Analyzing And Improving Organizational And Personal Skills

1. Choose an appropriate organisation for your analysis. This may be the organisation you currently work in or have worked in in the past, or an organisation you are familiar with through personal experience or through the media. If you choose a large organisation, you may opt to focus your analysis on a specific area of the company such as a branch, division or large department.

2. Identify and briefly describe a current organisational problem or challenge faced by your chosen organisation. Relevant problems or challenges may include high turnover, low engagement among workers, the need to implement a change within the organisation, loss of revenue or market position etc. Note that these are only examples and you are free to focus on other problems that are relevant to the specific organisation.

3. Critically analyse the problem or challenge you have identified drawing on relevant frameworks and concepts from Managing People and Organisations. Based on your analysis, make specific recommendations on how to resolve the problem or challenge and how to improve the organisation's effectiveness in dealing with the issue. 

1.Looking back at what was a hectic day during my admission to college; I was not able to prepare myself well enough to meet the first day requirements and deadline. Few days before my admission, I had been working overtime so as to raise some money to assist me in my upkeep. Normally get home late and wake up very early in the morning, therefore, I could not manage my time well enough to arrange the relevant documents needed for the first day. I had been admitted to college, but I had to bring some relevant documents for my first-day checking and procedures. The enrollment and orientation process was a systematic process that required every student to carry all the relevant documents. Having driven hundreds of kilometers from home to college, I expected that I had all the requirements on the checklist. Upon my arrival, I noticed that I was 2 hours late from the commencement of the process, but the enrollment process was still going on. To my surprise, I did not have all the admission documents with me, my offer letter and my senior secondary school certificate were missing. The documents were mandatory for enrollment meaning my official registration date had to wait till I could get hold of those documents. This whole situation was brought by poor planning and time management skills as I could not manage to plan my time and read the checklist to ensure that I had carried all these documents with me.

Analysis: Time management can both be described as a skill and also as an attribute that enables one to arrange his or her schedules correctly. A day consists of 24 hours, and this allows any individual to organize his activities promptly so as to prevent inconveniences that may arise. Prioritizing allow for one to establish what is an important issue and what can be described as a non-Important (Pothukuchi, 2008). Inability to priorities what was urgent made me arrive late and also miss the essential documents for my enrollment as I was too busy working.

Failure to adapt to the incoming change forced me to lose a lot of time as could not focus my mind to shift from working individual to a student. Accepting change and adaptation is one of the key concepts one should understand and comprehend so as to ensure that things run in a smooth manner (Saini, D.2016). Keeping track and proper planning of future events would have assisted me in ensuring that I was not caught unaware and on surprise.

Improvement planning: Through my learning, I have come to understand how I could have handled the situation differently or how I could have avoided the situation. Prioritizing, tasks breakdown, goal setting and making a list of things to do would have assisted me in avoiding the inconveniences on that day. I have learnt that proper planning, prioritizing and setting appropriate goals and objectives would help in reducing this kind of incidents in the future (Taylor, 2012). It is also essential for one to devise ways of making routines and proper adjustments to those own routines. One of the obstacles that would affect time management can be an instance where one develops an issue in remembrance memory.

Organizational Problem Identification

2.College assignments and course work will at one point in time require a student to show his understanding and ability of his communication skills. I remember when I was assigned a duty to go and research about any particular topic on employee productivity subject, come up with the findings and present my conclusions and recommendations in front of the class. At first, I didn’t critically think of the seriousness of the matter, and I saw it just like a regular assignment that needed me to collect information and present it in front of the class. I did not understand the concepts and technicalities of topic selection, data collection, communication and presentation requirements required for the display. I thought the presentation was a regular and natural activity that required me to go study about the topic subject, derive data, prepare a presentation and then present it to my audience students. This was not an easy case as I thought as I could not connect with the audience on the matters of subject topic. I had researched well and deep, but it seems my communication skills were not good enough to create a bond between me and my fellow student that would make my topic seem more interesting and creative enough.

Analysis: I learnt that my topic was not appealing enough to the knowledge and interest of the audience. I took a comprehensive and a hard to understand topic thus making it less attractive for the students to connect (Guillén, Mayo, & Korotov, 2015). The broad topic required me to have extensive research, and therefore I could not find time or space to narrow down my presentation to an appealing article. My presentation required power point representation, but I made a mistake of relying on the visual aid all through my presentation. I should have written main points on a piece of paper that would have assisted me in deriving the key issues and ideas effectively to the audience. My whole presentation was based on the visual aid thus making it relatively dull and less interesting.

