Week 11 PepsiCo

We can learn from the PepsiCo case study that it is important and safe to have a wide range of products. In case something big is going to happen and in 1 or 2 years time nobody will buy Pepsi, they have other smaller companies to rely on. They are very efficient at risk management, they don't have all eggs in one basket. Another effective strategy is to grow the health market by investing in smaller companies that sell healthier goods. This might turn out to be successful in the future when people will buy fewer noxious products in favour of more healthier products. Pepsi is customer focused and they are adapting their products to customer needs; just like in China where products were made with local flavours to satisfy customer needs and that turns out to be a good strategy for China Where Pepsi has recorded decades of growth. Pepsi is also investing in their brand image as "good" which might not have immediate effects but on the long run they are most likely to benefit from it (super bowl).  A very interesting strategy that Pepsi is adopting is to involve local people in their product development. By adopting this strategy there is little risk that the product will not be successful, since local people contributed to the taste of the product.  Being responsible is very important to the customers but being profitable is important to the shareholders. Now if shareholders are unhappy they might choose to invest in other companies and everything ca turn out very hurtful for Pepsi but if customers perceive the brand as low quality, bad image and bad customer relationship management, it can result in decrease of sales an eventually bankruptcy. Therefore, being responsible and profitable are equally important.

Week 10 Faslane

Faslane change was successful because the management team brought people who dealt with change before and helped them implement changes. It was successful because employees were involved, they were told that things have to changes and asked for their opinions. The management team was motivated to make changes because of the earning they will be making as a result of cost savings. One important thing that contributed to their success was that Babcock was a company from the private sector where thing are very different (more competitive, better structured, different stakeholders, different targets, etc.)  compared to the public sector where people were relaxed because of the notion of jobs for life, they never considered that one day the government will not have enough money to pay for their services.  Babcock came and restructured the organisation. They reduced the levels of management from 7 to 4, reduced about 400 full-time equivalent posts, which I believe made a significant contribution the cost reduction. They managed to reduced the review period from 56 days to only 6 days, a change which contributed a lot to the speed of the decision making process in the organisation. Employees understood that they had to come up with new ways and ideas of how to cut spending. They were asked to create their own team, their own departmental business plan. All these changes turned out to be very successful because Faslane would become the home base for the entire UK submarines fleet.  We can learn from the Faslane case study that change needs to be communicated, it needs to come from the employees as well as involve employees and ask for their opinions (the event in the tent). The management team which took charge of Faslane did a good job by letting people know that change was needed and it can no longer use the same structure, hence 98 people decided to give up their jobs. It was unethical to spend the tax payer's money for things that were not  necessary or which could have been much cheaper. The Babcock team managed to make a huge transformation form a leadership style which was highly transactional to a highly transformational (I believe it's a great thing to encourage people to work for a company in a more passionate way, to try and make things better, but it is probably quite hard to achieve that level of commitment from the employees).  The leadership approach used by the Babcock team can be compared to Lynch's model, in fact I believe they used "The five elements of successful and effective strategic leadership". 1. Developing and communicating the organisation's purpose - that is exactly what they did. Employees were told that the organisation can not function the it used to, things have to change. They were also asked to create their own teams so that they can increase productivity.  2. Setting ethical standards - that's the whole reason why they brought Babcock, to restructure the organisation so that they can spend less. It was unethical to spend the tax payers money. 3. Managing human resources and organisational decisions - again Babcock did a good job by reducing the number of employees, reducing the review period to 6 days (which contributed a lot to the decision making process) and asked employees to create their own teams and manage themselves.  4. Sustaining competitive advantage over time - if the costs were reduced and they continued to reduce them, over time these savings gave them a great competitive advantage (the entire UK submarine fleet was moved to Faslane). Faster decision making process, small teams of people working together, all these contributed to their competitive advantage. One great thing that babcock has managed to achieve was to transfer the culture of a private company to a publicly owned organisation which resulted in greater competitiveness between the employees themselves and other organisations. 5. Defining and delivering to stakeholders - this is the area where Babcock didn't do a good job, they did a great job by over delivering year on year! They managed to save much more then the given target. Stakeholders where truly satisfied. As a result of this great performance the entire fleet moved to Faslane.

