A.

SYNOPSIS OF THE MOVIE

B. ISSUES OR PROBLEMS REVEALED IN THE MOVIE

I. Issue of stress
II. Issue of conflicts
III. Issue of lack of leadership quality portrayed by Barney Ross
IV. Issue of poor team foundations and team cohesiveness

C. RELATING THE ISSUES WITH THE STUDY OF ORGANIZATIONAL

BEHAVIOUR
I. Stress Management in an Organization
II. Conflicts
III. Leadership Qualities in Organizational Setting
IV. Foundations of Team Dynamics and Team Composition

D. SUGGESTIONS IN MINIMIZING THE ISSUES IDENTIFIED

I. Increase emotional intelligence to tackle the issue of stress
II. Solving conflict through problem solving method
III. Increasing leadership competencies
IV. Building a stronger team dynamic and strengthen team
cohesiveness

E. LIST OF REFERENCES
A. SYNOPSIS OF THE MOVIE

The Expendables 3 tells the story of the Expendables team, led by Barney Ross and consists

of Lee Christmas, Doctor Death and the other three members of the team that come to a

frontal battle with a guy named Conrad Stone banks who was the co-founder of the

Expendables team together with Barney Ross before turning his back from the team and

becoming a ruthless arms trader. Barney was previously given a mission to kill him, but Stone

banks managed to eluded death and now is in the mission of killing not only Barney Ross, the

guy whom wanted to kill him before, but also the other members of the Expendables Team.

After Caesar, one of the members of the Expendables team was shot down by Stone banks,

Barney decided to disband the old team and form a new team consisting of younger and

stronger members with the sole mission of taking down Stone banks once and for all.

B. ISSUES OR PROBLEMS REVEALED IN THE MOVIE

There are four main issues or problems that are apparent throughout the movie. These four
issues are as follow:

I. Issue of stress

One of the apparent problems that we can identify in the Expendables 3 movie is the issue of

stress. This issue was highlighted mainly by the main character of the movie; Barney Ross

played by Sylvester Stallone, throughout the movie. In the movie, Barney is a character that

was created to lead the Expendables Team, or in other word, he was given the responsibility

of being the leader for the team. The issue of stress was highlighted in the movie in the scene

after Caesar, one of the members of the old Expendables Team, was shot down by Stone

banks during their operation of taking down a man named Victor Menz. Barney

regarded Stone banks’ decision of aiming the shot at Caeser instead of him, as a

sign or threat given by Stone banks that he will hurt not only Barney but the other members

of the Expendables Team too. As the leader of the team, Barney felt like it was his

responsibility to ensure the safety of the other members of the team and to make sure that
what happened to Caeser will not happen to the other members as well. Because of the stress

felt by Barney due to his instinct of wanting to protect the safety of the other members of the

team, he then made the biggest decision that became the turning point of the movie which is

to disband the present Expendables Team and to recruit new team members that are younger

and stronger than the previous members in order for them to hunt Stone banks down. We can

clearly see that the stress felt by him

has urged him to make a hasty decision of disbanding the old team and forming a new team

without discussing about his decision to the former members of the team first. The members

then felt like he was betraying them for leaving them behind and forming a new team to replace

them. Because of his rush decision of wanting to form a new team in order to arrest Stone

banks, he has put the safety of his new team members at-risk since they were not given any

training nor briefing beforehand of the mission. This then led to them being held as hostages

by Stone banks in order to lure Barney into the trap that he has created.

