The Management of Blue Sky - Essay Example

? As we view the shift of the leadership of Blue Sky from Max Blue, the founder, CEO and Chairman of the board, of the company to Jim Willis, the ex-VP of the company a drastic change in the leadership style can be observed. Max Blue’s leadership’s success was pivotal on his talent as a software engineer. It enabled him to develop three main software programs which were critical to the development of the company’s competitive advantage. Keeping his way of conducting operations in mind his leadership style, according to Simon Oates author of Leadership Expert, can rightly be labeled as autocratic. With identifying factors such as lack of delegation, stringent control and allowing little involvement in the decision making processes. It was also evident that the majority of the communication taking place was one way and that Max Blue’s focus was on directing employee’s in order to achieve objectives rather them taking into account their opinions and feedback. That being said it also enabled Blue Sky to benefit in terms of efficiently, productivity and their increased profitability under Max’s leadership. However it is important to note here that this led to an organization culture which was deeply reliant on the management skills of Max. It also proved to be a barrier to communication, creativity and an overall weak culture for the organization as it centered on the personality of Max Blue. Culture as a unifying factor under his leadership failed to be one of Blue Sky’s operational strengths. With Jim Willis taking charge of Blue Sky his approach to leadership can be considered more democratic. Although this switch posed to be a management challenge for Willis but his approach to management incorporated a broader involvement in the decision making process. This can be seen in the way he held a meeting with all the VP’s to discuss the issues faced by the company instead of simply handing out instructions based on his personal decision-making. We can also observe an increase in the participation and initiative of the VP’s as they contribute to finding a suitable solution. His willingness to delegate is also observable in the way he takes into consideration moving the regional heads under Susan’s authority. However there are also observable factors that serve as barriers to the development of Willis’s democratic style. Office politics is one concern as Garrison and Robert’s carefully avoid any kind of intervention in the decision making. An increase in the decision making process can also be observed which rightly categorizes Willis’s approach to management as democratic (Simon Oates, Leadership expert). Usually lower levels of motivation are observed when an autocratic leadership prevails. This is largely due to the minimal participation of the employees around the central aspects of the decision making process. The drive and the job-relevant knowledge of Max Blue although an asset completely dominated and left very little room for any initiatives that the employees might have wanted to voice. Furthermore it tips the balance into the promotion of a perception that Max Blue might’ve categorized the employees into the theory X component of McGregor’s theory X and Theory Y of motivation (Robbins & Coulter-a, Management). Another critical aspect that might’ve contributed to the nominal motivation was due to the fact that Max Blue promoted and showed an obvious preference towards the hiring of individuals of prior association. An example was that of hiring Susby Hubres, who was the daughter of his long time friend. Although she might’ve qualified as a member of the Executive team, the mere act leads to a prevalent assumption of favor-ism in the minds of the other employees. This has a direct impact on their motivation levels. With Willis’s adoption of a democratic leadership style there can be significant viewable changes in the level of motivation. This can be seen in the way that a lot of the regional officers were promoted to higher ranks. Another reason could be because of the senior manager’s being close to retirement a lot of positions for probable promotions would open up this would increase the efficiency and performance of the current employees. This leads to the adoption of the Equity theory of motivation as employee’s judge their treatment as compared to that of others. One thing that we should note here is that despite the fact that the motivation levels increase there is still one huge barrier that hinders employee motivation. The lack of a specification of organization goals leads to not only cracks in the company culture but also employee motivation. Although these are being addressed by the management under Willis but the measures taken are still in their initial stage. Strategic planning and decision making has definitely changed at Blue Sky. Keeping in mind the success of the company under Max Bell’s autocratic decision making and lack of goal setting as well as formulation of proper strategies the change that has come over the company is indeed positive. Under Bell the reliance on his personality and personally perceived goals, the company without his guidance went headfirst into a lot of management issues. Goal setting and then the formulation of appropriate strategies to achieve the objective of the company are critical to give the business an overall direction. Willis understands the importance of strategic planning which is why he has supported his VP’s decision to undertake measures to comprehensively develop them. Furthermore when faced with issues like lack of co-ordination between departments, function myopia, employee de-motivation and the adverse results of decision making without consultation he has aggressively endorsed and encouraged steps that would result in thorough decision making and a unifying focus for all of Blue Sky. (Robbins & Coulter-C, Management) There are several control problems that Blue Sky faces. The divisional structure of Blue sky although aims at increasing efficiency it somehow results in functional myopia with each department focusing too closely on the aspects that benefit their own department without seeing the entire company as one unit. This proves to be a failure of strategic management of Blue Sky due to a lack of coordination in terms of a unified focus on achieving the organization’s goals. (Daniel R Tobin) Then there is the annual increase in expenses that exceeds the increase in profits, which its Machine Tool Division faces. This is a depiction of the failure to put in place an efficient span of control in accordance to the department size and employees. Other problems faced by the remaining regional departments also show the poor organization communication linkages and the fact that Blue Sky’s design from Mechanistic to Organic will take a while to transition. Traces of bureaucracy in the organization design are also observable in the way Willis cannot downright get rid of James, head of the Machine Tool Division, solely due to the fact that it would displease Max Blue. The Decentralization of the regional departments and how ineffectively they are connected to the HQ is another control problem for Blue Sky and to eradicate it measures towards a more centralized approach are already in place by the management. (Robbins & Coulter-b, Management) REFERENCES Daniel. R Tobin. Using Leadership Development to Overcome Functional Myopia. Online. Retrieved from: http://ezinearticles.com/?Using-Leadership-Development-to-Overcome-Functional-Myopia&id=5176865 Oates, Simon. Leadership styles – autocratic vs democratic vs bureaucratic. Leadership Expert. Retrieved from: http://www.leadership-expert.co.uk/leadership-styles/ Robbins and Coulter. A. Motivating employees. Management. 9th edition. Chapter 16. Pg. 450. Robbins and Coulter. B. Strategic management. Management. 9th edition. Chapter 8. Pg. 206 Robbins and Coulter. C. Foundations of planning. Management. 9th edition. Chapter 7. Pg. 182. Read More