Brandon W. Jones

Col. Joe Dowdy was a strong leader of principle. Although he was pressed to change his principles, he was unwavering. His leaders pressed him to go faster than he was comfortable with to invade Baghdad which would put his soldiers’ lives at risk. He felt the lives of his soldiers were just as important as his mission. Because of this belief, he was forced to take a slower pace when invading Baghdad. His leaders were very against this approach. He was, however, not willing to lower his standards in order to meet their demands because he knew his soldiers would die.

He is a great example to follow. Although he was ridiculed and even relieved of his duty because of his approach, he had his priorities straight and followed his instinct even with extreme pressure. By standing firm in his approach, he was able to both accomplish the mission and save the lives of his people.

This is an amazing article. It was about an army lieutenant that made an impact during World War II. As an African American Army Lt., John Withers was a by the book leader that did everything by the rules. When he was in the army, there was strong segregation. Because of the segregation, the African Americans were watched very closely. John Withers was very diligent in doing everything right.

When two prisoners were released from one of the concentration camps, he made the decision to go against protocol and serve them. There are some important lessons that can be learned from Lt. John Withers.
1. Stick to your values at all costs.
2. Teach those you lead by your actions as well as words
3. Learn from the past

Lt. Withers knew the rules for the army and he did everything he could to follow them. He did not, however, compromise his values when it came to the rules. When first approached about harboring refugees, he was not going to allow it so he would be upholding the rules, but when he saw the condition of the refugees, he decided to help them. To him it was more important to save a life than follow the rules, so that is what he did.

Lt Withers constantly led his soldiers by his example. He also led his family and children by example. Because his example was so powerful, he was able to teach by words as well. His words were able to change those he came in contact with.

Lt Withers was able to take the lessons from his WWII experiences and teach his children. He learned from the past and constantly worked to share those lessons with his children so that they too could learn.

The article about the dean’s disease is very powerful. As the article pointed out there is a big problem when people let their power go to their head. Power and authority are good when used properly, but when it goes to a leader’s head it is very destructive. One very important aspect of the article about the dean’s disease was that it not only identified the symptoms of the disease, it also gave a checklist to do a self-check of dean’s disease.

There are two things that good leaders must do regularly. They must do a self-evaluation on their performance as a leader, and they must make changes once they recognize problems.

In order for excellence and success to be obtained, change needs to continually occur. There are always ways to be better. In a way, success is the hardest challenge to overcome. Once someone is successful, they think that their methods are the best even when they aren’t treating people with the respect they deserve. The article gave eight different aspects that a leader can review to find out if they are being effective. Everyone should review them.

Once the self-evaluation has been completed, one must make to necessary changes to improve. Improvement can be very difficult and sometimes even painful, but it is always worth it. In order to make an effective change that is long term, one must set out a plan of action. With that plan, they must follow through to see that it happens. Just as change plans are common in the business world on a company level, they must be instituted on an individual level to avoid the pitfalls of the dean’s disease.

The approach that Gary Loveman used as the COO was very interesting. Rather than go off of feelings and emotions as many people tend to do, he was very analytical in every aspect of his decision making. As he ran Harrah’s, he constantly was using the data that they were receiving from slot players. He constantly mined the data to see trends that were occurring and how they could use that knowledge to better the company.

Data mining is one aspect that he used constantly which is overlooked by many companies. It seems like there are many companies out there that are looking for some special secret sauce from researchers that will solve all of their problems. When they take this approach they are completely discounting all of the data that the company is or could be gathering. By recording data on the customers on a regular basis, they could be seeing trends within their own company.

One of the most successful methods for progress within a company is to find out what you are doing wrong and fix it. Although that may seem very obvious, the only way to find out if a practice is correct in the sense that it draws in more customers is to review the data that you can receive about the customers. Once a company or organization records data they mine the data to identify which methods work and which methods do not work. As a company looks closely at their processes, they will be able to see what they can do better or what they are doing wrong and they can then fix it. Progress is all about finding out and recognizing what you are doing wrong and then fixing it.

As was pointed out in the case study, Gary Loveman caused a change in the system at Harrah’s. He was able to change the system because of the person that he was. There were four keys that led to his success.
1. He gained credibility with the employees/management team.
2. He tried to understand the existing system
3. Had high expectations and led by examples.

Gain Credibility
In order to gain credibility, he spent time at the various properties. He also made himself available to the employees, which is essential when entering a new organization because people are automatically going to be skeptical. They are going to question why someone new was brought in for a position, instead of just hiring someone from within the company. It was extremely important for him to go amongst the people so that he could gain their trust. Through his interactions, he gained credibility with the employees/management team.

Understand the System
By going to the various properties, he was able to see how the company currently operates. He was able to see the flaws and strengths of the existing system. He also recognized that there was a sense of defeatism and victimization within the company. Once he understood the existing system, he was able to know which changes must occur. In order for a manager to be successful, they must first dig in to find out what is going on and then they are able to fix the problems. In the process of digging in, they are also able to gain trust and credibility with the employees. Often managers only view things from the 30,000 ft level when they begin to make changes. This method is not as successful because they are unable to see the underlying issues that exist.