II. Issue of conflicts

Another issue that arise in the movie of The Expendables 3 is conflict. Conflict sensued

through out the movie everytime the members of the old team meet with the members of the

new team. Conflict occurred on the first occurrence between these two teams, which was

before Barney and the other members of the new team depart for their mission of capturing

Stonebanks. The members of the old team that were feeling dejected and betrayed by the

action taken by Barney that disbanded the team and recruited newmembers, started to

degrade the abilities of the members of the new teams by calling them amateurs and

questionning about the lack of knowledge that they possessed of themission. The new team

then, feeling challenged and degraded by the harsh words said by the former members of the

team started to counter the attack by throwing some harshwords too. Here, we can clearly see

the conflicts that ensued between the two teams.Next conflict occurred between Barney and

Galgo. Galgo faked his resume to get into the Expendables new team but Bonaparte rejects

him after hearing that his last team let him go, despite Galgo pleading and insisting he has
exceptional combat and weapons skills. When Barney plots his rescue mission to save the

new team members that were being held as hostages by Stonebanks, he was found by Galgo,

who somehow managed to locate him. Galgo then again tried to convince Barney

to allow him to join the Expendables team. Because of his non-stop chattering, Barney

finally was forced to allow him on board of the team.

III. Issue of lack of leadership quality portrayed by Barney Ross

Barney, as the leader of the Expendables team, always seems to have his own agenda. After

breaking Doc out of prison, Barney did not tell him that they were going ona mission. Doc was

excited as he thought he was going home. Although being misled, Doc still follow Barney’s

order due to the respect he has on Barney. During the mission,Barney realizes that the target

of the mission was the co-founder of the Expendables team that was supposed to be dead,

known as Stonebanks. After realizing that fact, Barneythen abandoned the safety of his

teammates and started firing his gun while shoutingStonebanks’ name without even telling his

teammates about it beforehand. As a result,they were being attacked heavily by the enemies

After Caesar was hit by bullets, Barney, being autocratic then decided it was dangerous for

the team and disband it immediately. When the others tried to talk him out,he ignored their

opinion and disband it anyway. After dissolving the old team, Barney recruited a new team to

hunt Stonebanks, he gathered new people and making it clear it isa ‘one way ticket’ indicating

that they may die during the mission. Barney seems to benot interested in the welfare and

survival of the new team. Moreover, even with the new team, Barney is being secretive as he

does not tell them who Stone banks really was. Heeven have secret of having Stone banks

shot by him in the past. When the old team and the new team had a fight during the rescuing

mission,Barney shot a few bullets to gain people’s attention. He used force to make people

listen to him.
 IV. Issue of poor team foundations and team cohesiveness

Another issue in this movie is the poor team foundations. There is poor team cohesiveness

shown at the beginning of the movie. The current Expendables team are not so comfortable

working with Doc who have just being breakout of prison. Due to lack ofinteraction, they do

not know what Doc could do and why he is called ‘Doctor Death’.They do not know that Doc

was a medic and a knifeman before Christmas. There is evenhostility shown by Doc towards

Gunner. Thus making the team being cautious towards Doc. Another example of poor team

cohesiveness is when the old team met the new teamfor the first time. Each team picks a fight

by calling each other with awful title such as ‘amatuer assholes’ and ‘Grandpa’. The team size

for each mission was practically small. Barney had to break Docout of prison just to

complete the team for a mission. There is also a problem of specialization. Due

to having the same knowledge and skills among the old members ofthe Expendables team,

their methods of completing a mission are the same. When they are surrounded in a building

armed with C4, they never thought the portable computer Gunner was wearing on his wrist

could help jamming the bomb signal. Gunner used itonly to check the weather. Other than

that, team consist of people with different expertise are called heterogenous team.

By being heterogenous team, it takes longer time for the old and thenew Expendables team

to bond and develop. There is also a result in conflict every time they met. Besides that,

social loafing will occur. During the last battle against the Azmanastan Army, Doc

pretends to be dead while others keep on fighting. Although it seems like a good strategy, it is

not fair as other has to fight more people on behalf of him.

