Equality Opportunities

Equality comes from “equal opportunity” this is in place to make everyone meet the terms with the anti discrimination legislation. This protects people from being discriminated against, on the basis of group membership i.e. sex. While diversity is the recognition of individual differences and that people are not all the same.

2006 age legislation/ effects

1)      Widens  people to pick from

2)      Keeps people in employment if able to work

The stereotypes that we tend to hold about young people is that, they may be a little bit reckless and unreliable, however with the old age people, the stereotypes we tend to hold about them, is that they may not be as efficient as the middle age people, also they can fall sick at any point in time, due to their health, this paints a picture of them being unreliable.

B&Q success is down to the amount of customers and staff they have. The company greatly believes to make their workforce as diverse as possible, and mix up the talent, right from the highest power of the hierarchy right to the bottom, more that 1200 of B&Q staff speak various different languages. The company continues to promote, equality of opportunity to prevent barriers from people working for them.

To conclude equality is a major thing in the work place of today, and is seen as very important, however this doesn’t mean that, there is equality everywhere. For example, a British Airways worker was punished for not taking off her crucifix, while other employees from different religions are allowed to be the religious symbols’, so even though the act is in place, we still need to question, how effective the equality act is.

Personality

First of all what is nature and nurture debate all about?

Nature can be seen personalities that are inherited from the family, in other terms the genes have been passed down from other members in the family that contributes to our personality, and the way we behave. Meanwhile nurture says our personality and behaviour is produced by the environment we live in.

Nomothetic approaches, this approach focuses on people in general, rather than a certain group of people. This is done through analysising group data. Believers in this approach suggest that personality is largely inherited instead of influenced by the environment. This perspective looks traits and characteristics, and then looked at as a whole. Then identified and measured, and finally put forward for test and observation.  This method is particularly helpful to managers. The nomothtic researchers take a positivism approach, which is looking at things from a scientific view, and mainly based on observation.

 Cattell used quantitative methods to analyse the data, he continued the study using basic traditional scientific methods to understand different people’s personality.   Cattell identified two main types of personality traits which are: surface traits and source traits.

  

Idiographic approach studies the personality and attempts to understand the individual and unique personality of people. Idiographic approach, this approach regards personality development as a process that is open to change; they all see the environment as a major factor in shaping peoples.  They also we people adapting with their environment, as a normal skill everyone has, this is said to make everyone unique in their own way.

Carl Jung theory identifies life energy as something that is concerned with hopes and goals of the future, and not just of post.

 Jung describes three levels of personality:

1)      A conscious

2)      An unconscious level

3)      A collective conscious level.

To conclude, the nature and nurture debate is important, however, according to what we are taught from a child in primary school, are genes and traits are gotten from people in our family, however i believe a load of factors, are taken into consideration to the development of an individual’s personality. In referral to the personality test, I agree with the rest.

Teamwork

Coming to the middle of first year in college, the sociology teacher sprung group work on the class, which was all about raising money for charity, and reviewing people’s perceptions in the modern day to day world about giving money to charity. The teacher put the class in random groups, which left the class working with people who they didn’t really know.

The group I was in consisted of three females and two males, which was kind of funny that the only two boys in the class where in the same group. That same day the group set to the library to construct a plan, funny enough I noticed had the hard working people in my group, which had me motivated even before we even started the work, the team came together, with limited disagreements, and we achieved are objective, this was looked as a successful and hard working group by the team members and the teacher

The theory that best relates to my college teamwork experience is tuckman , Tuckman's model explains that as the team develops maturity and ability, relations established, and the head changes leadership style. The module has five different stages which are forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning.

Forming is when the team just get together and start knowing each other. Storming is when the team goes through a rainy season and there is allot of infighting and demotivation .Norming this is the group starts to control issues, can getting found of a process to carry out the task. Performing this is where the group become more supportive to carry out and complete the task.

Adjourning this is make or break, if a team is willing to work with each other again, or cannot wait to leave, in my case the team i worked with would love to work with each other again. This would be seen as successful, because all the stages encountered by my group, was taken head on in a positive way.

Tuckman suggest that a group goes through 5 different stages which is known as forming, storming, norming, performing and adjourning, my group from the first assignment  fits  into Tuckman’s  module, because the group went through all the stages outlined, some stages more intense than others. We did not perform greatly in the performance stage and this had a great effect on the end result, even though we went through the five stages it ended up with not adjourning again. Compared to the group i worked with at college, we performed poorly or maybe because the work in university is more advanced than college.

The two companies that are going to be looked at are:
1) Office Angles (recruitment consultancy)
2) Microsoft IT/internet


Office Angles use team work as a major driving force to motivate staff and encourage them to work hard, the company goes further by explaining how, they use rewards to encourage staff compete amongst themselves. The company renders rewards such as trips to Dubai, New York and Barbados.

