Question 1
Adam
Grant is many things to many people. He
has college degrees in organizational psychology and studies and contributes to
workplace dynamics. He is the epitome of a leader. He is not only very successful, but very
intuitive and giving. He has done many research studies examining mankind and
man’s work life. He has made multiple
observations during his reflective moments. For instance, he states that an
effective leader should not move for location because what people do is more
important than where they do it. People who take jobs with a; too good to be
true expectations, burn out, get dissatisfied and quit. The situation is that
moving for location is ineffective and too good to be true jobs end in disaster.
He feels that a good leader needs to motivate employees to stay at the job and
the followers need to give their job a chance. These two actions should end up
with a successful leader and a satisfied follower.
Organizational
psychology has shown that people will enjoy their work and want to keep doing
it. Financial incentives and work that is interesting and offers the
possibility for career advancement really motivate employees, but Grant’s
opinion is that the greatest untapped source of motivation is service to
others; defined as the potential to make people more productive and therefore
giving them something else to think, about instead of being selfish. The end
product of this kind of thinking is that motivation can come from service to
others and consequent enjoyment of work. The leader needs to keep work
interesting, productive, and make service more available to employees. The
followers need to seek out more service opportunities, find enjoyment in their
work, and become productive. Workers that feel good about their work, get more
done, and appreciate the people they have helped.
In a study, Grant placed 2 signs at a
hand-washing station in a hospital. One stated “hand hygiene prevents you from
catching diseases” and the other stated “hand hygiene prevents patients from
catching diseases”. Grant then measured the amount of soap used at each
station. The doctors and nurses at the station where the sign referred to their
patients used 45 percent more soap or hand sanitizer. The situation was providing
a good quality job within a hospital setting, Grant was a leader that
successfully motivated his followers, and the followers responded doing a more
efficient job.
Givers
focus on the benefits to others if they succeed and worry less about disappointing
them if they fail. Grant divided people into three categories: givers, matchers
and takers. Givers give without expectation of anything in return, and are
never seem too busy to help. Matchers always want something in return. Takers try
to come out ahead in every exchange and get defensive quickly. The situation is
the effect of givers, matchers, and takers, where the leader is what motivates the
individual person and where the followers fall on the spectrum, and the
situation is what course of action they decide to follow.
Grant’s psychological prosocial examination of leaders, followers and
the workplace has interesting concepts that are not the historical norm to
management of a company. However, his viewpoints and explanation about what
motivates followers has influencing results.
There are multiple people who work in service jobs that state they are
not doing the job for the money or financial benefits because those are meager,
but they enjoy their work and are satisfied and motivated to do as good as
possible every day because they feel they are making a difference. This is the concept that Grant operates under
and includes his moral compass. His goals are to focus on productivity, company
efficiency and follower’s satisfaction for a job so they are efficient and
satisfied and then he adds the twist of prosocial behavior. His ambition and
success has been extensive purely by observing a social phenomenon that has
been in existence, in some realms of the workforce, for generations.
Works Cited
Question
2
Jim Good worked with a team of researchers
with the main goal to examine; what are the correct ingredients it takes for a
company to come into greatness and success. They conducted research that
selected multiple successful companies and then examined what steps were
consistently taken by those companies so that their growth and success
occurred.
Good and
his team of researchers identified that there are many qualities that a company
thinks will make them great, but if a company buys into these ideas they are
destined for lesser success. These qualities were summarized into many ideas
and actions previously taken by companies that Good and his team classified as
myths to success. These myths that companies have believed about change can
make or break their outcome for success. There is the burning platform, stock
options, fear-driven change, acquisitions, and technology-driven change. The
burning platform is that change starts when there is a crisis that persuades
unmotivated employees to accept the need for change. The situation is a crisis,
then the leader tries to motivate employees, and the followers accept the
change. The myth of stock options says that stock, high salaries and bonuses
are the incentives that motivate employees to change. The situation is stocks,
higher salaries, and bonuses, the leader motivates employees by these
incentives, and the followers accept the bribe. The myth of fear-driven change
is employee’s fear of being left behind, watching others win, and monumental
failure. The myth of acquisitions states
that a company can buy their way to growth. The situation is money buys
everything and the leader and followers consequently decrease production. The
myth of technology-driven change states that a company can become great if
technology jumps over the competition. The situation is that technology jumps over
the completion and the leader and followers work harder, but do not necessarily
achieve success.
Jim Good wrote about his Flywheel Effect
theory about how a company can gain success. The flywheel works effectively if
there is a building of plans that deliver results and the right people, who are
the workers, contribute to produce results and they feel excitement and satisfaction
about their work. The situation is the Flywheel Effect, the leader gives the
employees a voice, and the followers get more satisfaction and consequently production
increases.
The
second criterion for a company to be great is to avoid the doom loop. Companies
that fall into the doom loop start down one path, and then sharply change
direction. They then realize that they have not created the momentum needed for
the change to work. Disappointing results lead to reaction without complete
understanding, which leads to a new direction, a new program with momentum,
which leads to more disappointing results. This situation is the leaders do not
delegate tasks and effective communication, and the followers get disappointing
results and no constructive actions towards success in change has occurs.
Another
important criterion for a great company is setting a new direction and great corporate
vision. The company may be headed in the right direction but without a great
vision. If the company has mediocre people that are not motivated to produce
great results they produce mediocre results, instead of great results. The
leader needs to develop a great vision and communicate it well, the situation
is a new direction, and the followers follow and need to be productive.
Good
stresses that there are multiple ingredients for a company to be successful. He
maintains that the company needs to obtain the right people and place them in
the right positions. Then the company develops the right direction for the
company. It is developed out a single
organized idea that helps the leader and workers unify, organize and guide towards
that successful pathway. A good leader
also needs to know when enough is enough and when to take action to stop. Giving too much effort in the wrong direction
or for too long a period of time can drag the company down and limit the
company’s success. The overall idea of the correct pathway has to be a single
direction with diligent efforts and focused on results.
Works
Cited
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