Leadership In An Organization

I believe that leadership is a huge part of a business. From top managers, to middle level managers, to the employees. The way the managers act and behave will always reflect upon the way the employees act. I know this from my own personal experience. I have had jobs where the assistant manager is lazy and isnt not responsible, thus the other employees including me became somewhat lazy and irresponsible. I have also had jobs where the managers are paranoid about little things, so as a result I saw the other lower employees also paranoid and picky about little things. So the way the higher employees behave, like the manager, assistant manager etc. reflects upon the behavior of the lower employees. Thats why managers must be good leaders and good rolemodels for thier company.

What other ways does leadership affect a company?

In Response to Michaela

Is the cost of going green too expensive? Is that whats holding back companies going green?

I have done some research on green energy sources. I have found them to be very expensive, but I have also found them to be able to save a business a fairly good amount of money in the long run. For example, water power is not very expensive but the business needs to be somewhat close to a reliable flowing river. On the other hand, solar power is very expensive and obviously there needs to be an efficient amount of sun to provide power. This is why a lot of companies refuse to go green, because they dont want to wait a long period of time to see the profit from it. Also a lot of top managers arent properly informed about the benefits of green energy. A lot of companies just use location or situation as an excuse, like they are not located on a river or in a sunny area etc.

Are there any major companies that have decided to go completely green?

In response to Katie

Has a manager ever motivated you in a particular way that made you more motivated?

Yes, I have had a manager motivate me in some way. Recently during the month of october at my job, I cashier at a convenient store, we had to sell these pumkins for donations. We would ask the customer, would you like to donate to teh march of dimes? If they wanted to donate they would give us a dollar and we would put their name on a little paper pumpkin up on the wall. So most of us cashiers would always forget to ask, so we would end up asking only a few customers throughout the day. The manager would get mad and always be all over us to ask EVERY customer. So the manager came up with an incentive, who ever sold the most paper pumpkins by the end of the month would get $50. Now we all asked almost every customer and we ended up selling a lot of pumpkins. I didnt win but I sold a lot more than i would have with out a prize incentive.

Is that right to bribe employees with cash?

In response to Katie

Is facebook helpful to our society today?

I think that facebook can be helpful to the society in several ways. First it can help family and friends stay in touch with each other. Second in can help companies advertise thier companies by having pages. With businesses that have pages, facebook users can become a fan or "like" the company. By seeing what type of customers thier company attracts, they are able to target certain age groups or groups of people to get the most business.

In what other ways is facebook helpful to the society?

Managing Organization Change

Chapter 13 talks about managing organization change and innovation. I actually worked in a small convenient store that was changed in order to succeed. The store used to be just an average convenient store selling mostly soda, milk, candy, coffee, and other small grocery items. It was located right over the mass. border in NH, along a busy road. The store really didnt get much business becuase it wasnt near anything, it was just on the side of the road as people sped past it to get to the main part of town. They actually went out of business for a little while because they didnt know how to change in order to get more customers. Well about a year later, a family bought the store and completely changed it. Instead of being just an average convenient store they changed it into more of a liquor store and sold tons of beer and hard liquor and not much of the other stuff like soda and milk etc. They thought this would be a good idea because since they dont have as much tax in NH as they do MA, all the people in MA would come right over the border and buy their beer in NH at this store. It was a success, and now if its a nice day out, they are swamped with people all buying thier booze.

What other stores have been changed in order to not go out of business?

In Response to Jack

Is this going to be the worst Christmas ever, or can people look beyond the material objects?

It is pathetic how a lot people base the quality of thier Christmas and the holidays on how much cash they have to buy gifts for people. Or how much gifts they recieve from friends and family. In recent years many people go out and max out all their credit cards in the months of november and december, hoping to get a nice tax return in febuary to pay it all off. It's probably true that many people are going to be much more careful in how much money they spend this year because their budgets can't afford as much as they did in the years past. The economy is very bad, so maybe the malls and stores wont be as packed as they used to be. That is how most of the world views a good Christmas, tons of shopping and packed malls. But that is wrong, thats not the true meaning of Christmas, we are celebrating Jesus' birthday not going into debt. People should be able to just enjoy being with their families, having the day off, and eating good food with the people they love.

Whats more important to you, gifts and chaos or being with your family?

Organization Design

In my life I have had quite a few jobs. I have had jobs with all of the basic forms of organization designs. I worked at market basket for about year, and they have a mostly a fucntional or U form of organization. I think this form of organization is good for very large companies like market basket. But also its much more impersonal, because the main manager of the store barely knows the lowest employees, like the cart boys. I also worked at a small liquor store, which was a family business. This business didnt really have a organization design because of the fact that it was so small. The recent job I have is Cirlce K, which is a small gas station convenient store. The store itself is very small but it is owned by a much larger corporation, Macs Convenience. This corporation has an organization desing similar to the divisional M-form design. They have many small businesses and stores that are all related somehow. With my experience I have found working at the circle k most enjoyable. This is because it is not a small family business, but it is owned by a large corporation. The store itself is aslo small so the manager knows all the employees very well and we all know each other very well.

What type of organization design do you think works best? Does it have to do with what type of company it is?