High Expectations
By setting high expectations for himself and others, he was able to raise the bar on performance within the company. One essential element of him raising the bar was that he also raised the bar on himself. He chose to lead by example. If a leader sets high expectations for the group, but doesn’t live up to them himself, the group will have no desire to meet the expectations. When Gary not only talked the talk, but also walked the walk, he demonstrated to his employees that he didn’t expect anymore of them than he did of himself.

This article is very insightful because it explains all of the flaws in the statistical research behind the book Good To Great by Jim Collins. He did not set out to prove a specific hypothesis; instead he just found similar characteristics between 11 successful companies. This is very important because it is very easy to just read an article with new ideas and concepts and then accept them as the truth. It is very important to do a logical analysis of the methods used to derive the theory. If the theory is based on a solid statistical analysis it can be accepted, but if it is based on a flawed study it may be just commonalities of several test subjects. It is also very important to look at causality and not just associations. The two are very different and must treated as such.

This case was very interesting to me. In the case there were three points that stuck out to me. The points that stuck out were:
1. Demand evidence.
2. Examine logic.
3. Treat the organization as an unfinished prototype.
When each of the points is followed, the organization will be on its way to progress towards becoming an evidence-based organization.

When it spoke about demanding evidence it really made me think about how the organization can be bettered when changes are based in concrete evidence. It explained the importance of having relevant evidence. The evidence must come from data and experimentation from within the company. It is very interesting how often companies will change policies or systems on a whim just because something worked for someone else. The new policy may not have been tested in their company and when it actually gets to the time that it is tested, sometimes it fails.

In talking about the logic behind the evidence, it is very important that the experiments that are done are accurate. They must use correct methods to test changes. They can’t go off of existing procedures and fit the numbers to make the procedures look good when in fact they really don’t. Accurate experimentation that follows a logical evaluation is essential.

For any organization to flourish, they must continue to change. The managers must be flexible to doing new practices when they are proven effective. If an organization gets stuck in a rut and fails to change, they will find that they are falling behind the competition.

This article pointed out the results that come from “group think”. Group think has some very negative results because people begin to stop thinking as individuals. The text book Understanding Organizational Behavior by Debra Nelson and James Campbell Quick points out the symptoms of group think. They are:
1. Illusions of invulnerability
2. Illusions of group morality
3. Illusions of unanimity
4. Rationalization
5. Stereotyping the enemy
6. Self-censorship.
7. Peer pressure
8. Mindguards
Although all of the symptoms were present to a degree in the article, the biggest contributors to group think were mindguards, peer pressure, and self-censorship.

Group think is very detrimental to any group. It is, however, very difficult to avoid at times. In the work force it is easy to get in a cohesive group where several individuals are very focused on getting the job done and the major pressure is to get quick results. That type of atmosphere creates high peer pressure to not raise questions that will slow the progress of the work to be done. When individuals are under extreme pressure to get the job done, they also begin to have self-censorship. They continue to move forward without looking at all aspects of the solution. As happened in the article, this behavior can lead to severe negative consequences. With the group think mentality, extremely important details can be overlooked.

There are many important factors that must be followed by product team leaders for the team to be successful. One important factor is that the system be set up so leaders and team members work together. In addition, for the team to be successful it is essential that the team members be allowed to make decisions for their specific responsibilities.

I have been involved in many different team projects in school as well as in the work force and there is a significant difference in the outcome of the project depending on the role of the leader. There are two types of leaders that I have seem and worked with: the leaders that stand back and tell others what to do while not getting involved themselves and the leaders that jump in and get just as involved as the team members. The leaders that get involved know exactly what the team members are going through and they are a strong support to the team. The uninvolved leaders are less able to gain the respect and love of the team members. The team members also begin to have the feeling of us versus them with management.

The other important factor to having a successful team that I want to highlight is that team members must be allowed to make decisions over their responsibilities. In a system where team members always have to request permission to make a decision, the team members don’t feel as much confidence in themselves or their work. They also are not as diligent in coming to the best conclusion they can because they feel their leader will either override their decision or take the decision and modify it. Either approach is detrimental to the overall production of the company.

From this case study, it is very evident that the correct compensation system is extremely important to the success of an organization. The case reviewed several instances where the compensation packages in use were set up to put a quick fix in place for a failed system. The compensation system is extremely important because it is one of the main drivers for obtaining and keeping qualified employees. It cannot be the sole source of satisfaction for the employees, but it must function properly to serve the benefit of the system as a whole.

The compensation system will train the employees what is valued by the company. When a company drives for customer satisfaction, but compensates based on the number of sales of the individual employee, the employee will do whatever he or she can to obtain the sale. He or she will not be encouraged to spend time with the customers that are just browsing. On the other hand, in order for the company to obtain customer satisfaction, they must create a system that values customer satisfaction. The system must reward the employees based on the customer satisfaction ratings.

The companies must also set up a system that promotes teamwork within the organization. In the systems where the employees are rewarded based on their individual efforts and not as a team, the group loses unity and becomes several individuals with their own interests at stake. In order for a company to reach its maximum level of success, all the individuals must work as a team. This must be promoted by team awards rather than individual awards.