The structure and flow of ideas were not clear enough thus making it fairly hard for the students to understand and comprehend the whole presentation (Benjamin, 2016). By picking a broad topic, I was limited to the broadness even in my presentation as I could not be able to align my ideas in a systematic way and in an easy way to follow. I also realized a big problem in my presentation as I expanded the topic into broad ways and covered even the unrelated matters in the question. The topic was supposed to be a simple one and analysis should have been on the key aspects of the subject; however, I went deep into the topic and covered a lot of irrelevant information in the topic.

Anxiety played a huge role in the ineffectiveness of the presentation as I was nervous and unable to derive and explain my points and ideas in a somber manner as required by (Wilkins, Bernstein, & Bekki, 2015). I lacked the composure and calmness to handle the situation and the stage thus proving to be a huge hindrance to the success of my assignment. My delivery also had some issues as I was not audible and energetic enough to present my ideas in a vibrant manner. Every delivery information is negatively affected if audibility is not sufficient.

Analysis of the Organizational Problem

Improvement planning: During my studies, I have learnt the concepts of communication skills that make communication more efficient. The biggest obstacle in these activities and assignments is the lack of ample time to research and present the ideas. Understanding the topic, deriving the key points, structuring flow of information, composure and audibility will assist me during my next presentation and make it more useful and enable me to connect with the audience well.

3.One of my hobbies and the part-time job is coaching a teenager’s football team that plays at a grassroots level. A few weeks ago I encountered a poor performance by the team as they could not implement my ideas on the field. As their leader, I felt disappointed but realized that the team members were not driven and motivated enough to achieve and deliver their best efforts. It is my role as leader to have given them the motivation and personal drive to go out in the field and deliver results, so I felt I had failed and should have given them an extra push. Leadership and motivation cannot be separated in any way as they depend on each other because a good leader should learn how to understand his or her team member’s different characteristics and personal motivators (Kline, 2008).

Analysis: People have different motivating factors; others are driven by intrinsic factors while others are motivated by extrinsic factors (Rees, 2015). In my team I should have learnt the players on individual level and understand what drives them to perform at their highest level. Intrinsically motivated players would include those who are driven by internal motivations such as wanting to be a team member for a long time or the ones who wish to pursue the career further. Such an individual would be encouraged if his future or reputation in the team or the game was challenged, thus making him works harder.

Some others are encouraged by external factors such as rewards, bonuses and allowances. It was my responsibility to understand how such individuals would be invited to perform further. Setting a reward for each objective achieved would push such individuals to perform at their highest level. Other players in the team might have personal discouraging factors, so it was my role to understand those factors and act in responsive ways because some will be motivated if offered a sense of self-belonging in the team.

Improvement planning: To improve team performance in any team, group or organization, I have learnt that there must be structures that are based on motivation of team members so as to improve their productivity. It is critical to understand that different individuals are motivated by either intrinsic or extrinsic motivators. Good working environment, teamwork and having clear objectives would go an extra mile in improving performance and productivity of the team members. Failure of the team should not be solved by punishment but rather on advice and motivation to do better so as to improve on self-believe that will, in turn, lead to better performances and improvement in general productivity of the team members.

Recommendations for Improving the Organizational Problem

The report aims to explain the level of employee voice at Manage Wealth PTY Limited and how it affects their overall productivity. Freedom of expressing ideas, suggestions and complaints is the core subject of this report while trying to explain its influence on motivation morale and their overall output. The study will show the general perception and believe of both the organization and the workers on matters pertaining employee voice. The report will also include the findings, analysis, conclusion and recommendations on the subject matter.

Employee voice typically means the employee engagement and involvement in an organization key decision making processes. Under communication terms, this can be described as the ability and freedom of communicating suggestions, ideas, issues, conflicts and complaints from a subordinate worker to the management (Ruck, 2015). It is the easiness or space accorded that determines the level of employee voice in an organization. Manage Wealth PTY Limited is a financial consultancy firm that develops and advice on ideas of investments to their commercial customers. It boasts over 150 staff members on their head office thus proving to be a large enterprise. Among their services include real estate planning, debt management, insurance advice and offer retirement tips and plans.

The company faces a huge problem in establishing employee voice structures that will improve worker engagement and participation. It has faced significant difficulties in dealing with workers issues who feel left out in the major decision making and consulting areas.  The increase of working hours and inflexible working routines are some of the key sectors the staff members have not been able to air due to poor communication structures in the company. There have been cases where workers improvement ideas and suggestions have not been taken into considerations thus limiting and discouraging their overall productivity (Rees, Alfes, & Gatenby2013).