Week 9 Energix

Effective strategic leadership depends on each situation. Every company is different from one another with different people, different cultures, different objectives. There is no right way of solving problems but I believe the more flexibility and the more options are available to the decision maker the better the outcome will be. A successful leader like David could not adapt to the newly founded Energix. There isn't a 'one right way', if it would have been just one way of solving all problems then David would have been very successful at Energix. Because he came from a manufacturing firm with a rational goal in mind he couldn't adapt to the situation in which Energix was.  He was successful in a way because he was involving people in the process of change, he researched the organisation. He focused on his area of expertise, on the new product development, where unfortunately the organisation showed him some resistance. He used his analytical skills to identify gaps/holes in the research and development department, an area which he understood quite well. He also used his rational and logical approach, which were in fact his most important strengths, when he attempted to redesign the way the R&D department functioned.  David unfortunately failed to gather subjective views and opinions on how the organisation was working. He couldn't adapt to the culture, he didn't understand the culture of the firm. He failed to make others undertand what he was doing. He started by redesigning from scratch the R&D department when he should have started with a minor change and analyse what the effects of that change have on the organisation and build on to that. He focused on productivity and less on the culture of the company. He demanded loyalty which is only normal to my eye but perhaps he should have been a bit softer on the employees. After the meeting with the R&D department some people went straight to the CEO and complained. He wasn't flexible, he didn't or maybe couldn't adapt to the new environment (some people resist to change). He had a set of rules and ideas on how to deal with problems and he wasn't going to change that. He didn't consider the roots of the company, how did they manage to be so successful. But the most important problem of all (I think) is that he didn't communicate well enough with his colleagues. Many problems could have been solved only by talking to other people make them understand what he was trying to achieve and ask of their opinion and they think this might be improved. A bridging method at this point would have been very very important. Because of his difficulties in communicating freely and effectively he ended up using a formal style of communication with the CEO, which I believe is not as effective as a more relaxed approach where all problems can be discussed.  Gerry Robinson could have been very efficient in this situation because of his impeccable communication skills. He would have understood the problem and he would have asked for feedback on his opinions on how to solve the problem and in most cases he will ask the employees on what they think it should be done.  Madonna would have probably used her great adaptability skills (reinvent herself) in order to get integrated in the organisation and understand how things are running.  IDEO would have probably analysed the problem very well and tried to come up with many ideas on how to solve the problem in a creative manner. Pick only the best bits of each idea to come up with the final decision.  The Challenger case would be have been probably very similar to David's situation, where employees are against the management decision. Lack of effective communication exactly like in the challenger case.

Week 8 IDEO

Managing in a creative way is very important in any organisation. Most organisations do not adopt this style of leadership. By being creative many opportunities can arise. Companies which encourage creativity and innovation tend to have a competitive advantage. When ever a problem is encountered many ideas and solutions come along easier in a creative style of leadership.  We can learn many effective strategic leadership from the IDEO case study. In order to be creative, all employees of an organisation must be free and relaxed at the work place. At IDEO employees design their own offices in order to feel comfortable and relaxed so that they can be more productive and innovative. Just like a write who needs his chair, his desk or maybe his sofa to write something down. Very low power distance is one of the most important aspects of the organisation. This is a very good method for closing the gap between the boss and the employees at the bottom of the organisation. Low power distance results in more dialog between employees, which can result in more innovation. I personally find it easier to develop some else's ideas as opposed to generating my own ideas, therefore, more communication can only result in better outcomes. Another very important and effective strategic leadership that we can learn from IDEO is the high level of freedom, which think is one of the key elements for innovation and creation. A person can't be creative if he or she is not given a bit of freedom. Employees at IDEO do not criticise each other. All ideas are taken into account, even the wild ones. The company is divided into small teams and each team is required to come up with a innovative and creative solution to the problem. This is another effective style of leadership where a group of people are responsible for a particular task, instead of just one person who might not be as productive as a team. All employees are allowed to come to work dressed up just like they want to, there is no dress code at IDEO. This is another factor which contributes to the low power distance of the organisation. I believe that one of the most important factors, for a company like IDEO where creation and innovation is at the core of it's business, is to employ people from diverse backgrounds, which is exactly what IDEO is doing.  I don't think we can compare IDEO case study with Gerry Robinson because IDEO is a company that tries to come up with creative solutions to particular problems, whereas Mr. Robinson was looking for creative ways of speeding up the process at hospital, he was looking for ways to make the process more efficient. He was analysing the problem to identify the possible gaps which could have been used to diminish the waiting list. But we can compare IDEO with NHS where we clearly see major differences such as, high power distance at NHS and low power distance at IDEO, lack of communication and team work (everyone seemed to work for themselves and also a high degree or rivalry between employees) at NHS and extensive communication within the company and great team work at IDEO.  We can identify many differences between IDEO and the Challenger case study. IDEO is a flat organisation with employees that are comfortable and open to everyone, whereas at NASA high power distance is in place forcing employees to adopt a more formal style of communication, which sometimes is proven to be less effective. These two organisations are dealing different pressures, different costs of failure, different cultures and different roles and rules.  If we compare it with the Carrefour case study we can again identify differences in the cost of failure, we can see high power distance at Carrefour, differences in culture and style of leadership.  Madonna has always maintained a certain level of innovation in her career. She understood a very important fact in her career as a singer and that was and is to be in line with people's expectations. She managed to stay in the trend for a long period of time because she understood how important it is to be flexible. And we can see a high degree of flexibility at IDEO.

