Loading...

Messages

Proposals

Stuck in your homework and missing deadline? Get urgent help in $10/Page with 24 hours deadline

Get Urgent Writing Help In Your Essays, Assignments, Homeworks, Dissertation, Thesis Or Coursework & Achieve A+ Grades.

Privacy Guaranteed - 100% Plagiarism Free Writing - Free Turnitin Report - Professional And Experienced Writers - 24/7 Online Support

Harvard business review you can t fix culture

21/10/2021 Client: muhammad11 Deadline: 2 Day

Please make sure that you carefully address each question including details to support your answers. Each answer should connect back to information from the book or discussion videos. Please use detail from the class to answer each question. The strongest answers will have specific detail regarding topics from the book and lectures.

You will use the 2 case studies from Harvard Business Publishing to complete the paper. Please note that there are strict copyright rules for the use of this case.

Please address each question separately. Label the question with the number below, and organize your document by question.

Questions for “The Team that Wasn’t”

How effective has this team been?
What norms have emerged?
What is the culture of the group? How would you evaluate their interpersonal processes using concepts from the book?
What leadership theories apply either as leadership you see as present or leadership concepts that are not present, but you feel would be useful?
Questions for “Can you fix a toxic culture”

Create a fishbone diagram to analyze possible root causes of problems in the organization. Include an actual diagram.
What is the culture of the organization? What type of work attitudes are relevant to this case?
What leadership elements (or lack of) and theories do you see operating in this case?
What plan of action would you create in this scenario?
What ethical issues are raised by this case?
What elements of psychological contracts may exist for employees in this case?
This is your culminating project in place of a final exam. All work should be completed independently, without consulting other students, faculty, or others. The work must be your own, do not copy material from the internet. More thorough answers will receive more points.

As CFO, Noelle was, of course, concerned about the numbers. But after spending time in Little Rock, she worried they might be facing a bigger problem. She’d gone to Arkansas to review operational plans and financial projections for the rest of the year with the team on the ground. FB Holdings had made it through the financial crisis of 2008 without losing money—but the climate control systems divisions, a Tier 1 automotive

supplier, had not fared as well. Franklin had finally returned to profitability, but she and Cameron Koren, a turnaround specialist who’d been brought in as CEO five years earlier to right the ship, were still working hard to keep the busi- ness on track. She knew the Little Rock plant had been through years of belt-tightening and turn- over, so she hadn’t expected a warm welcome, but the negative vibe she’d felt from the employees had been even worse than she’d expected. The word that kept popping into her mind was “toxic.”1

Doug Lee, the company’s head of HR, had warned her and Cameron about the plant’s “bad mood,” as he called it. He’d been very vocal about his concerns that although Franklin was now on stable financial ground, a less quantifiable prob- lem was still dampening performance: extremely low morale and widespread disengagement,2 especially in Little Rock.

Noelle had listened to Doug’s concerns, but as a numbers person, she’d assumed that once the

The flight attendant had to ask her twice, “Anything to drink, ma’am?”

FRANCESCA GINO is a behavioral scientist

and the Tandon Family Professor of Business Administration at Harvard Business School.

HBR’s fictionalized case studies present problems faced by leaders in real companies and offer solutions from experts. This one is based on the HBS Case Study “Webasto Roof Systems Americas: Leadership Through Change” (case no. 917015-PDF-ENG), by Francesca Gino and Paul Green, which is available at HBR.org.

CASE STUDY CAN YOU FIX A TOXIC CULTURE WITHOUT FIRING PEOPLE? A CFO WONDERS HOW TO TURN AROUND A STRUGGLING DIVISION. BY FRANCESCA GINO

Harvard Business Review  November–December 2018 2

FOR ARTICLE REPRINTS CALL 800-988-0886 OR 617-783-7500, OR VISIT HBR.ORG

For the exclusive use of H. Hu, 2019.

This document is authorized for use only by Haixin Hu in Psyc 302 taught by JANELLE GILBERT, California State University - San Bernardino from Jun 2019 to Dec 2019.

http://hbr.org
division was out of the red, the people problems would go away. As the plane descended into Aurora, Noelle won- dered if she was wrong. This may be a problem a spreadsheet just can’t fix, she thought.

TWO DAYS EARLIER It was Noelle’s third scheduled meeting to review financials, and again she was alone in a conference room waiting for people to show up.

When one of the plant supervisors popped his head into the room, she asked, “Are you joining?”

“I guess so,” he said noncommittally and took a seat at the opposite end of the table.

Noelle leaned toward him, hoping to demonstrate her eagerness to engage.

He leaned back. “I don’t even know if I’m supposed to be here,” he said. “I got an invite, but it was forwarded to me by someone else.”

