MIM 213

A Case Study for Organizational Management

Submitted to: Dr. Cythia Alpas

Submitted by: Noria K.Ali

JEREMIAH BIGATALLIOS LEADERSHIP CHALLENGE

Jeremiah Bigatallio was eager to start his new job at Intercontinental Communication, a high- tech company near Boston. Jeremiah, a civil engineer, joined the organization because it was a relatively young, growing, and dynamic organization that claimed in a brochure five years ago that its work environment was modeled on that of Microsoft. Jeremiah was hired as director of engineering services to supervise a staff of 25. The staff includes 10 engineers, 7 technicians, and 8 lab assistants. Mr. Bigatallios predecessor was John, who was fired for just cause. The official reason for his dismissal was not made public, but it is well known that he was having trouble managing his staff as well as interacting with other departments. First, most of the engineers did not get along with one another; some have not spoken to each other for more than two years. Second, the technicians disliked the engineers because they were seen as arrogant prima donnas who were concerned only about themselves. The engineers did not have any respect for or confidence in the technicians. They felt that the technicians were a group of bungling incompetents who should all be sent back to trade school. Third, both of these teams were in almost complete harmony in their contempt for the lab assistants, all of whom they felt were lacking in initiative, vastly overpaid, vastly under qualified, and more concerned with abusing overtime privileges and being promoted than achieving and maintaining minimum productivity standards. Other line and staff departments head were very upset with John Angle. The head of corporate financial control was dissatisfied with him because his department was constantly over budget allocations, particularly because of the excessive amount of overtime worked by his staff. He did not keep good records and did not submit accounting information on time. A recent audit revealed major financial irregularities of more than $300,000 in salaries. And there were also concerns about potential misappropriation of $250,000 of a government grant program. People in other departments (research development, manufacturing, quality assurance) were very

displeased with John Angle because the internecine warfare on going in his department made it difficult to work with anyone in engineering. This lack of communication, and frequent substandard lathes, dies, and design surveys, resulted in backlogged work and unnecessary overtime expenses. And when communication did occur, the engineering units performance was generally unreliable. John Angle believed in self-directing and autonomous work teams. Consequently, he believed in empowering his subordinates to make decisions and to feel responsible for the successes of the department was well as their own successes. John provided little or no direction or support for his subordinates. He did not articulate his vision, leadership style, or expectations to his subordinates. He felt that they were highly trained professionals who should know what is expected of them and should be willing to do the right thing. He also felt that by being self-regulating an solving their own problems as they arose, employees would learn from their own mistakes. He saw this as the best way for employees to grow and develop on the job and for the organization to realize maximum output from workers. John Angle viewed himself as a progressive liberal thinker whose new-age leadership style would transform and motivate employees to achieve great things. He believed that sharing power would enhance employees self-worth and energize them. He also believed in maintaining a convivial work atmosphere. Thus, absenteeism and lateness were overlooked. Angle was also fairly lax in enforcing work rules and work productivity standards. As a consequence of the laxity in discipline and absence of enforcement of work standards, employees took advantage of the situation and worked at their leisure; they frequently late or absent and (mis)managed other aspects of their own work schedule. They also took frequent coffee breaks and tended to work substantially higher amounts of overtime relative to other employees in the organization. When Jeremiah was hired, he was told that he had the full confidence of the CEO and his vice presidents to clean up the mess in the engineering department. He was given four months to fix all the existing problems in the departments. On his first day on the job, Jeremiah sat down in his office and typed on his laptop: What type of leadership style should I use on this diverse team of individuals? Then he stopped to retrieve from his pocket a note that he found under his door that morning. It said: try changing our overtime around here and we will cut you down to size!

Discussion Questions 1. In what way was John Angles leadership style ineffective? In what way may the existing span of control be considered too broad or too narrow? What impact does the existing structure have on a managers leadership style?

Answer 1:

The case shows the relationship between John Angle and his subordinates are extremely poor as John could not monitor his staffs' behavior did not make communication with them. Also, due to the lack of consideration in both of subordinates and task with unclear goals and mission, the tasks were unstructured and inconsistent. Furthermore, John Angle did not tell his staffs what to do and gave them empowerment. This resulted in weak position power relating to leader. Actually, his leadership style was neither relationship orientation nor task orientation. Besides avoiding the conflict and making no communication with the subordinates, he did not care about the tasks. The work is backed-logged even though there was overtime and the accounting problems were uncontrolled. What John Angle did is nothing but keeping let his subordinates behave what they felt like behaving. Therefore, his leadership style was totally unidentified and ineffective. Another evidence for John Angle's leadership ineffective is based on path-goal theory. The theory focuses on how leadership behaviors can influence the subordinates' satisfaction and performance to achieve their goals. John Angle had high confidence in his subordinates and thought they are professional. There was little or no rule and procedure in work environment. The subordinates had too much empowerment with autonomous work team. Therefore, they lose their self-conscious and did what they wanted. However, John Angle decided not to involve in any of these as he wanted his subordinates to solve the problem themselves. Therefore, there was no participation. The case also shows that not only he did not give direction, supports to the staffs but also there were no expectations and visions from him. John Angle killed the team works affecting the organization. His behaviors did not match with any leadership styles, including direction, support, participation and achievementorientation. However, his personality is only a small factor of his ineffective leadership. Main reasons are poor communication, wrong implementation of power. The way of existing span of control can be broad when a leadership become effective by influencing his people, providing purpose, direction, and motivation while operating to accomplish the mission and improving the organization and when the existing span of control too narrow by means of lack of control in managing a certain company. From that point, the amount of absenteeism and turnover among the staffs will decrease. Therefore, it is