NASA Week 5

Unfortunately from this case study we can not find any effective strategic leadership actions, but what we can do is to learn from the ineffective strategies used by the management of NASA. We can learn form the case study that the leadership of an organisation should question and listen to their subordinates before taking any hasty decisions. Even the high pressure situation a check list needs to be made, starting at the top with the most important factors. In the NASA case the most important factor was health and safety, then it was reputation and so on. But the management decided to ignore recommendations of their engineers and put people's lives at risk. We have also learned that the management needs to be flexible and consider different options. The biggest problem in some organisations (unsuccessful organisations) is that the management does not listen to their employees who have better access to information and have a better view of the picture. In some situations the management will believe that they know everything and they will often refuse to take into account the opinion or the idea of a subordinate just because they are educated not to and if they do take into account some one else's view, they will consider themselves not good enough for the job. Therefore, it is much easier for them to just ignore any incoming ideas, views, opinions. The mission went ahead because there was a lot of pressure from the public, first teacher to go into space. The management believed that if the launch was to be postponed again the reputation of NASA will be affected. The launch was postponed for six times already and the management's image was at stake, therefore, the decision was made despite the protests of the engineers.  I believe the disaster could have been avoided if the management would have listened to the engineers. But it is not only the management to blame. The whole organisation is to blame. There are many factors that contributed to this disaster. High power distance in the organisation. The manufacturer did not take any action to repair or replace the rubber rings. The launch was made during inexperienced levels of temperature.  The engineers should have communicated the problem to the entire organisation not only to the management. If the management did not answer to their emails they should have tried to communicate face to face and explain what the problem is and what consequences can arise from this problem. The engineers waited too long until they actually got in from of the managers and explained the problem. They should have been more persuasive when talking to the managers and explain what effects a possible disaster can have on the organisation. We can not compare it with the Carrefour case study because no one told the senior executive of the retail chain that the new investments won't work. I think we can compare it with the NHS case study because there was also high power distance between the employees of the hospital. And also some people in the organisation (NHS) have had ideas for years to try and improve and speed up the process of getting people into the surgery rooms, but again no one was listening. 

Week 4 Madonna

Madonna managed to sustain her success by diversifying her interest in different parts of the business. She never focused only on music. She was always in the trend, always working with successful artists at the time. Great bargaining power and influence over others. Powerful image, powerful brand which gave her a major competitive advantages in attracting more and more fans. Very ambitious person, very motivated. Came from a poor family. Always had the fear of loosing everything.  We have learnt from the strategic case study that a good leader can go and be part of any industry without even being very talented within that industry and be very successful. Madonna was never a great singer but she was a great leader, a great entrepreneur, she was and still is very ambitious and that made her very successful. She is not just a singer, she became an iconic person, a brand, a trusted brand that attracted millions of people across the world. We have also learned that luck can be of great importance. But most importantly is that once you get to have a great reputation many doors can open and opportunities jump n your way. Madonna made great use of her reputation and managed to spread her brand across other industries too, which is not always easy. More harm can be done by entering other industries, but Madonna managed to do it right and strengthen even more her position. We can compare this case study with Carrefour case study. The huge retailer also decided to diversify their brand by making great investments in organic food, which turned out to be very unsuccessful. Madonna decided to enter the movie industry which was a great success. If we look at these brands (Carrefour and Madonna), both have a great reputation, a great name, what made Madonna successful when she decided to enter different markets? Even though we are talking about different industries, I believe the answer can be found in the management style, the leadership style, where some are better than others.

Week 3 NHS

Gerry Robinson is a manager, which knows what needs to be done. But before that, the problem needs to be understood. And that is exactly what he did in the NHS case. He started by asking questions, getting the big picture. Asking the staff of their opinion. It didn't take long to realise what the problem was. Bad management of the organisation, too many empty surgery theatres, no clear structure in the organisation, lack of leadership, no credibility in the leadership. The most memorable Ineffective Strategic leadership example was the lack of communication between the leader of the organisation and the staff. Objectives were not communicated in the organisation. If for example, the entire organisation would have known that they are fighting for survival, the staff might have been more aware and more involved in changing what was wrong. They all knew that there was a huge waiting list but they didn't do anything about it. The most memorable effective startegic leadership example which was applied by Mr. Robinson was to ask questions. It is crucially important to identify the problem and the only way to find the problem is by talking to the people. This is where Mr. Robinson had performed very well, by using a bridging method in order to extract as much information as possible from the employees. Different styles of influence need to be use in order to be effective in the real world. Gerry Robinson used most of the Styles in the video case study. And we can very easily observe that he knows exactly when to use each one of them and that is very important. It is extremely important to understand your positon and the position of the person you are talking to. I believe in most cases it is a variation between two styles instead of just one. If we link it to the last week's case study, a very noticeable difference can be spotted. In the Carrefour case we saw a few wrong managerial decisions whereas, in the today's case study no decisions were made at all. The CEO decided to employ a team of consultants to identify the problem and to come with solutions. Another decision was to ask Mr. Robinson to come and help. Some of the people that were employed at the hospitant didn't know who the CEO is or what he looks like. A similarity between the two case studies might be that both leaders were not fit for the job. In the group we discussed the situation in which the organisation was in and the different styles of influence used by Mr. Robinson. We didn't have too much time to discuss it in detail but it was very interesting to hear what the others have picked up from the video. Overall it was a very interesting and useful session. After today's session we can really use what we have learned in order to achieve better goals.