Noelle had been hearing things like that all day. It was clear that people weren’t communicating across depart- ments or even with colleagues on their own teams. No one seemed interested in hearing a financial update—the few who had shown up in previous meetings were just short of hostile. When she’d walked into the building earlier that day, it had been dead silent. On the plant floor and in the offices people kept to themselves; when she walked by, no one even looked up. There was no bustle, no camaraderie.

“Can I ask you a favor, Marshall?” Noelle asked. “It is Marshall, right?”

He nodded.

“It doesn’t look like anyone else is coming to this meeting,” she said, look- ing at the clock, which now read 11:20. “Can you tell me what’s going on here?”

Marshall sat quietly for a minute and then shrugged. “I guess I have nothing to lose at this point,” he said. “This just isn’t a good place to work anymore. I have people quitting or threatening to quit all the time.3 People don’t like coming to work. They clock in and clock out. I’ve been here for 18 years, and it hasn’t always been like this. We used to have fun at work, and we’d hang out together after. Now all I hear is ‘I just want to do my job and get out of here.’ There’s no sense of community.”

“Because of the cuts?” she asked, knowing the answer before she even finished the question.

“Yes, exactly. Everyone knows that the company hit hard times. But all the ‘belt-tightening’”—he used air quotes here, and Noelle winced, realizing how stupid the euphemism sounded—“has taken a toll. The perks that used to bring teams together—on-site lunches and dinners; bonuses, even small ones—they meant a lot to our people. Now we don’t do anything for them. And making $15 an hour isn’t cutting it for them.”

“I appreciate your being candid

with me,” Noelle said. “I imagine it can’t be easy.”

“Like I said, nothing to lose.” Marshall smiled ruefully. “But it’s sad. I remember when it felt like the company noticed me, even cared about me. But now it’s like nobody trusts anybody.”

“Is there any way the company can regain your faith?”

“Honestly, I’m not sure. The feeling is that Aurora is focused on the bottom line. Everything that’s been done over the past few years has been about the penny, not the people. The message has become ‘Just be glad you have a job.’ And I haven’t seen any signs that things will be changing anytime soon.”

BACK IN AURORA The morning after Noelle returned from Little Rock, she found herself in another empty conference room, this time waiting for Cameron and Doug. A few minutes later, they walked in together.

“How was your trip?” Cam asked. “Bleak,” she said. She recounted her

meeting with Marshall. Cam shook his head impatiently.

“These are tough times for everyone. Our other sites have felt the pinch, but none has turned as sour as Little Rock.”

CLASSROOM NOTES

1. When is calling a culture “toxic” appropriate? How bad do things need to be to earn that label?

2. This is not uncommon. Gallup’s 2017 State of the Global Workplace report found that 67% of employees are

“not engaged” and 18% are “actively disengaged” at work.

3. Downsizing a workforce by 1% leads to a 31% increase in voluntary turnover the next year, research shows.

4. Studies show that when employees feel valued by their companies, they are more committed and satisfied in their jobs and show fewer signs of stress and burnout.

“The feeling is that Aurora is focused on the bottom line. Everything that’s been done over the past few years has been about the penny, not the people.”

3 Harvard Business ReviewNovember–December 2018

CO PY

RI G

H T

© 2

01 8

H AR

VA RD

B US

IN ES

S SC

H O

O L

PU BL

IS H

IN G

C O

RP O

RA TI

O N

. A LL

R IG

H TS

R ES

ER VE

D.

For the exclusive use of H. Hu, 2019.

This document is authorized for use only by Haixin Hu in Psyc 302 taught by JANELLE GILBERT, California State University - San Bernardino from Jun 2019 to Dec 2019.

He paused. “You know we’re still under intense scrutiny from FB. Layoffs might be our best option to keep things moving in the right direction.”

Noelle exchanged a quick glance with Doug. She knew he was adamantly against more layoffs now that they were on better financial footing.

“I realize that personnel cuts are not necessary from a financial perspective. But culturally, it might be time for a purge,” Cam continued. “We can’t have people like Marshall—a supervisor— spreading doom and gloom across the entire facility. We need people who are positive about the company’s future, not holding on to an unattainable past.”

Doug spoke up. “Respectfully, I dis- agree with you, Cam.” He had never been one to tell the CEO only what he wanted to hear. “These employees have stuck with us through the worst of it, and with the right initiatives, we can bring them back around. Additional layoffs—especially now that we’re making money again— would just make things worse. And who wants to join a company that treats its peo- ple like that?4 How would we find enough people to replace the experienced—albeit disengaged—staff we’d be letting go? And remember the research I showed you: Companies that lay off large numbers of employees are twice as likely to file for bankruptcy as companies that don’t.”