reasonable for John Angle to believe and think that self-managed work teams would be the best way to rule. However, looking at the aspect in leadership roles of self-directing work teams provides the reasons why the way John Angle chose was ineffective. First of all, self-managed team is ineffective when the team members among the subordinates really understand their roles relating to the goal-setting and the groups' expectation. The point is that John Angle did not make communication with the subordinates about what his expectation is, what his vision is or what the goals are to meet the organization's objectives. These led to the lack of information about the subordinates' roles and tasks. Secondly, self-managed team requires interaction and cooperation between the members. It is obvious to see that it is impossible for the subordinates to work together consistently due to high conflict occurring at the workplace. The problem is John Angle did not think so and still implement autonomous team whereas the conflict was not solved. Thirdly, self-managed team is not a good idea when the span of control is broad. The impact does the existing structure have on a managers leadership style is negative because it show the autocratic style, lack of communication and his leadership style was neither relationship orientation nor task orientation. Besides avoiding the conflict and making no communication with the subordinates, he did not care about the tasks.

2. Use the path-goal leadership model to identify the best leadership style(s) for Jeremiah Bigatallio in this situation at Intercontinental Communication.

Answer 2:

The good choice for Jeremiah might be directive leadership of path-goal theory. As the time is short to explain and give instruction to the subordinates what they should do or what their tasks are about. However, to analyze the work environment which is one of elements in situational factor, the engineers seemed to think highly and arrogantly about them. The point is that directive leadership might be not a good choice when there is high internal lack of control but there is not any theory stating it is impossible to choose it. As the achievement orientation cannot be used for dysfunctional behaviors, the styles of participation and support are better choices in this situation. However, Jeremiah cannot clean

up the mess within such a time if he uses participation or support. On the other hand, another thing Jeremiah has to consider his subordinates' former behaviors when choosing the leadership styles. He should think about how leadership styles can solve out the problems, especially overtime, poor performance and the violent attitude. Assuming that he uses directive leadership and tell his staffs what to do, what must not do and cut the overtime. Jeremiah will take him to a dangerous situation. An individual show his or her violent attitude by sending Jeremiah a threat that he will be in troubles if he cuts overtime. Therefore, Jeremiah cannot use just only one leadership style with is direction to cut overtime in this situation. The solution for Jeremiah according to path-goal theory is to integrate and exploit advantages of each leadership styles such as direction, participation or support. The best solution for Jeremiah in this case is to make the subordinates satisfy and will have to do work properly. Jeremiah might have communication with his subordinate and discuss about this. Jeremiah should let the staffs know that the over time will not be cut if the staffs follow his directions and do tasks properly. This is the best solution as direction style of leadership of path-goal theory helps him clean up the mess with in four months and also, the subordinates still get their overtime work and extra pay. However, this is the solution for only shortterm. From that point, it is assumed that the subordinates get to the right behavior after four months. Then, he might change the leadership style into participation and support, so that the relationship between him and the staff might be improved. As a result, it is showed that Jeremiah has to use more than one leadership style of path-goal theory in order to gain leadership effectiveness. Besides choosing leadership styles, Jeremiah should make sure the goals are clarified and understood by the subordinate. Therefore, when the goal is established and given to the staffs, they have more motivation to complete and achieve the goals as rewards. In the end, the feedback according to path-goal theory is provided to the subordinates can increase their desire to improve the performance.

3. What other type of leadership style could Jeremiah use in leading his staff? Explain why and how you believe the style you have selected will be effective in resolving the conflicts and other problems within the department and between departments.

Answer 3:

Other type of leadership style could Jeremiah use in leading his staff is the situational leadership model. Familiar to path-goal, Jeremiah can give directions, supports or guides to the subordinates but he also should focus on relationship behavior also, especially the readiness of the staffs to perform the tasks. This model encourages Jeremiah adjust leadership styles to fit the situations of environment. Therefore, Jeremiah not only can improve the motivation of employees but also can deal with stubborn individuals. However, this might be ineffective as Jeremiah is having such a shock of time. He should remember that there are only four months to solve all problems and he might not have enough time to explain the job to the staffs, so that they understand and make decisions. To solve the problems in time, Vroom-Jago model is a better choice for Jeremiah. The model applies seven situation factors and use high' and low' to measure the degree of significant in decision making. By measure how important the situations are, Jeremiah can decide that whether he will make decision himself, delegate, consult team, consult individual or facilitate. This model creates opportunity for the subordinates participate in decisionmaking at particular situations. Therefore, it is not always Jeremiah who provides directions and makes decision himself. From that point, Jeremiah not only can make high-quality decision but also gives the staff more job satisfaction. It is because the staffs feel that they do participate in the organization's problem. It helps solve the conflict between Jeremiah and his subordinates. Also, Jeremiah can clean up the mess promptly. Besides focusing on leadership styles, Jeremiah can motivate the subordinates by feedbacks and rewards so as to improve communication in work place and increase the subordinates' motivation. Another way for Jeremiah to resolve the conflict is to invite third-party to involve in and negotiate with the subordinates. The third-party might be top-manager or the vice-president. With mediation, the third-party might negotiates with subordinates and identify problems of conflict. Then, the agreement is given to subordinate to perform. It might help Jeremiah solve the problem of conflict.