C. RELATING THE ISSUES WITH THE STUDY OF ORGANIZATIONAL

BEHAVIOUR

1. Stress Management in an Organization.

Seaward (2004) has defined stress as the experience of a perceived threat to one’smental,

physical, or spiritual well-being, resulting from a series of phsychological responses

and adaptations. The American Institute of Stress on the other hand refers to the definition

coined by Hans Selye in the year 1936 in defining the word stress, which is,“ the non-specific

response of the body to any demand for change”. In defining the word work stress, Stranks

(2005) has provided a clear definition of it in his books, “aphyschological state

which can cause individual to behave dysfunctionally at work and result from people’s

response to an imbalance between job demands and their abilities tocope with it”.As what we

have learnt in the Organizational Behaviour subject, stress can be further classified into two

types; eustress and distress. Eustress refers to the type of stress that is a necessary part of

life because it activates and motivates people to achieve goals,change their environments,

and succeed in life’s challenges. Whereas, distress refers to the degree of physiological,

psychological and behavioral deviation from healthy funtioning (McShane, 2013). In

the movie Expendables 3, the type of stress felt by Barney is eustress. It was the kind

of stress that motivates him to achieve his goals and change his environment in order

for him to complete his mission of capturing Stone banks, hence the decision to

disband the previous team of the Expendables and recruit new team members that are

stronger and younger than the previous one. Eventhough the kind of stress felt by Barney in

the movie is the good kind of stress, but it also forced him to act alone without consulting his

team members and make a rushed decision that was regarded as betraying his former team

members by disbanding the team without even asking for the members’ opinions first. The

way individuals cope with their stress will affect the level of stress that they feel. People who

managed to find the most positive way of coping with their stress may experienced a lower

level of stress as compared to those people who are coping with it in a negative way (Rossi

A., 2009). Some of the positive coping mechanisms may include seeking support from others

including friends and family members, asking for opinions from the people in their

surroundings and reframing the stressor in a more positive light.While the negative coping

mechanisms that may be adopted by certain people in handlingtheir stress include blaming

others for the stressor and denying the existence of the stressor (McShane, 2013).In

the case of Barney, the mechanism that he chose to cope with the stress faced is by
eliminating the stressor by disbanding the former team of the Expendables and

forming a new team to hunt down Stone banks. Since his instinct of wanting to protect the

safety of the previous members of the team from being the victims of Stonebanks is the

stressor that caused him the stress that he felt, he decided to eliminate it by disbanding the

team. This may be a positive way of coping with stress as what has been discussed in the

previous paragraph, however, his failure to ask the opinions of the people who will be directly

affected from the decision that he made may caused other problems such as the issue of

loyalty and friendship when he decided to leave his old members behind to start a new team.

2. Conflicts

Conflict is the process in which one party perceives that its interests are being opposed or

negatively affected by another party. It may occur when one party obstruct orplans to obstruct

another’s goal in some way. Conflict is ultimately based on perceptions, it exists whenever

one party believes that another might obstruct its efforts, whether or not the other party actually

intends to do so (McShane,2013).There are several sources of conflict which are incompatible

goals, differentiation, interdependence, scarce resources, ambiguous rules and

communication problems. The sources of conflict that related with The Expendables

3 are differentiation and communication problems. Differentiation can be distinguished

from goal incompatibility because two people or departments may agree on a common goal

but have profounddifferences in how to achieve that goal. For an example, intergenerational

is the obvious conflict in this movie where younger and older teams have different types of

values and ways on how to conduct their mission. Same goes in the organisations, sometimes

seniors and younger staff may have their own ways in order to carried out their tasks.

The different needs, different expectations and different workplace practices produces

conflicting preferences and actions. Communication problems occur due to the lack

of opportunity, ability or motivation to communicate effectively. First, when two parties lack

of opportunity to communicate, they tend to rely more on stereotypes to understand the other
party inconflict. For an example, when Barney seems to have stereotypes towards Galgo. At

first, he doesn’t want recruit him after hearing that his last team let him go. He then learnt that

Galgo was not being let go by his previous team but all of his team members had died in a

mission leaving him behind alone as the sole survivor. Besides that, conflicts caused by

communication also happen when there is not enough communication process that took place

in the organization or team. This lack of communication then lead to misunderstanding to

occur. In The Expendables, we can see that there are communication problems between

Barney Ross and his old teams. When he decided to disband the team, Barney made the

decision alone without consulting his fellow team members first making them feel like they

were betrayed and replaced.

