The conflicting values that are evident in these case are, the aggressive targets that Cheryl wants to meet before the holiday season and which the reluctant managers do not want to meet and the next one is the conflict that she has developed over time with her managers regarding cheap outsourcing of production, offshore. Response to Question: 2
5ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS To avoid such conflicts Cheryl Hailstrom must make some changes that would be of utmost benefit for her company. She can definitely include outsiders who are experienced in managing the offshore business but she must include existing managers to look after the operations as well. Cheryl must also appoint a supervising team to look after the midmarket private label development strategy (Johansen & Voto, 2014). The supervising team must also keep a stringent eye towards ensuring on-time delivery. Cheryl must change her leadership style. For example, Cheryl has relocated her office which has been seen as intimidation and coercion by her subordinates. Cheryl must also start listening to the opinions of her colleagues which will only let her find intelligent ways to draw parallels with the employees’ interests. By framing her business strategies in such a way that it meets all the individual needs and expectations of her subordinates, she can very well reason with them and make them lead the company in a direction which would be the best for it (Elkington et al., 2017). Response to Question: 3 This case highlights certain management competencies which are important for any leader-manager in the VUCA world of the 21st century. To talk about Cheryl, she lacks communication in an effective way and the lack of which is fuelling the conflicts which she is facing (Bennett & Lemoine, 2014). Cheryl must channelize the best of her employees through effective communication which stresses motivation and drawing a parallel between her vision and the vision of the employees. The second thing being delegation, Cheryl must channelize the managers according to their best qualities and motivate them in such a way that they do the work for her because it is true that she herself cannot run a business all by her own (Mack et al., 2015). Cheryl should also focus on effective team building which would eventually take care of the overseas production.
6ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Reference Ambrose, P. (2014).What Happened to Planning?(Routledge Revivals). Routledge. Basoglu, K. A., & Hess, T. J. (2014). Online business reporting: A signaling theory perspective.Journal of Information systems,28(2), 67-101. Bennett, N., & Lemoine, G. J. (2014). What a difference a word makes: Understanding threats to performance in a VUCA world.Business Horizons,57(3), 311-317. Bolman, L. G., & Deal, T. E. (2015). Think—or sink: Leading in a VUCA world.Leader to Leader,2015(76), 35-40. Elkington, R., Steege, M. V. D., Glick-Smith, J., & Breen, J. M. (Eds.). (2017).Visionary Leadership in a Turbulent World: Thriving in the New VUCA Context. Emerald Publishing Limited. Espinoza,C.,&Ukleja,M.(2016).ManagingtheMillennials:Discoverthecore competencies for managing today's workforce. John Wiley & Sons. Johansen, B., & Voto, A. (2014). Leadership skills to thrive in the future.People and Strategy,36(4), 4. Khoreshok, A. A., Zhironkin, S. A., Tyulenev, M. A., Barysheva, G. A., Blumenstein, V. Y., Hellmer,M.C.,&Potyagailov,S.V.(2016,August).Innovativetechnicsof managing engineers’global competencies.InIOP ConferenceSeries: Materials Science and Engineering(Vol. 142, No. 1, p. 012122). IOP Publishing. Lawrence, K. (2013). Developing leaders in a VUCA environment.UNC Exec Dev, 1-15. Mack, O., Khare, A., Krämer, A., & Burgartz, T. (Eds.). (2015).Managing in a VUCA World. Springer.
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7ELEVATOR PITCHES AND CASE DISCUSSIONS Shields, J., Brown, M., Kaine, S., Dolle-Samuel, C., North-Samardzic, A., McLean, P., ... & Plimmer,G.(2015).Managingemployeeperformance&reward:Concepts, practices, strategies. Cambridge University Press. Wrenn, B., & Mansfield, P. M. (2014).Marketing planning guide. Routledge.