“But your engagement surveys—not to mention the anecdotal stories like Noelle’s—show that things are just getting worse,” Cam responded. “So I’m struggling to find a way to make this work. We’re still not where we need to be operationally and

financially, and maybe that’s because we have too many people holding us back.5 It’s like we’re surgeons who have a patient bleeding out on the operating table. Do we join hands and sing ‘Kumbaya’? Or pull out our scalpels?”

Doug stood firm. “I think—and correct me if I’m wrong, Noelle—that the bleeding has stopped. So now it’s more like we have a patient in the ICU who needs help getting better.”

He and Cam sat back and looked at her, waiting for her response.

“You’re right that we’ve stabilized, Doug,” she said. “But given what I saw in Arkansas, the patient is definitely not out of the woods.”

HIT THE RESET BUTTON The following Saturday, Noelle met her friend Joss at the reservoir near their houses. The two women had gone to business school together and had both ended up in Aurora, so they often turned to each other for work advice. Having executed a successful turnaround as COO of a construction company, Joss had been especially helpful to Noelle during her time at Franklin.

Now, as they started out on their five-mile loop, Noelle described the situation in Little Rock and Cameron and Doug’s most recent debate. “We talked a lot about ‘excising the bad seeds,’ and as you know, we’ve already laid off a lot of people. But the crazy thing is that even once the worst offenders were gone, morale stayed just as low.”

“It’s not the people who are toxic,” Joss said, “it’s the culture.6 So even

though it’s hard, you have to fix that first. I gave you the name of the consul- tants we worked with, right?”

“Yes, Doug and I even had an explor- atory call with them. But whenever we’ve floated the idea of working with them to Cameron, he has shot it down, saying we can’t afford it right now. And he’s right. Our bottom line will look better if we keep reducing overhead7 rather than spending more money to try to fix the problem.”

“For our company, it was the best money we ever spent,” Joss said. “Ardu- ous, yes. Time-consuming, yes. Most of the time it felt like I was living in a Dilbert parody. But employees’ attitudes have really improved, and so have the numbers.”

“I’ve got more than enough to do with the financials—I don’t know why I’m even getting involved.8 But I hate feeling that the executive team is letting our people down—and using my num- bers to justify it.”

“Bringing the company back to a high level of operational performance will take the focus and energy of hundreds of employees,” Joss said. “Cameron is kidding himself if he thinks he can rely on a few good people who somehow—miraculously—manage to stay engaged through another round of cuts.”

“I just keep looking around for the reset button,” Noelle said.

“Unfortunately, when it comes to culture, no such thing exists.”

5. In the U.S. layoffs are straightforward from a legal standpoint. In other countries they are highly regulated, and in some regions companies are required to justify the reductions to authorities.

6. Is Joss right in saying that getting rid of toxic people won’t change the culture?

7. Is this viewpoint too narrow? In a 2012 review of 20 studies of companies that had conducted layoffs, Deepak Datta of the University of Texas at Arlington found that staff reductions had a neutral to negative effect on stock prices in the days after the announcement and that most of the companies eventually suffered declines in profitability.

8. Should a CFO be getting involved in HR issues?

Reprint Case only R1806X

Harvard Business Review  November–December 2018 4

SHOULD NOELLE SUPPORT THE LAYOFFS OR ADVOCATE FOR CULTURE CHANGE?

FOR ARTICLE REPRINTS CALL 800-988-0886 OR 617-783-7500, OR VISIT HBR.ORG

For the exclusive use of H. Hu, 2019.

This document is authorized for use only by Haixin Hu in Psyc 302 taught by JANELLE GILBERT, California State University - San Bernardino from Jun 2019 to Dec 2019.

http://hbr.org/search/R1806X
http://hbr.org

Homework is Completed By:

Writer Writer Name Amount Client Comments & Rating
Instant Homework Helper

ONLINE

Instant Homework Helper

$36

She helped me in last minute in a very reasonable price. She is a lifesaver, I got A+ grade in my homework, I will surely hire her again for my next assignments, Thumbs Up!

Order & Get This Solution Within 3 Hours in $25/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 3 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

Order & Get This Solution Within 6 Hours in $20/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 6 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

Order & Get This Solution Within 12 Hours in $15/Page

Custom Original Solution And Get A+ Grades

  • 100% Plagiarism Free
  • Proper APA/MLA/Harvard Referencing
  • Delivery in 12 Hours After Placing Order
  • Free Turnitin Report
  • Unlimited Revisions
  • Privacy Guaranteed

6 writers have sent their proposals to do this homework:

Finance Master
Quick Finance Master
Helping Engineer
A+GRADE HELPER
Calculation Guru
Engineering Guru
Writer Writer Name Offer Chat
Finance Master

ONLINE

Finance Master

I have read your project description carefully and you will get plagiarism free writing according to your requirements. Thank You

$38 Chat With Writer
Quick Finance Master

ONLINE

Quick Finance Master

I find your project quite stimulating and related to my profession. I can surely contribute you with your project.

