Reflective Writing (2)

Reflective Writing

Insert name

Institutional affiliation

Reflective Writing

Many interactions, relationships, and processes that occur on a daily basis characterize organizations. The complexity of the relationships and processes makes it difficult to understand organizations. Therefore, it is vital to develop insights that would enable the management or the leadership of the organization obtain valuable insights into the organizational life. It would also enable the members of the organization understand the organization and the behavior of people within the organization with whom they interact with. The course has helped me understand the impact of my behavior in the workplace and the behavior of the people around me in the workplace on my work performance. It has helped me acknowledge the importance of human behavior and interpersonal relationships. The course has helped me acknowledge the importance of teamwork in any contemporary organization. In fact, teamwork was also used in undertaking various projects within the course.

The course has helped me appreciate the importance of the workforce as the most valuable asset of an organization. Indeed, organizations are made up of employees and not the technology or processes. An organization can only achieve its goals if it entrusts them to a committed workforce. According to DeCenzo, Robbins, and Verhulst (2016), it is vital for an organization to hire the right employees and allocate them to the right tasks to enable the organization utilize their capabilities fully. The employees’ compensations should also commensurate with their contributions in the realization of the goals and objectives of the organization.

Managers also play a vital role in any organization as they help in coordinating the roles and responsibilities of the employees of the organization to ensure they help in the achievement of the goals and objectives of the organization. Therefore, managers should have good interpersonal skills since they have to interact with people within and outside their work units. They should also be information since they receive and communicate information. Managers should also be decisional since they are required to make decisions tackle problems or take advantage of situations or opportunities (Younger & Smallwood, 2016). As such, managers should also know how to pursue the organizational goals with efficiency and effectiveness. They should also have the ability to predict, influence, and understand organizational events.

Therefore, the course would help me to become a better manager. It would improve my ability to identify various issues that affect the performance of my organization. It would also enable me have the ability to identify market trends and recommend strategies that would enable my organization take advantage of the trends. It would help become more adaptive by being open to new experiences. It would also improve my extraversion and agreeableness.

The course would ultimately ensure I help in improving the satisfaction of my subordinates. This would improve the satisfaction of the employees of my organization. According to Rapp et al. (2016), all team processes are important. However, team interventions are more effective when teams set and reflect on goals. Interpersonal processes are seldom the systemic causes of problems within an organization.

Intezari and Pauleen (2018) claims that there are two types of decision-making – rational and non-rational. Various steps are involved in rational decision-making. These include the identification of the problem or opportunity. The next step is thinking about alternative solutions. The third step would be the evaluation of the alternatives and selecting a solution. The last step would be the implementation and evaluation of the chosen solution.

On the other hand, non-rational decision-making may involve bounded rationality. Bounded rationality refers to the ability to decision-makers being limited to several constraints. According to the satisficing model constraints make managers fail to engage in an exhaustive search for the best alternatives. Instead, they search for alternatives and chose the satisfactory alternative instead of the optimal one. The incremental model can also help in explaining non-rational decision-making. It involves taking small, short-term steps in the evaluation of a problem instead of attempting to determine the long-term solution to the problem.

Intuition can also be used to explain non-rational decision-making. Intuition involves the making of decisions without using conscious though processes or logical references. It is caused by expertise and automated experience. Expertise involves the explicit or tacit knowledge about an individual, situation, or decision. Therefore, it makes an individual make non-rational decisions due to the above assumptions. Automated experience refers to the involuntary emotional response to the matters mentioned above.

There are four ineffective reasons on decision-making. These include related avoidance, relaxed change, defensive avoidance, and panic. Relaxed avoidance refers to taking no action due to the belief that there would be no significant negative consequences. On the other hand, relaxed change refers to the realization that complete inaction will have negative consequences but taking the first available alternative. Defensive avoidance involves procrastinating, passing the buck, or denying the risk if a good solution cannot be found. Finally, panic involves being so frantic to get rid of a problem that one ends up failing to deal with the situation in a realistic manner.

