OB: reaction paper#1

a reaction paper for organizational behavior. i'm sure you guys will like it.

Program Reaction:
The program is finally off and rolling! It all started 1 year ago when I was on the motorcycle trip up to Canada and my father in law suggested I enroll in an MBA program. he said "an MBA will help you as much with your career as your undergrad in engineering has" so the only way to prove him right or wrong is to do it and see what happens! I have been anticipating the start of this program for awhile now and I was really hoping it would start last spring. I completed the application, took the GMAT, and thought I was accepted, but the school kept pushing the start date out. so... like I said, I'm really happy the program has started.

Teacher Reaction
The experience in big business (medical hospital field) is a great slant to add to the course material. my mother has been in nursing even before I was born, so I have heard much about the industry from a workers perspective. now I look forward to the bits and pieces that are always divulged during a good class discussion that will give insight into the inner workings of the corporate level of the medical industry. Its always fun to learn that even though the fields are very diverse (engineering compared to running a hospital) the same people issues seem to come up. its the people side that makes being a manager entertaining / challenging, and I hope your background can supplement my own and through our in class interaction help me to view people from a more rounded perspective and make me a more effective leader.

Powerpoint
I absolutely HATE powerpoint. I find that people throw a gazillion slides up and then read them to the audience. I always think to myself "WHY are you even standing there?, your just blocking the screen". I learned in my speech class in undergrad that visual aids are a must, but keep the slides to no more than about 1 for every 2 minutes of talk time. wait, maybe it was 2 for every 1 minute. well. I can't remember exactly, but the point is slides are a SUPPLIMENT to the material. as a new manager, I have found the importance of powerpoint in delivering information the those that work for you. there is MUCH info that my boss wants to me 'share' with those that work for me, the powerpoint presentation just serves as a reminder when I talk to keep me on topic. or rather I should say it will be when the company gets me the laptop. I'm sure you were reading this thinking I was going to dog on your use of powerpoint, but your wrong. I think you only had 4 slides the first night. you didn't read the slides to us, you used it as a reminder to share key thoughts with us. AWESOME. thats what powerpoint is all about. short, to the point, don't' read it.

Class diversity
Since Organizational Behavior is about people, why not analyze the class real quick! I was amazed to find that the class is over 1/3 GE, about 1/3 misc. engineering firms and 1/3 state workers. mix and match a little home entrepreneurs and harley davidson finance guys and you have our class. it really didn't shape up to be what I predicted. I figured it'd be 1/2 GE and 1/2 Starbucks, but for some reason Starbucks didn't really show? what gives? I guess that goes to show that no matter what type of group you 'think' you'll end up with, if you are open minded you can end up with just about anything. Thats something I need to put to work immediately. I need to remember not to stereotype people. on a whole a stereotype may be an accurate generalization but you will be hard pressed to hold free thinking people to 'the norm'

Class goal
I was glad to see that ALL of the people in the class are working professionals, that all look like a die hard crowd to finish this thing. I wonder how many people will drop out along the way? I"m sure we'll lose some, but right now it looks like the class shares the same hard viewpoint of making the classes meaningful. I like that the comments are on topic, and people aren't sleeping, walking in late, or taking tons of cell phone calls like undergrad. I hope the class maintains a professional atmosphere, as it is really inducive to learning.

Teams for Case Study
I wasn't quite sure what to expect for the case study groups. When I first read the syllabus I thought we were going to have to propose a topic the first night. I was very relieved to find a list of topics that we just had to sign up for. it was also convenient that you forced the teams to be 3 or 4 people. this made sure there wasn't half the class on one topic, and then each of the other topics only had 1 person assigned. I was a little puzzled that you didn't just throw the teams together by random. I appreciate you letting the teams self form, but I"m afraid what I've seen in the past will repeat itself and all of the 'smart' highly driven people will end up one team and a lot of people that may need more help, or be lacking one area, will be forced to be all together on one team. its kind of sad in a way. I think the rational that was given was that the people that were near each other could be on a team but was does location have to do with it?! this is the era of high speed communication. email, IM, blogs, webct, and even fax if you had to. I venture to say you could have thrown just about anyone together and if they had 21st century technology it wouldn't be a problem. oh wait. theres my stereotypical view again. now that I think about it again, I think there most defiantly are some in the class that are more tech savvy than others. it would be VERY challenging for me to be on a team with people that weren't Internet savvy, so my hat is off to you for letting us self form! thanks


Herzeberg
I have no idea what case study topic I signed up for. I must admit I just signed up for the first one to get it done. I hate procrastination. it just makes it more painful later. I say get it over with! and if I go first theres no major class standard I'm held to. I get to set the bars starting point. I like that. it eases the pressure.

MAIC
The book talks about the Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control process of six sigma in the first chapter. GE uses the DMAIC process, where D is Define. I learned in intro to engineering, one of the very first classes I took in undergrad that to find a suitable solution, you must FIRST understand the problem. so WHY in the world doesn't the authors of the book talk about the DMAIC process? is it not industry standard to first DEFINE the problem? its very strange and puzzling to me, and worth more investigation when I find time.

Teachers just work for money comment in class
In class, there was an article handed out about how there is a shortage of teachers in the local community. One person made the comment that it was 'just all about money, its always about money and the majority of the class went into a mini uproar. I can't believe people want to deny that they work for money. If you were so naive to admit to your boss that you just worked there because you liked your normal day job better than any of the hobbies you had, you'd be an idiot. I'm sure this class will bring up additional reasons why I go to work, but right now, I'm letting you know that I work for money. That is may main reason for working, is to put bread no the table. side reasons include: mental stimulation, growth (in all senses of the word), friends, atmosphere. reasons to NOT work include: being pissed off, not getting along with people, it costs money to commute to work, work takes up time that I'd rather be doing something else. hey look, I have my own little list of criteria for the Herzeberg report!