$28 Chat With Writer
Helping Engineer

ONLINE

Helping Engineer

I am an experienced researcher here with master education. After reading your posting, I feel, you need an expert research writer to complete your project.Thank You

$15 Chat With Writer
A+GRADE HELPER

ONLINE

A+GRADE HELPER

I am an academic and research writer with having an MBA degree in business and finance. I have written many business reports on several topics and am well aware of all academic referencing styles.

$38 Chat With Writer
Calculation Guru

ONLINE

Calculation Guru

As per my knowledge I can assist you in writing a perfect Planning, Marketing Research, Business Pitches, Business Proposals, Business Feasibility Reports and Content within your given deadline and budget.

$17 Chat With Writer
Engineering Guru

ONLINE

Engineering Guru

I have done dissertations, thesis, reports related to these topics, and I cover all the CHAPTERS accordingly and provide proper updates on the project.

$30 Chat With Writer

Let our expert academic writers to help you in achieving a+ grades in your homework, assignment, quiz or exam.

Similar Homework Questions

Cyber Security and Internet of things - Module 2 Identify Patterns- Assess - Case Study - Impractical jokers present your crotch - Annotated Bibliography Graphic Organizer - Bond sinking fund journal entry - Discussion - Nursing post - Single phase power measurement - Gold coast city council proposed developments - The art of songwriting ed bell pdf - Manifesto - Boost juice market segmentation - Asynchronous counter truth table - Theories of play ppt - When mrp ii systems include feedback they are known as - Revive to survive chirnside park - Happy days heart song lyrics - Conflict resolution in the workplace powerpoint - 95a queens road connells point - Hydrochloric acid + sodium carbonate - Employee salary details program in python - Week 8 340 b - Scope management plan example of it project - On april 1 2015 jiro nozomi created - Gp receptionist jobs leyland - Biblical worldview edition of dynamic business law - Http www criticalreading com critical_thinking htm - What is an underachiever - Mymathlab liberty - Project 3: Discussion -- Fiscal & monetary policy in IS/LM - 3 winding transformer symbol - Ppt - Jack black saxophone tonight show - Boundaries of inguinal triangle - Hoenig v isaacs [1952] 2 all er 176 - Cengagebrain vitalsource - Webcom2.0 - Thesis statement on effectiveness of advertising - Please answer full no plagiarism. - They say i say is college the best option - As nzs 2243.8 2014 - Gyorgy kurtag kafka fragments - Vmware tools heartbeat failure - Mitosis vs meiosis video - International professional practices framework - Joan shays appli bond needles - Pdf 4 deadfall trap - Angela's story a case study on the reproductive system answers - Epistemology Assignment - Costco sam's club or bj's - Fleck 2900 valve manual - Paper - Multinational Company Project - Silver sulfide soluble or insoluble - Gpo box 4309 melbourne vic 3001 - Hydro 175 john deere - Cambridge igcse mathematics syllabus - Adapting counseling skills for multicultural and diverse clients - How loud is 84 db - O2 electron dot diagram - Capitalise mum and dad - Final disc 9 - The concept of guanxi, defined as ______, is important in _____ business culture. - Problem 5 3a perpetual alternative cost flows lo p1 - What number is lv in roman numerals - What does mycaa stand for - To introduce her class to binomial distributions - Elmo roper concentric circle theory - Carestream vita cr system software download - Project reflection paper - What happens when two plates carrying continental crust collide - Peanut growers cooperative marketing association - Describe perplexity and wonderment as ways to god - How to open docx file in oneplus 6 - 82nd academy awards winners - Blade runner quotes rachael - Individual Project(2 different copies needed) - Long term investment decision in financial management - Perspectives in history snhu - Writershub tests - Usa today innovation and evolution in a troubled industry - Air preheater efficiency calculation - Developing effective communication in health and social care - Whitchurch primary school harrow - Chief complaint nursing care plan - Ioncross freelancer character editor - Hotel connected to mandalay bay - Eco 550 assignment 2 operations decision - Citizen crystal part numbering - Phasor diagram of 3 phase induction motor - Poster Development - John ortberg speaking fee - Project Management Paper - 4 pages - Discussion #5 - Zinn chapter 8 study questions answers - What is the magnitude f of the force? express your answer numerically in newtons. - What is a synthesis claim - Gold coast council number - Case Study – Security