3. Leadership Qualities in Organizational Setting

The topic that can be related to Organizational Behaviour for the first issue is leadership

qualities in organizational setting. In the movie, leadership is the ability to influence, motivate

and enable others to contribute toward the effectiveness of the organizations of which they

are members. In competency perspective of leadership,Barney did not fulfill one of the

leadership competencies criteria. A leader is supposed to have integrity. Integrity involves

truthfullness and consistency of words and action, qualities that are related to honesty

and ethical conduct. For an example, at the beginning of the movie, Christmas called Barney

‘vague’. This is because Barney always have hidden scheme playing in mind. The statement

made, shows that one of the members do not really trust his leader 100 percent. Unfortunately,

most surveys conducted shows that employees do not trust their leaders and do not think that

they have integrity (McShane,2013)According to psychologist Kurt Lewin, there are three

major type of leadership styles. Those are autocratic leaders, democratic leaders, and

Laissez-faire. Firstly, autocratic leaders make decisions without consulting team members

even if their input could be useful. An exampleof Barney being an autocratic leader is

during the dissolvement of the team. The members tried to talk him out but he do not listen to
their reasoning. The members felt a huge let down as they are ready to sacrifice their life for

the organization but instead being disbanded. Secondly, democratic leaders make final

decisions but include members during decision making process. Barney let the new team to

give out their opinion on how to capture Stone banks using the CCTV and the securitylocks

instead of just killing everyone. Lastly, laissez-faire which leaders gave freedom toemployees

on how to complete task and how they set deadlines. This can be seen during the last clash

between the Expendables team with the Azmanastan Army. Barney gave out a simple order

and it is up to the members when and how to demobilize their enemy.

4. Foundations of Team Dynamics and Team Composition

The issue of poor team foundations and lack of team cohesiveness identified earlier in

the report is related to the topic of foundation of team dynamics and team composition in the

syllabus. Teams can be identified as a group of two or more people. It exists to fulfill a purpose.

Teams are usually interdependent where they interact and influence each other. When team

cohesiveness is strengthen, members would want to remain in the team. They also share

better interpersonal relation and have stronger bonding. The type of teams that can be seen

through the formation of the new Expendables team is skunkwork. After merging with the

new people, the team has a diverse set of skills consisting of knifeman, techno geek,

gunman and also both male and female combatant.For an example, Thorn could jammed the

bomb signal and prevent it from blowing up. Others do not have computer expertise thus

making Thorn the most suitable person forthe task. However, it also creates conflict due to the

different in styles and opinions.Other than conflict, the time taken for team development is

longer. Diverse membershipindicates that they generally exhibit high level of conflicts and

experience low levels of cohesion; however, they also tend to out perform their homogeneous

counterparts (Carte,Chidambaram, 2008). As the team become larger in size, social loafing

are likely to occur. Socialloafing is when someone exert lesser effort to complete their task

compared to others.Lastly, norms which can be seen in the movie. There are positive and
negative norms. An example of positive norms are the expendables tattoos. Those who bear

the marks of the expendables are bound by the rule of its organization. It create values

and sense of belonging to members.

D. SUGGESTIONS IN MINIMIZING THE ISSUES IDENTIFIED

a) Increase emotional intelligence to tackle the issue of stress

One of the ways that can be used to deal with the stress faced by Barney in the movie is by

improving his emotional intelligence. Helpguide.org in an article published in their official

website, http://www.helpguide.org, states that, by understanding and praticing emotional

intelligence, a person can retain a large measure of self-control and self-confidence even

when the environment of the work has grown intensely stressful. Emotional intelligence can

be defined as the ability to understand, manage and effectively express one’s own feelings,

as well as engage and navigate successfully with those others (www.psychologytoday.com).

