MGT401 papers (module 2 slp and module 3 and 4 case and slp)

Module 2

Module 2 - SLP

ONE SIZE DOESN’T FIT ALL: SITUATIONAL APPROACHES TO LEADERSHIP

For the Module 2 SLP you will continue to apply the concepts from the background materials to your own personal experiences in the workplace. Think carefully about Hersey and Blanchard’s Situational Leadership model and the four leadership styles of Directing, Coaching, Supporting, and Delegating. Then consider the styles of one or more of the supervisors you have worked with, and reflect upon whether or not their style changed depending on the situation.

After doing some reflecting on your own experiencing and reviewing the background materials, write a two to three page paper addressing the following issues:

1. In general, would you describe your supervisor’s style as Directing, Coaching, Supporting, or Delegating?

2. Did you ever notice any of your supervisors changing their leadership style depending on the situation? If so, explain what you observed and discuss whether or not you think your supervisor followed the Situational Leadership model. If not, discuss a situation when you think your supervisor should have changed their style but did not.

3. Would you recommend that your supervisor take a training seminar on the Situational Leadership model, Fiedler’s Contingency model, or the Path-Goal model? Explain your reasoning.

SLP Assignment Expectations

· Follow the assignment instructions closely and follow all steps listed in the instructions

· Stay focused on the precise assignment questions, don't go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials

· List supporting references and cite sources in proper format

· Use appropriate writing style in essay form (organization, grammar, and spelling).v

odule 3 - Case

CHANGE-ORIENTED LEADERSHIP: TRANSFORMATIONAL AND CHARISMATIC LEADERS

Case Assignment

Yahoo was once a giant in the internet world, experiencing rapid growth and soaring stock prices after being founded in 1994. But currently Yahoo is struggling against fierce competitors such as Google and Facebook. It was clear to their Board of Directors and shareholders that radical change was necessary in order for Yahoo to remain competitive. In 2012 former Google executive Marissa Mayer was named as the new CEO.

Since joining Yahoo, Mayer has not been shy or hesitant about bringing about change. This has included the purchase of over 20 companies, banning teleworking, strict new hiring policies, and clashes with other senior executives and shareholders. The results so far have been mixed, with some observers saying her hard-nosed approach is what is needed for a struggling company like Yahoo and others saying that her style is overbearing and unnecessarily harsh.

First, carefully review the four background readings on change-oriented leadership with close attention to the definitions of transformational, transactional, and charismatic leadership. You need to apply these definitions when writing your paper. Then do some research on Marissa Mayer and her approach to managing change. You will find a lot of articles about her as she is frequently in the news. Here are a few articles to get you started:

Yahoo's geek goddess. (January, 2014).Vanity Fair, 56, 68. [Proquest]

Quinn, M. (Jan. 22, 2014). Poof. Marissa Mayer's honeymoon period at Yahoo ends.Oakland Tribune[Proquest]

Cook, J. (2013, Mar 15). Can a 'hard reset' give Yahoo a boost?The Globe and Mail[Proquest]

After you have reviewed the background materials on managing change and finished your research on Marissa Mayer, write a four to five page paper addressing the following issues. Make sure to cite both required background readings such as Barine and Minja (2012) as well as specific articles on Marissa Mayer such as Quinn (2014) or Cook (2013) in your paper:

1. Overall, how would you describe Marissa Mayer’s approach to leadership? Discuss her leadership style the best you can in terms of being a charismatic leader, a transformational leader, and/or a transactional leader. Draw upon the definitions of these types of leadership from Rainey (2009) and Avery (2011) and discuss them as they apply to Marissa Mayer.

2. What do you are the main benefits and drawbacks of Mayer’s approach to leadership and change?

3. How do you think Marissa Mayer should change her leadership style?

Assignment Expectations

· Follow the assignment instructions closely and follow all steps listed in the instructions

· Stay focused on the precise assignment questions, don't go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials

· List supporting references and cite sources in proper format

· Use appropriate writing style in essay form (organization, grammar, and spelling).

· Include both a bibliography and in-text citations. See theStudent Guide to Writing a High-Quality Academic Paper, including pages 13-14 on in-text citations. Another resource is the “Writing Style Guide”, which is found under “My Resources” in the TLC portal.

· Submit an Originality Report using Turnitin.

Module 3 - SLP

CHANGE-ORIENTED LEADERSHIP: TRANSFORMATIONAL AND CHARISMATIC LEADERS

For the Module 3 SLP you will be again be applying the concepts from the background materials to your own personal experiences. You can write about the same supervisor you wrote about in Modules 1 and 2, or choose a different supervisor that you worked with and got to know well.