Therefore, the course has helped me acknowledge the processes that are required to ensure I make rational decisions. It would ensure I give the utmost importance to decisions. It would also ensure I know how to engage in group decision-making. It would help me build on ideas of others to make better decisions in a group setting. It would also help remain focused on the topic during group discussions. It will ensure I acknowledge the importance of having one conversation at a time during groups discussions.

Ethical decision-making is vital in the success of any contemporary organization. It prevents an organization from being subjected to backlash from its customers from making unethical decisions. Nevertheless, ethical decision-making is related to various biases. These include the overconfidence bias and confirmation and self-serving bias. Overconfidence bias occurs if there are many players involved in the decision-making process. Confirmation and self-serving bias occurs if the decision makers focus on good news while ignoring the bad news.

The course has also helped me acknowledge the roles of the managers in the current and future success of any organization. According to Ollila and Yström (2017), the roles of managers may be classified as interpersonal roles, informational roles, and decisional roles. The interpersonal roles requires managers to interact with people within and outside their work units in addition to acting as the figurehead, liaison, or leader of their work units. On the other hand, information roles requires managers to receive and disseminate information. It requires managers to be the monitor, spokesperson, and disseminator within the organization. Finally, the decisional roles of the manager require the manager to use information in making decisions that solve problems facing the organization. It requires the manager to be disturbance handler, resource allocator, entrepreneur, or negotiator within the company.

Human resource planning is also one of the main functions of management. It is a vital tool in the implementation of the strategy of an organization. It helps in the selection, training, and evaluation of the workforce. It ensure the managers have the right number and type of people, in the right places in the organization, and at the right time, who can effectively and effectively performing the tasks required in the achievement of the goals and objectives of the organization. Human resource planning helps in alleviating sudden talent shortages or surpluses.

Various steps are involved in HR planning. These include assessing the current human resources of the organization, assessing the future human resource needs of the organization, and developing a strategy that would help in meeting the future human resource needs of the organization.

Employee learning and development is also one of the most important functions of human resource management. It involves training, group building, and hands-on method. Training refers to the efforts of the organization to facilitate the employees’ efforts on acquire job-related skills and competencies. Group-building involves the efforts of an organization to facilitate the group activities within the organization. This is necessitated by the fact that most of the activities in modern organizations are undertaken in a group setting. Hands-on methods refers to the on-the-job training, simulations, and activities that help in modelling the behavior of employees.

The course has also helped me appreciate the importance of performance management. Performance management helps in the creation of performance standards and appraising the performance of the employees to ensure they help in the achievement of the goals and objectives of the organization.

The course has also highlighted various leadership approaches that a manager or organization may use. The nature of the functions of the organization have a major influence on the type of leadership that would most effective. As such, no single type of leadership style is suitable to all types of organizations. However, leaders should ensure that their leadership style has the ability to influence employees of the organization to pursue to the goals of the organizations voluntarily. Managers should also ensure they do things in the right manner. Communication is an important aspect of effective leadership. This course will ultimately help me develop my own leadership style and remain adoptable and flexible to the situations that I am bound to face from time to time.

References

DeCenzo, D. A., Robbins, S. P., & Verhulst, S. L. (2016). Fundamentals of Human Resource Management, Binder Ready Version. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons.

Intezari, A., & Pauleen, D. J. (2018). Conceptualizing Wise Management Decision‐Making: A Grounded Theory Approach. Decision Sciences, 49(2), 335-400.

Ollila, S., & Yström, A. (2017). An investigation into the roles of open innovation collaboration managers. R&D Management, 47(2), 236-252.

Rapp, T. L., Gilson, L. L., Mathieu, J. E., & Ruddy, T. (2016). Leading empowered teams: An examination of the role of external team leaders and team coaches. The Leadership Quarterly, 27(1), 109-123.

Younger, J., & Smallwood, N. (2016). Agile Talent: How to Source and Manage Outside Experts. Boston, MA: Harvard Business Review Press.