There are two critical ways available to increase one’s own emotional intelligenceas what has

been explained in an article published by Huffington Post in their official website,

http://www.huffingtonpost.com. The first method is by recognizing andeliminating self-

imposed stress. Some people tend to put too much stress on themselves by doubting their

skills and abilities, which most of the times tend to be wrong. This self-imposed stress that

people are putting on themselves may add up to the external stress that they are facing and

this may then lead to an uncontrollable psychological responses of the body. In the case of

Barney, he needs to first identify the self-imposed stress that he was putting on himself that is

hindering his emotional intelligence. For an example, he blamed himself for what happened to

Caeser and he decided to take full responsibility for the incident even though it was not his

fault to even begin with. This is the example of the self-imposed stress that Barney has put

towards himself. He needs to eliminate this kind of stress and stop blaming himself for the

things that happened beyond his control in order to make sure that would be able to increase

his emotional intelligence which may helps him to cope with stress better in the future.
The second method that can increase a person’s emotional intelligence is by acknowledging

and managing one own’s emotions. The more volatile and emotionally challenging the

situation is, the more important it is to keep one’s cool in dealing with the situation. In order to

increase emotional intelligence, a person need to be able to process information in a timely

manner and then respond in the most appropriate way available. As in the case of Barney, he

needs to learn to be more relax and control himself from the various emotions that may be

caused by his nature of works. When he faced the situation where the lives of his team

members are in danger, he need to assess the situation critically first, and he must not allow

the stress resulting from the guilt that he felt to cloud his decision-making process and

judgement like what happened in the movie. His rushed decision has put the lives of not only

the previous members in danger but also the members of the newly formed team.

b) Solving conflict through problem solving method

The best suggestions in tackling the issues arise in the movie that can help us to implement

effectively is problem solving. Problem solving tries to find a mutually beneficial solution for

both parties. This is called win-win orientation. The old team and new team should seat

together and discuss the beneficial solution to work together and find a creative solution in

order to conduct their mission. Information sharing is an important feature of this style because

both parties can collaborate to identify common ground and potential solutions that can satisfy

everyone involved. Through dialogue and clever thinking can help them to break out the limited

boundaries of their opposing alternatives to find a solution where both sides can gain the

value. Problem solving also can improves long-term relationship, reduces stress and

minimises emotional defensiveness and other indications of relationships conflicts. Thus,

Barney as a leader should act as the middleman that helps to find the common ground

between the two teams so that they can work together effectively and efficiently and avoid

conflicts from happening. Common ground here may refers to the same goals orobjectives,

same motivation or any other similarities that both teams have. Problem solving can also be
solved through negotiation process where Barney actually can build good deals. Barney

should prepare for the negotiation and set goals before he recruit new team. This is to ensure

that the old team will not feel betrayed and offended with their ability. Barney should have one

target point, which identifies the best possible outcomes in order for not hurting both parties.

Try to explain to both parties the importance of the collaboration. Collaboration is actually

important because it helps to create value, to maximise both parties best possible

outcomes. Barney should signal trustworthiness to strengthen the relationship. He can do

this by demonstrating that he is reliable and will keep his promises, or by identifying shared

goals and values. Thus, if Barney may end the negotiations on a positive note and both sides

agreed, the chances of getting good deal is increases.

c) Increasing leadership competencies

In order to solve the issue of lack of leadership qualities portrayed by Barney Ross in the

movie Expendables 3, increasing his leadership competencies can be used as one of the

methods to tackle the issue. Leadership competencies refers to the leadership skills and

behaviours that contribute to superior performance of the leader (http://www.shrm.org).

