Good to Great

Good To Great is the book that we read in class and the book that I have already recommended to two different people.  I think that the book has many good points including talking about technology.  The point that the book makes is that a great company has to keep up with technology.  This means that they need to be up to date with everything and not have old technology.  I worked at a company a few years ago that did not have up to date technology and it was hard to get stuff done.  The computers worked, but were extremely slow and it was hard for them to process what we were telling them to do.  Since this was the case the company was behind on in putting records and other things.  It was hard to work to work at the company, even though the people that were there were great.  Since I have left the company has updated its equipment, but I still don't think they have the most up to date technology.

Bureaucracy

So far in my life I have worked in four different companies and all of them have been in the form of a bureaucracy.  A bureaucracy is an organization structure with highly routine operating tasks achieved through specialization, very formalized rules and regulations, tasks that are grouped into functional departments, centralized authority, narrow spans of control, and decision making that follows the chain of command.  This is the book's definition and I think that it is very accurate.  Since I have only worked in this type of organization I don't really know how other types of organizations work.  I would like to one day see how other organizations work, but I don't know if I will ever get the chance because I won't to work for the government.  This is definitely a bureaucracy and definitely the most famous one.  I am excited to work in this bureaucracy, but will never know any other form, most likely.

Leadership

Leadership is something that i have always been interested in because it is such a unique topic.  I have taken Ms. Gorrell's class and loved it.  In the future I would like to go into politics somehow and so this topic is something that I need to take serious and learn all that I can in order to succeed in the career field that I would like to go in.  I would already consider my self a leader in many regards.  For example all my friends always look to me to plan trips, come up with what we are doing over the weekend, or just look to me for advise.  These are not huge things in the grand scheme of things, but I do think that it shows that people look to me and will do what I tell them to do.  I think that you can never stop learning, how to be a leader; therefore I think that it is important to keep working and practicing different techniques to see which ones work the best.  Hopefully I can take everything that I have learned thus far and everything that I will learn with in the next 6 months, and apply it right when I get out of school to become the most successful I can be.  I will work hard at this and always continue learning, and who knows, maybe one day I'll be the greatest leader ever!

Diversity in the work place

A topic that really struck me in unit 2 that we covered was diversity in the work place. This is something that I had not actually witnessed until this summer when I worked in Washington DC. My first three jobs did not have any diversity in the work place. I always thought that this should change, but it never did. Then this summer I worked on Capital Hill and thats when I really witnessed diversity in the work place. I worked with a student named Papa and he was of Indian decent. Both of us got along great and everyone loved him in the office. Where the trouble came in was from people that called into the office. Many people had no idea what race or age we were. There were a few times when someone would ask us what race we were. This is when Papa and I saw the difference in how people treated us. There were people that would talk to Papa differently than they would talk to me and if fact some people even hung up on him. It was interesting to see that people in the actual work place were great and excepting of different races, but there are still many people out there that don't give the time of day to someone that is of a different race. This experience really showed me how some people struggle in the work place. I can't believe that people have to deal with the issues of people yelling at them and putting them down because they are a different race. Diversity is growing still and will continue to grow, but the struggles that the people have to deal with, like Papa, is unjust, yet it will always be there for them and they must always deal with it.

What managers do and good to great

Welcome to my blog and my first blog ever!
Reading chapter 1 in Robbin's book Organizational Behavior was all new material for me.  I have never been a manager and have never really known what managers do.  I have only had three real jobs and the first two both of the managers were corrupt and stole money from the company.  The most recent job I worked in Washington and I did not have a real manager.  I have never known what a great manager does until I read this chapter.

While reading the chapter I read that effective managers spend the most of their time communicating with other employees and customers.  This really made me think about how my managers have been awful managers and how when i walk into a store i can tell if there is a good manager in the store or not.  My managers have never communicated with me.  If all managers communicate with the employees and customers (if possible), a lot and in an effective manager then business will get better.

Another thing that I read for unit one was the book Good to Great.  This book really made me think about do companies become great?  This is addressed in the book and it says that they do become great.  I don't know if I see this as an accurate statement yet.  I was thinking about this and can not think of a company that I have watched go good to great!  All the companies I know of have always been great.  Of course a company cant start off great... or can it?  It all starts with the managers I think and so if the managers are great to start with then the company does start great!  I will continue to read this book and see if it can change my perspective on this.