Microsoft employees are said to get a buzz from working in teams, a workforce consisting of 2625 have people who enjoy helping their team mates, outings outside work is seen as a team bonding session as well as leisure

To conclude, working in teams has seen to work for organisations in the sense of getting them to work hard, and achieve goals, however we should not fail to remember, that not all teams work well with each other.

Perception and Communication

A pervious situation where I have gotten the wrong insight of an individual, happened while working at Phones4u, while working at phones4u, I had up to four colleagues I worked with and I was initially assigned to pair up with a particular colleague called Lance who was the manager of that particular store.

My first thought of Lance when I first saw him was, how am I going to work with Lance, because my first day at the phones4u, he had a meeting with all staff, and it lasted for 2hours, consisted of lance talking about how he is going to change, the way we do things in the store, and how he doesn’t like the way things are done. After him saying all this I noticed the reaction of staff that had been working there for over 2yrs, they didn’t seem very happy.

The first thought that came to mind was, how am I possibly going to work with this manager, with my  previous perception of him is him being ultra arrogant. And with other staff saying, they had never had a manger like that, got me thinking can I cope with such an arrogant and strict manager, what made it worse he was my partner.

After the 2hr speech about changes, the new manger had to go to the head office for a meeting, so I didn’t get to work with him, which was a relief, I came to the conclusion it would be hard working with such a person.

The next day was back to work, funny enough I resumed work late, and panic had kicked in, due to too much thinking about, what my manager would say. Strolling in late,with all eyes on me, but to my surprise he said “how you doing mate, hope your not too tired from the long shift yesterday”. 

During lunch Lance suggested me and him should go on brake at the same time, I was really dreading going on break with him, while eating lunch we had various interesting conversations, about views on life ,the world and social events, after lunch I told him, your much different from when your at work, he told me, its better not mix business with pleasure, to get the job done every one has to do what they have to do, that he is only putting on an act, jus to get things done (job). 

This showed me that people can give different perceptions across to people, consciously and sub consciously, but lance was diffidently  not the person I thought he was, I even started to see him more as a friend by the time I left the company.

However to conclude its better to read the book, and not blurb before Judging the book, in other words are perception of people should be made after, we get to know them, rather than judging them.

Enterprise week

In this blog I am going to explain one of the event s I attended and highlight how it has inspired me at me time in new Bucks University.

After attending two events at the enterprise week, which was Yasimina the BBC winner of the apprentice and the advertising conference, of the two, the talk from Yasimina was very detailed and interesting, she is a 29 year old woman with a drive to succeed in life, and she spoke to us about how she opened up a restaurant with her brother named Mya Lacarte.

Even though Yasimina was doing well with her brother running the restaurant, she told us she still aspired to be on the BBC apprentice show and she did, Yasimina got to the finals against Kate Walsh, she won in the end and landed herself a £100,000 year salary.

During the talk she connected with audience she even described the atmosphere as being at home while giving here talk, she proved the saying “you can have what you want, in life if you work at hard at it”. She reminds us on how it was difficult working under film 24/7, and portraying her real personality at all times.

 However she didn’t tell us how it was behind the scenes but she did tell us, how it was working with sir Allan Sugar, and went on saying it was a great experience for her, and has helped her with her business ambition and helped her drive hard to achieve goals

This talk for the award winning Yasimina, has helped influenced me to drive harder to achieve the career I aspire to gain after my time at new bucks university, the reason why it has encouraged me so much, because she was already doing well before she went on the apprentice, but she was still determined to excel, so that has encouraged me to excel.

To conclude this talk was event was great and precise compared to the 2^nd event I attended, however the talk from Yasimina, could have come with a little bit more information about Sir Allan sugar.

Conflict

The group that I have taken part in, within the last few years, was Phones4u, while working in this organisation we had to continuous had to work in teams to maximise sales, this was a good experience, because it helped us all get to know each other, and it made it easier for ever employee in the team to hit assigned targets, and group targets.

The group consisted of 4 males and 2 females; all from different backgrounds and different parts of the world, the problems we had all of us had different perceptions, most of us viewed the world in different views, which conflicted with the other employees view, perceptions  are usually seen as peoples reality

Working at Phones4u, entailed each employee to share resources, such as planners, computers to sell contacts, and phones, this created conflict between workers, also when targets were not substantially met, and conflict arose.

Violation of territory is a very common with people who are in touch with their personal space, for example these employees sit on a specific chair, specific tables, specific tables, this can easily bring about conflict in the work places, and working at Phones4u this generated problems between staff, territory at work is taken very seriously by some workers and is compared to the home.

Phones4u made use of Human recourses management and policies and procedures, a review on the HRM policies can reduce conflict in different areas of the organisation, for example this can be done by reviewing the recruitment centre and the system of punishments and rewards. Mullins, (2007). To review conflict situations between staff with different views

After been sent away for group activities in a hotel in central London, so staff could get to know each other better it came to realisation that, Group activity may overlap one group’s problem with another, Mullins (2007). Overlapping different membership with the ‘linking-pin process’ and careful selection of teams can bring out problems, but what may be affecting one group can be beneficial to the other.