There are seven leadership competencies that are essential for any leader to possess in order

to help them improving their leadership qualities. However, the one that are most important

for Barney Ross to nurture himself with, in order to solve the issue highlighted are emotional

intelligence, integrity, and drive himself with, in order to solve theissue highlighted are

emotional intelligence, integrity, and drive. Emotional intelligence has been discussed in

the earlier part of this report. Emotional intelligence is important for any leader to

possess, especially Barney Ross, in order to help him to control and contain his emotions as

to not hinder the progress of his teammates and to not cloud his judgement and decision.

Because of the lack of emotiona l intelligence possessed by Barney, he ended up making a

rushed decision of disbanding his old team and putting the life of the new team members in

danger. Integrity on the other hand refers to the truthfulness trait that a leader must have.
Leaders are said to have integrity if they are able to being true to not only themselves but also

his teammates. Barney needs to be opened about his emotions and being truthful about his

feelings withhis members instead of keeping it to himself and making his own decision

without consulting his teammates as what he did in the movie. The third competency is drive.

Drive refers to the trait where a leader is able to steer the organization towards the desired

goal and objectives. In this movie, Barney need to play his role more effectively as a leader in

communicating the real task in hand to his members instead of just giving them a vague

instructions and let the members do their own job without knowing what the actual mission is.

This is portrayed by Barney during the mission of capturing Stone banks in which he just gave

the new members a vague details about the mission and ended up putting their lives in danger

after being kept as hostages by Stone banks.

d) Building a stronger team dynamics and strengthen team cohesiveness

In order to increase and strengthen the team dynamics, decision making should bemade

democratically. Neither leader nor any members should dominates the discussion.When none

is dominating, it make the others become more creative and able to speak freely without

constraint. For an example, Barney gave Thorn a chance to speak his idea and the other

member approved it. As a result, they managed to capture Stone banks without being

notice first hand and have minimum casualties.Other than that, maintaining optimal team size

could help leader to organize and control the team better. The team should be small but large

enough to complete the task.The instructions given can be disseminated and received without

any interfering noise. An illustration to this explanation is when Barney gives order to the team

to evacuate on the roof. Every member received it clearly as they all have their communication

network. Besides that, creating sense of belonging to the team could help strengthen

theirbonds. Bearing the same trademarks or having something in common will

minimizesconflict in future. For an example, The marks of “Expendables” shows that they

werefamiliy. They belong to the organization and they stick together through thick and thin.

Asa result, there will be less arguments due to their difference in skills and expertise.
Anyconflict can be settle through discussion. Lastly, introducing effective stuctures helps in

improving the team dynamics. Members should have their own division of labor depending

on their skills. This will ensure task being settled faster and better qualities. In terms of span

of control, it is better for team to have flat structures. Despite having a democratic decision

maker, this help centralizes the management ensuring that final decision maker is the leader.
E. LIST OF REFERENCES

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Western.

Goudreau, J. (2013). 12 Ways To Eliminate Stress At Work. Forbes. Retrieved 24 May 2015,

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work/2/

Helpguide.org,. (2015). Stress at Work: Tips to Reduce and Manage Job and Workplace

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work.htm

McShane. (2013) Organizational Behavior. (6th ed., pp. 116-120, 330-333). Singapore.

Psychology Today,. (2015). How to Increase Your Emotional Intelligence ― 6 Essentials.

Retrieved 23 May 2015, from https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/communication-

success/201410/how-increase-your-emotional-intelligence-6-essentials

Rossi, A., Quick, J., & Perrewe, P. (2009). Stress and quality of working life. Charlotte, NC:

Information Age Pub.

Seaward, B. (2004). Managing stress. Sudbury, Mass.: Jones and Bartlett.

Stranks, J. (2005). Stress at work. Oxford: Elsevier/Butterworth-Heinemann.

Stress.org,. (2015). What is stress? | The American Institute of Stress. Retrieved 25 May 2015,

from http://www.stress.org/what-is-stress/

Tublin, D. (2015). 2 Critical Ways to Increase Your Emotional Intelligence. The Huffington

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