Paper 7

Part 1: First view the video located under write in module 7 and then
drawing from the Cultural Dimensions of Leadership discussed on pages
365-368 answer the following questions:

1. What were some of the cultural misunderstandings that occurred at this

meeting?

One of the cultural misunderstandings was about the purpose of the actual
meeting. It seems that it is more customary to get to know your team before
just jumping into business. Tasleem wants to be lead more from a high
relations leadership style. The importance of a quiencinera is very
important in the Latino community. This is bigger than a sweet sixteen party.
Fernandos need for being there for his family is greater than the actual
meeting. Fernando now feels that Tom cares more about results than about
people. Sachiko, the marketing person did not want to overstep her
boundaries as a leader. Her cultural probably assumed that the main leader
would be more authoritative and less participative. This may come from
gender roles that are deep rooted in her culture. Tom felt that Sachiko
should be more prepared and less of a receptionist. Tom most likely comes
from a low gender egalitarianism culture. Lastly, Omar did not have the
reports ready because he did not know that he could say no. It some
cultures you can never say no to your boss. He did not have any kind of
relation with Tom to be feeling comfortable to have a two-way dialogue.
Omar probably comes from a high power distance culture. Tom came off as
very authoritative and Omar just said yes.

2. How did each of the participants view the interactions that took place?

1. Tom-He felt that his business meeting was not successful. He

does not have faith in anyone of his team. He is disappointed
and frustrated. He wanted each employee to be more
Individualistic. He wanted Fernando to not care about the
birthday party and just care about making sure he got his work
done.
 2. Omar He felt that his boss gave unrealistic expectations. He
does not have the relationship with Tom that he can say no. He
feels overwhelmed and unmotivated.

3. Sachiko She feels that as the boss, Tom should know the
numbers. She does not understand why she is being asked
questions when he is the boss. She feels overwhelmed. Sachiko
most likely comes from a culture of high gender egalitarianism.
This is linked to gender roles in her culture.

4. Tasleem - She feels that Tom is all about business and does
not care about the human/emotional relationship of the
employees. She feels very unmotivated. Tasleem most likely
comes from a culture of low gender egalitarianism. She favors
more relation-related and transformational leadership. Tasleem
also has a high humane orientation. She stated that Tom cared
more about results than about them.

5. Fernando He feels that Tom does not care about the

important event in his familys life. This would be like Tom
missing a wedding or a baptism. This is a very important event
for Fernando and his family. He feels very unmotivated.
Fernando might feel that Tom has a high performance
orientation. He cares more about results than about Fernando
and his family.

3. If you were Tom the team leader what would you have done differently to
ensure a healthy and productive meeting?

I would have had a one on one meeting with each member of the team. I
would try and learn a few things about each of the cultural norms of each of
my team members. Since this is a global team, it is needed to make the
team cohesive. Next I would have had a meeting where everyone was able
to meet each other. It would not revolve around work. This would give the
team a chance to get to know each other. Next, I would have a business
meeting in an office setting. I would make sure that I would have an agenda
and pre-work done for each member. At the meeting, anyone who did not do
the pre-work would have a one on one meeting with me to talk about my
clear expectations. Tom assumed that everyone knew it was a
business/work meeting. There was no agenda. Tom made a lot of
assumptions that his vision was communicated.

Part 2: Managers Workshop - Assessment and Reflection

1. Complete the mastery Tests

2. Re-take Job Satisfaction Self Assessment and Motivational Style
Assessment (compare with first assessment results)
3. Reflect on the change in your assessments as compared to those
employees you studied. Discuss how your self-assessment results
influenced your management decisions. Did your self-assessments
change as a result of having completed the managers workshop?
Discuss what you learned from completing the Managers Workshop.
4. Reflect on what you learned in this class in general. You can discuss
the Yukl textbook & weekly case studies, the NYT discussion boards, as
well as the Managers Workshop.
Your reflection should be at least three pages long and in 12 point
font.

Reflection:
 Not much has changed in regard to the results of my assessments. Two of

the highest marks that I have are both based on the fact that I work for

Starbucks Coffee Company. It is a company that I truly do value so I got

higher marks than normal around organizational. I also got higher than norm

remarks around employee importance. I know that unless my staff is

bought in and inspired, than I cannot have consistent and reliable results. I

will only have mediocre results or a short burst of success, followed by a

decline of results as my staff loses steam or I lose employees because they

are not satisfied with the results.

I learned from the mastery class that I am very confident around need and

learning theory. I also learned that I do not have as much confidence around

expectancy theory. This comes as no surprise as the type of management

that I do on a daily basis. I consistently need to fulfill the needs of my staff

and influence their learning through positive reinforcement. The expectancy

theory is not as much used since we have very routine outcomes to our

work. The only variable is around the human behavior and motivation.

This class was great for me to be able to better quantify what it is that I

have learned through out the years from trail and error. As a leader at

Starbucks, we have a management-training program. This program is meant

to focus on teaching an employee the basic skill set needed to be a store

manager. I went through the program fairly quickly since I had some of the

natural attributes that lend themselves to being a good leader. There are a
lot of great insight and theories that I learned by making the wrong decision.

If I would have taken a class like this before hand, I would have hopefully

been more successful and efficient.

As I step into my role as a trainer of future managers, I see my outlook has

changed due to this class. I see my role as more of teaching beginning

basics around leadership and influence. I do not emphasis on the duties of

the busy work that needs to be taught. I have seen that it is important to

start with leadership skills like modeling behavior, influence tactics versus

being authoritative, and also creating an environment of accountability both

ways. Creating a culture where we all learn from each other and feedback is

given no matter the hierarchy has helped many of my employees gain

leadership courage to give input into situations/processes that other stores

do not lend themselves to have.

The manger workshop did give me a chance to test different approaches of

other theories. Most mangers tend to relay on past experiences to help us

navigate situations. I did the same. I used many years of dealing with

different employees and different situations. The workshop allowed me to

test out different methods and theories. I first went with what my past

experiences have taught me to do. Then I would go back and just try to

incorporate some of the readings and lessons that we had just covered. This

activity allowed me to test out new methods in a safe environment. It

allowed me to compare and contrast what the differences were and keep

some key learnings for future situations.

The New York time articles were a bit of a gray area for me. I enjoyed the

readings of the articles. I do feel that there was a more difficult time trying

to connect the readings of the week to the article. I think the readings may

be better if we had to all read the same article. This would allow for more in

depth discussions. I would normally just find who had picked the same

article and comment on their thread. I think if the article was more related

to the module, we would be able to have more in depth discussions. I would

recommend having a few specific articles in place for each module. As long

as they are changed out semi yearly, they would still be current events

(not as current as those videos!).

Oddly enough, my favorite part about all of the class was the extra credit

videos. Every single one of the videos that I watched gave me more insight

into leadership and influence. I looked at the JFK speech in a different

perspective than I have before. The Steve Jobs commencement speech was

a speech that I had never seen or heard. It inspired me to look at my self

and keep moving forward. Stay hungry. Those extra credit reflections also

allowed me to spend some time in reviewing my own leadership abilities. As

a leader that is in position already, I dont have a lot of time to do too much

self-reflection. I have to balance out all of my duties and focus on the

continuous improvement of the business and each of my employees. The

extra credit class gave me the time to review my week and think about some

of the decisions that I made. Without the need to do the reflection for this

class, I would not have spent the investment in reflection.