Understanding Organization Behaviors and Leadership

Fifteen percent of the grade for this class will come from a report that displays your understanding of how leadership, culture (as expressed through memory), and ethics intersect

Task

We often do not realize what we have learned until after due deliberation. Writing a module report provides you an opportunity to reflect on the readings and lectures, and reading the reports you write provides me a chance to assess to what extent you have met the learning objectives.

Leadership Styles

Leadership is difficult to define and even more difficult to assess. We w have just seen a movie that has been used in leadership classes in all kinds of settings. You may use it as a source of examples for your observations on leadership.

Kurt Lewin has identified three leadership styles (other researchers have identified different taxonomies and types of leadership styles, but for this assignment we will use Lewin). The three styles are: authoritarian, participatory, and delegatory.

1. Authoritarian leaders prefer to make decisions themselves and may not consult others in deciding how to structure and organize the work of an organization.
2. Participatory leaders tend to be more democratic, inviting the participation of organizational members in making decisions, but keeping control of the final decision process.
3. Delegatory leaders tend to delegate decision making to others, allowing members to make decisions themselves and inviting participation in decision-making at all levels.

While we recognize that truly exceptional leaders may need to adjust their styles in different circumstances, most people may have a natural preference for one style or the other. So, thinking back to an organization you are familiar with that includes teams that have each of these styles of leader ...

1. How would you evaluate the performance of the teams?
2. What are the particular strengths and weaknesses of these styles?
3. What criteria can be applied to determine whether a leader has performed well?
4. Would you apply the same criteria as a yardstick for success, or would you apply different criteria depending on the style?
5. What other aspects of the team might be important to consider in evaluating performance?
6. What type of leader would you most prefer to work for?
7. Why?
8. What type of leader are you most likely to be?

If you have no experience with this kind of an organization, imagine one and discuss it.

Answer at least three of the above questions in your report

This task should be done by your group and your group should turn in a single product that reflects the agreed position of your group.

And add one more thing

Add to that discussion a paragraph or two about whether or not anything you learned from 12 O'Clock High could add anything you your organizational understanding

This task should be done individually and your group report should indicate each person's individual lesson learned from the movie.

Should you choose to do so, you may, instead of an organization you are familiar with, use the example from the movie as the backdrop to your discussion on leadership.

Condition

This task should be done by your group and your group should turn in a single product that reflects the agreed position of your group on the first questions,
and individual paragraphs on the movie lessons.

Include your answer in a class blog posting roughly equivalent to a 2-5 page paper.

You may go beyond the blog if you wish to accomplish this task (a document; a PowerPoint presentation; a Prezi presentation; anything)

If you choose not to do it as a blog posting, do be sure to use the blog to point the instructor to the where the deliverable may be found (if appropriate, place the deliverable in your Sakai dropbox and tell the instructor when it may be retrieved from the dropbox)

Grade	What it means	What I will be looking for
A	Mastery in understanding the organizational perspective in terms of culture, structure, and leadership at the highest level of attainment that can reasonably be expected	Well written with no grammatical errors, well-articulated discussion of the topic; it shows evidence of your having absorbed all of the key points of the organizational module, and that you described them in such quality that one could expect you to teach the module
A-	A totally acceptable performance demonstrating an adequate level of understanding organization leadership	An insightful discussion of the topic, with no grammatical errors. It is extremely good, but leaves the reader feeling that your understanding of the issues is perhaps a bit less than professionally sophisticated, in terms of depth of analysis.
B+		Really good, but perhaps a bit shallower in terms of your understanding one or more of the contexts; you may have a few grammatical issues in your writing; you may not have used relevant examples to explain your points; you may not have fully addressed all the elements requested
B		Good, but perhaps a bit shallower in terms of your understanding several variants of the contexts; you may have several grammatical issues in your writing; you may not have used relevant examples to explain your points; you may not have fully addressed all the elements requested; you did not use terminology that we discussed in the module sessions
B-		Good, but not as good as it could have been; you may not have fully addressed all the elements requested
C+	A marginal performance.	OK, in terms of grasping the essentials, but not good in terms of articulating your understanding in a manner that is easy to read and appreciate
C		You seem to understand the essential points of the module, but you did not articulate your understanding well enough to do more than the minimum
C-		It's time to start wondering if you missed something important, if you misunderstood the task, if you did not understand the key elements
D+		This is a warning that you are not currently on the right path; you might need to have a discussion with the instructor about this performance
D		There are indications that you were present and that you sort of grasped what we had discussed, but missed the key points to such a degree that you really need to re-group and catch up
F	For whatever reasons, an unacceptable performance	If it's unacceptable, it is unacceptable; it should be as obvious to you as it is to the instructor