Carefully review the concepts and definitions of charismatic, transformational, and transactional leadership. Then write a two to three page paper addressing the following issues using specific examples from your personal experiences:

1. Did your supervisor meet any of the characteristics of a charismatic leader as defined and discussed in the background readings?

2. Did your supervisor meet any of the characteristics of a transformational leader?

3. Did your supervisor meet any of the characteristics of a transactional leader?

SLP Assignment Expectations

· Follow the assignment instructions closely and follow all steps listed in the instructions

· Stay focused on the precise assignment questions, don't go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials

· List supporting references and cite sources in proper format

· Use appropriate writing style in essay form (organization, grammar, and spelling).

Module 4 - Case

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

Case Assignment

For this assignment, first do a thorough review of the required background materials and read up on each author’s discussion about Kotter’s eight step model of change, Lewin’s three step model, and the five steps involved in action research. All of the authors discuss at least one of these models. There are also some optional videos on some of these models that might help.

When you are done reviewing these models of organizational change, take a look at the scenarios described in Questions 1-3. For each of these scenarios, explain which of the three models of change would be most appropriate for this situation. Finally, Question 4 is a summary question that you should also answer using the required readings. Explain your reasoning for each of your answers to the four assignment questions, and use at least one of the required readings to support each answer. You are required to cite at least one of the required videos or tutorials and two of required readings in your paper. Your paper should be four to five pages in length:

1. Ten years ago the CEO of a company attempted to implement a major restructuring of her company. However, this restructuring ended up being delayed repeatedly due to opposition from both the employee union as well as by several senior managers. Now that ten years have passed, it has become clear to the CEO that the change should have been implemented as now the company is facing many of the problems that she predicted ten years ago. Furthermore, the CEO believes the company will go out of business unless the restructuring is done. Also, in the past ten years she has made peace with many union leaders and senior managers and believes she might be able to get their support for a restructuring if you she is able to convince them of the extreme necessity of making this change.

2. The Chief Financial Officer (CFO) and the Chief Marketing Officer (CMO) have a major disagreement. The CFO wants to radically scale back expenditures on marketing and change the focus of the organization away from expensive advertising and instead rely on cheaper relationship marketing techniques. The CMO instead wants to greatly expand advertising, and even wants the company to borrow money to finance a major new advertising campaign. Both present detailed data to support their point of view, but the CEO cannot tell who is wrong or who is right as the data they present is confusing and contradictory. Furthermore, the CEO does not want to anger the marketing department or the finance department by seeming to favor one side or the other. However, the CEO does see the need to make major changes in marketing strategy and other areas in order to boost revenues.

3. A small town newspaper still has a loyal following in the town and in neighboring areas, especially among the older residents. However, the publisher of the paper is concerned that nobody under the age of 30 seems to ever read the paper and instead they get all their news from the internet. Furthermore, all of the employees at the newspaper have been working there for over 20 years and are very resistant to any type of change. The publisher wants to publish a print version only once a week instead of every day, and instead focus on reporting the news through blogs and social media. He is confident his well-qualified staff will be able do a good job in this new format, but since they have been doing the exact same type of work for the last 20 years he is concerned about rather extreme resistance to making any type of change in the workplace.

4. Conclude your paper with a discussion about which of the three change models you think is the most useful and which one you think is the least useful. Support your answer with references to the required background materials.

Assignment Expectations

· Follow the assignment instructions closely and follow all steps listed in the instructions

· Stay focused on the precise assignment questions, don't go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials

· List supporting references and cite sources in proper format

· Use appropriate writing style in essay form (organization, grammar, and spelling).

Module 4 - SLP

MANAGING ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE

For the Module 4 SLP think about a major organizational change that occurred in your workplace. Think carefully about the steps taken by management during the change process, and the organizational change processes and concepts that you read about in the background materials. Then write a two to three page paper addressing the following issues. Make sure to cite at least two of the required background readings in your paper:

1. Describe the change that occurred in your workplace. Was the change successful? Was there a lot of employee resistance to this change?

2. What steps and processes did management take to implement this change? Was it similar to Lewin’s three steps, Kotter’s eight steps, or the five steps used in action research?

3. In retrospect, do you think the change process would have gone better if management used Lewin’s three steps, Kotter’s eight steps, or the five step approach of action research?

Carefully explain your reasoning for each of your three answers using specific examples from your personal experience and the concepts from the background materials.

SLP Assignment Expectations

· Follow the assignment instructions closely and follow all steps listed in the instructions

· Stay focused on the precise assignment questions, don't go off on tangents or devote a lot of space to summarizing general background materials

· List supporting references and cite sources in proper format

· Use appropriate writing style in essay form (organization, grammar, and spelling).

· Include both a bibliography and in-text citations. See theStudent Guide to Writing a Hi