Due to these issues the company has not been able to retain it most talented workers who are poached away by bigger companies. Innovation and creativity have been limited therefore limiting career advancements and improvements of staff members. Workers in the organization are characterized by low motivation and morale as they cannot express their feelings and issues. Absenteeism is at an all-time high in the company; this can be attributed to the weak encouragement of workers to report to work every day.

The company does not have a participative structure that allows workers to bargain their wages, thus leaving staff with no option but to look for other means. Lack of avenues to discuss their salaries have led to going slows inside their premises. Policies on conflict resolutions between workers and management have not been developed yet thus slowing problem-solving process among the subordinate staff. Tensions and personal differences are also seen flaring time and time again. Employee turnover is significantly affected by these issues facing staff members who have not been consulted and involved in decision-making. The reputation of the company is at high risk as employees will likely use obvious ways of forwarding their complaints including social media platforms, thus putting the brand of the company under threat (Martin, Parry, & Flowers, 2015).

Personal Skills Problem Identification

Manage Wealth PTY company should act fast and implement the following recommendations to ensure employee participation and involvement. They should start sharing relevant information with the staff members so as to make sure that they are not caught unaware on issues that affect them. This will be done through holding meetings and discussion on matters that involve their affairs. Creating innovation and creativity will as well encourage programs that would reward and motivate workers to come up with suggestions for service improvement and cost cutting. The management should also develop clear idea assessment criteria that will allow analysis of concept feasibility and validity.

To avoid employees airing their complaints on public social media platforms, the organization should develop an internal social platform that will enable staff members to express their issues and disappointments without posing a danger to the name of the company. The management also needs to ensure that all departments have group and teamwork meetings that allow for people to air their suggestion and issues in a participative manner. Other than assigning duties on the individual level only, the consultancy should develop a culture of group forming and group functioning (Patmore, 2016). The company should allow and encourage their workers to join labor unions so as to increase their bargaining power and also as a formal platform for presenting all their issues (Porter, Riesenmy, & Fields, 2016). By creating an organization that has same one voice through the combination of consultancy mission, vision and goals with employee’s needs and requirements.

Conclusion

Manage wealth PTY Limited is a company under severe danger of having employee’s related problems. Workers motivation and encouragement is an area that requires serious improvements as it cannot be able to have maximum productivity and commitment if these issues are not addressed adequately. Through engaging workers and staff, then workers can leap great results as it assists in educating, development of skills and abilities of those respective team members. The company will reap enormous benefits from loyalty, retention and productivity of the workers all through all the departments. The above recommendations would in a great way assist the human resource department of the company in understanding the drivers of motivation and productivity among employees. They do not only need tools for working and  good looking environments but also the psychological motivators that makes them feel wanted, self of belonging, worth, engaged and consulted on crucial matters.

References

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Lippert, & Huzzard ,. (2014). Corporate governance, employee voice, and work organization: Sustaining high-road jobs in the automotive supply industry

Martin, G., Parry, E., & Flowers, P. (2015). Do social media enhance constructive employee voice all of the time or just some of the time? Human Resource Management Journal, 25(4), 541-562.

Kline, J. A. (2008). Managing People and Processes. Armed Forces Comptroller, 53(1), 26-29.

Rees, C., Alfes, K., & Gatenby, M. (2013). Employee voice and engagement: connections and consequences. International Journal Of Human Resource Management, 24(14), 2780-2798

Rees, W. D. (2015). Skills of Management and Leadership. Palgrave Macmillan.

Patmore, G. (2016). Worker voice: Employee representation in the workplace in Australia, Canada, Germany, the UK and the US 1914-1939.

Pothukuchi, B. R. (2008). Personality-Time Management Skills Relationship. ICFAI Journal Of Organizational Behavior, 7(1), 57-61.

Porter, T. H., Riesenmy, K. D., & Fields, D. (2016). Work environment and employee motivation to lead. American Journal of Business (Emerald Group Publishing Limited), 31(2), 66-84

Ruck, K. (2015). Exploring internal communication: Towards informed employee voice

Saini, D. S. (2016). Managing people. Asia Pacific Journal of Human Resources, 54(2), 285-286.

Taylor, (2012). Managing people and organisations. London: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

Wilkins, K. G., Bernstein, B. L., & Bekki, J. M. (2015). Measuring Communication Skills: The STEM Interpersonal Communication Skills Assessment Battery.  104(4), 433-453.