After continues disputes amongst staff other resources and different duties, Making it clear to staff that no matter your position once a duty is assigned to you, the employee has to do it, this made it clear that no matter your position in the organisation, every was under the same rules.

Different sources of power

Coercive power: people obey to avoid punishment and dispute from the person in charge. For example the army has coercive power to control people by all means possible.

Expert power: this is where a person has a vase amount of skill and possesses a certain amount of information in this area. For example an engineer has a great amount of information in his job.

Referent power:  this sort of power, people obey the person in charge, because they have respect for them, for example, a lawyer respecting a judge at court

Reward power: the person in control sets targets so people can get rewards. For example, working at Phones4u, bonuses were given for hitting targets, and selling the most stock.

Legitimate power: from being in a legitimate position where, the person has been voted into power for example Barack Obama has legitimate power.

An organisation can make use of,

1.      Non monetary reward- rewards that don’t make use of money

2.      HRM policies and procedures- policies that ensure equal rights

3.      Group activities.–group activities that allow staff to get to know each other and find out if one group’s problem could another group’s benefit. Mullins (2007).

To conclude, organisations make use of different techniques to try to eradicate, conflict however, what organisations cannot prevent is people having different views on life, so their will always be conflict, but these techniques can reduce it. 

references 

Mullins (2004) management and organisational behaviour.  (8^th edition).

Culture

Organizational culture refers to the values that are taken for granted. It represents the way we do things are around here. (Handy,2003). It carries a sense of identity, provides unspoken guidelines for how to get along and improve the stability of the social system to which they belong. However McLean and Marshall (2001) differ by defining it as a collection of traditions, beliefs, attitudes and values that constitute a universal setting for everything we do in an organisation.

Deal and Kennedy (1982) argue that culture is the single most important factor accounting for success or failure in organizations. They identified four key dimensions of culture which are:

1. Values – the beliefs that lie at the heart of the corporate culture.

2. Heroes – the people who embody values.

3. Rites and rituals – routines of interaction that have strong symbolic qualities.

4. The culture network – the informal communication system or hidden hierarchy of power in the organization.

The two organisations mentioned have also different culture by which they operate.

Working at Hilton hotel for a while made me embrace the culture of the organisation so easily, after been explained what their culture was all about once, Hilton believe in friendliness and great customer service, Once walking into the building, directly from the entrance guest are made to feel at home, very rarely would you see a member of staff without a smile or unwilling to help a customer in need, this leaves you with the question why are staff so willing and more than happy to help?, well Hilton provide great perks and incentives which ends up motivating staff and improving performance.

Table showing In culture

Paradigms	Hiltons Hotel
Stories	This company is a multinational.
Rituals and Routines	The ritual and routines of the employees here are the basis of their customer satisfaction.
Symbols	The hotels are beautifully designed suiting both customers and employees making it a comfortable and a conducive environment to work in
Organisational Structure	As mentioned, the structure of this organisation is a tall one. Therefore there is bureaucracy.
Control systems	As a more bureaucratic system, the control systems are tighter; here employees are punished for making the wrong decisions or choices.

Power culture: entails having a central figure or a head that makes vast amount of decisions, having a leader, in an organisation may build up a level of trust between the leader and co workers under him or her, decisions are made faster than normal because co workers are not consulted this may de motivate staff and may have an effect on their performance. For example, the CEO decides the office should open on Sundays and everyone has to work on this day, this decision has been made with consultation of co workers, and may have a great affect on staff performance.

Role culture: consist of a bureaucratic system according to (handy), work in the organisations is decried by rules set, and not just appointed by the leader, this type of culture has a high level of communication between the different levels of hierarchy.

Tasks culture: this kind of culture is made up of freedom and flexibility, this is common in some organisations and high level of team work, working in teams at work builds stronger communication amongst staff an example of this Fatramz properties, everyone has their own rolls but it’s very flexible, with mutual objectives in the organisation to hit targets, but believe greatly in team work and less of individual rule.

Person culture: this type of culture is based on personal interest that forms an organisation; most of these organisations have members in trade unions, people who fall in to this category a people with professional jobs, i.e. teacher, with everyone basically on the same level.

The problem trying to classify culture around task, power and person culture is that, some people may just not fit in, it’s just like society today, even though there so many different pressure groups form rooms and niche cultures, some people don’t fit, just for the simple reason everyone is different. People come from all parts of the world is it then fair to categorise culture into four, this is the problem of classifying culture into power, role ,person and task

To conclude Schein (1992) says that organisational culture is even more important toady than it has previously been before. Globalisation, increased competition and technological change have created a greater need for innovation, coordination and integration across organisations in order to improve efficiency and meet the expectations of increasingly more sophisticated clients.

globalisation has improved and increased competition, however also has its negative effects 

references 

Mullins (2004) management and organisational behaviour.  (8^th edition).