What is the role of a communications team in an organization?
Leadership in Flux

Scenario (fictional):

Measures and Weights Inc. (MW) is a manufacturing company that produces all types of weighing and measuring instruments for a host of different industries worldwide. One hundred employees are divided between manufacturing and sales representatives, with about 20 staff assigned to managerial/administrative positions in the various departments. About 2 months ago, the head of production, Tom (in his job for the last 3 years), was in a meeting with several members of his staff when the following conversation occurred:

Production manager Tom says at the end of a half-hour meeting to review the last month’s production schedule results: “Does anyone have anything to add concerning operations today?”

Production employee Helena: “Well, we are starting to have some real problems in production because some of our vendors are late in supplying us with essential materials, and as a result, many of our orders have been late in getting to clients. Someone needs to speak with our vendors right away!”

Production manager Tom: “Anyone else have that problem?” (He waits for 3 seconds for any response and then continues.) “Thanks everyone, I guess that wraps up this meeting. Now back to work!”

After a week, the production manager began to receive reports from the database system. Many final products were being held off the assembly line due to late vendor materials delivery. Customer complaints now had gotten to the critical point, and executive management had been alerted.

The production manager had a special meeting of his department that same day and admonished the production team, saying: “It is your responsibility to see that these products are produced based on order due dates. If there is a problem, you are to contact me. I hold you all responsible for this lapse in reporting this problem. Soon, I will decide who is responsible and who will be working with me to resolve this issue.”[order_button_b]

Production employee Helena just looked at her colleagues and said: “But boss, I did bring this up at the last meeting.”

Production manager Tom responded: “Well if there was a problem as important as this one, you should have sent a follow-up memo to everyone. Someone will have a report submitted to their personnel file and a bad quarterly performance review as well for this oversight!” Then he adjourned the meeting.

Production employee Helena speaking to another employee, Zara, after the meeting: “I absolutely should not be blamed for this; I told him there was a problem. I am going to lodge a complaint with the human resources department right away and consider whether I will stay with the company.”

Quality control specialist Zara responded: “I might be joining you. Who can work for a boss like this?”

Checklist: Respond to the following items regarding the scenario:

Analyze the problems at this company as portrayed in the scenario.
Describe the leadership style demonstrated by the manager.
Name the leadership style.
Define the leadership style.
Explain why this leadership style was chosen.
Explain the aspects of the leadership process that the manager neglected.
provide an alternative leadership style that would be more effective and explain why.
Describe the steps in the communication process.
Describe the steps of the communication process that were not addressed or completed.
Explain how the communication steps were not completed or addressed.
Examine and explain how the manager could have used the communication and leadership process to (1) build a better relationship with the employees in his department and (2) make employees more effective on the job.
Provide an example from the scenario using the preferred communication and leadership process demonstrating how the preferred processes would have helped in the scenario.

Course Textbook: Robbins, S. P., & Judge, T. A. (2018). Organizational Behavior (18th ed.). Pearson Education (US).[order_button_c]

Write a letter to the editor arguing your own position on the matter. Note the suggestions for this assignment below.

1. Find a controversy that interests you in the newspaper or on social media. This should be an article or video representing an idea or opinion about some topic. Choose reputable sources—The New York Times, Salon, The Root, Huffington Post, The Chicago Tribune, The Montgomery Advertiser, The Wall Street Journal, etc.

2. Write a letter to the editor arguing your position for or against the writer’s or writers’position.

3. What are the counterarguments? Why do you think the writer is wrong? What has the writer not noticed or misinterpreted or taken into account?

4. Proofread your letter carefully, making sure you have freed your “letter” from logical fallacies or weak arguments. Look for errors in grammar and mechanics. Support your point of view with specifics where you can. You do not have to do secondary research. You should choose something with which you are very familiar and feel passionate about. Remember: If you are responding to someone else’s argument, make sure you refer to or refute their points.

5. Length is about 300 to 500 words.

Please pay special attention to the following two matters:

Development and Support—Use numerous examples to support your argument. These examples may come from history, personal experience, the experiences of others, things you’ve read, things you’ve seen on television, etc. Don’t just offer one or two examples. Make sure you explain how the example connects to your point. Don’t just throw out an example, and then move on. Make the connection.

Grammar and Mechanics/Format— Make sure you proofread carefully to ensure your sentences make sense, that nothing has been left out, and that you have followed the conventions of grammar, particularly regarding subject/verb agreement, congruity issues, word choice, and verb endings or tense. Watch for run-on sentences, comma splices and fragments. If you need help, please go to the writing center if you are in town or you may call me for clarification if you are not near the writing center.[order_button_a]

Suggestions:

1. Here’s an article in The Root. You could write a letter to the editor arguing for the removal of the monuments or against their removal.

http://www.theroot.com/new-orleans-begins-confederate-monument-removal-1794588609

2. Do you believe Angela Rye’s assessment of Joe Walsh as a bigot (or some of her other arguments) is accurate?

http://www.cnn.com/videos/cnnmoney/2017/03/29/angela-rye-joe-walsh-i-dont-talk-to-bigots-sot-nr.cnn

3. Do you think President Trump was justified in ordering an airstrike against Syria?

Article 1 from the New York Times:

Article 2 from The New Yorker:

http://www.newyorker.com/news/ryan-lizza/was-trumps-strike-on-syria-legal

Article 3 from CNN:

http://www.cnn.com/2017/04/13/politics/syria-religious-justified/

Your letter will be graded looking at four major components :

Focus/Strength of Argument

Development and Support (How do the examples support your position)

Coherence and Organization

Grammar and Mechanics/Format

*It might be a good idea to look up some letters sent to editors as examples to follow.[order_button_c]

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Date:
May 24, 2020
Time:
8:00 am - 5:00 pm
Cost:
Free
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Build on the preliminary plan.

Venue

Research quality improvement initiatives in your workplace.
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