A633.3.3RB_SeabournBeau

Find a company which reflects Morning Star and St Luke’s image of a Complex Adaptive System (CAS) and reflect in your blog what the implications are for you and your present organization (or any organization you are familiar with). Identify what you believe are appropriate actions to move your organization forward.

To understand this task, we must take a look at both companies and determine what differences there might be in them and then apply that to a third party organization. I’ll then look into my own organization and try to make reasonable comparisons and try to determine the best course of action for us moving forward.

First let’s look at St. Luke’s Complex Adaptive System (CAS).  St. Luke’s Website states “We are a top 10 independent creative agency, owned and run by our management team. What sets us apart is our ability to help clients set powerful new agendas in their market. Any good creative agency can provide you with a good campaign. We will help you set a new agenda” (St. Luke’s, 2015). What this tells me is that they are very complex, fluid, and adapting to the needs of the marketplace. In our reading this week, we learned that cross functioning organizations are becoming more and more popular and effective. What happens is, reaction times grow and more information is being shared at a higher rate throughout the organization because there are multiple lines open for communication. It appears that St. Luke’s utilizes that aspect of business and applies it to their daily work.

Next we have to look at Morning Star and their Complex Adaptive System.  Morning Star is in the food industry and they produce tomato products. Their website spells out their CAS this way “an organization of self-managing professionals who initiate communication and coordination of their activities with fellow colleagues, customers, suppliers and fellow industry participants, absent directives from others” (Morning Star, 2015). The main difference here is that they allow employees to work together while being responsible for their actions to an organizational leader or someone above them at all times. What actually happens is, employees are responsible to themselves and they are responsible for creating different opportunities and motivations for themselves. That is unique because in other systems, organizations set the precedent for that type of stuff. They are actually allowing the employee to enable one another and themselves.

I found a company called Connecticut Spring and Stamping this week. Their website describes them this way, “Family values have been at our core since 1939, and we share a sense of pride in CSS with each new generation. Our commitment to training for the CSS family enables us to deliver topflight products far more efficiently because our employees are able to seamlessly interact and collaborate across all our departments” (Connecticut, 2015). Because departments interact uniquely, they are allowing the flow of information and the interaction of employees to manifest. According to the book reading, “there will be a need for a more fluid structure and so the next stage of evolution occurs” (Obolensky, 2014). Here teams are constant but they fit the need of the organization. They go onto say that “As a family managed company, we treat our team like family and hold a vested interest in the professional and personal success of our employees. Each and every team member brings a depth of unparalleled knowledge and experience that we share every day across all our locations with the help of our 27 Self Directed Work Teams (SDWT) and trained team facilitators” (Connecticut, 2015). It seems as though they are heading in the correct direction and they’ve been successful for all these years because of their willingness to adapt and overcome.

For my current company, I think we have a unique mixture incorporating both organizations talked about above. At the lowest level, the controller level, each employee is responsible for creativity and they are hired for their ability to do the job. They are also responsible to themselves and in some cases, the tower team they are working with. Because of the job, things are instantaneous, the “market” is always changing and controllers have to be able to adapt to those changes spontaneously. In our additional reading this week, one source states “Like all forms of complexity, strategy is poised on the border between perfect order and total chaos, between absolute efficiency and blind experimentation, between autocracy and complete ad hocracy” (Hamel, 1998). If I had to describe air traffic control in itself, it is living chaotically and using experimentation based on past experiences to initiate complex control patterns. On one hand, we are operating in a complex environment everyday while on another, we are responsible to our self and to the company. It is a goofy thing to balance. Organizationally, I feel as though we still operate in a Silo functioning environment. Everything is directed by either our company or the FAA in a directive manner. What comes from the top goes and there is little feedback reception from the actual controller level. Because of that, retention levels are low and our organization has to constantly worry about replacing people at each facility. When the FAA hires, we loose people and we gain people when FAA employees retire. The problem is, those retired FAA controllers will eventually leave again and the circle continues.  Until we open communication lines from the bottom up and become more fluid, these issues will not change. Issues at the lower levels are hardly ever responded to unless they are operationally significant to air traffic control.

References

Connecticut Spring and Stamping. About Us. (2015). Retrieved August 30, 2015, from http://www.ctspring.com/who-we-are/about-us

Hamel, G. (1998, Winter98). Strategy Innovation and the Quest for Value. Sloan Management Review. pp. 7-14.

Morning Star; Self-Management. (n.d.). Retrieved August 29, 2015, from http://morningstarco.com/index.cgi?Page=Self-Management

Obolensky, N. (2014). Complex adaptive leadership. (2nd edition.). London, UK: Gower/Ashgate.

St. Luke’s: Who we are | St. Lukes. (2015). Retrieved August 29, 2015, from http://stlukes.co.uk/who-we-are/

A633.2.3RB_SeabournBeau

I find the butterfly effect to be an endless prediction of outcomes based on a situation that is changed, even by the slightest of factors. In my career field, air traffic control, I often think about certain situations that I have encountered and wonder what the outcomes might have been like if just one thing went a different way. It is often times associated with some sort of wrong doing or an accident. In a way, I find myself always thinking about the butterfly effect. Our reading points out that “the butterfly effect is very significant as, on the face of it, it seems to break the first law of thermodynamics, sometimes known as the Lay of Conservation of Energy, which can be summarized as: the effort you put in will dictate the result you get out” (Obolensky, 2014). I find that interesting as I couple it with the “what-if thoughts”. What if something would have changed just slightly because of the input of effort? I find myself always thinking about the example from our reading about the butterfly flap causing a tornado in Texas. Thanks a lot Obolensky!

Example One

In the last year, the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has changed a procedure know as Taxi Into Position and Hold (TIPH) to Line up and Wait (LUAW). The line up and wait procedure changed the TIPH to a ICAO standard, adhering to international pilots and making the phrase universal globally. In basic terms they changed the way air traffic controllers implement a departure sequence to pilots. This procedure tells the pilot to go out and park on the runway while the air traffic controller waits for another aircraft to 1. land and turn off the runway or 2. Take off and adverted from the same runway. Now implementing this one small change in phraseology is not a big deal to the public but to the aviation industry it is. First all air traffic controllers, managers, pilots, crew members and so on have to learn the term and drop using the old term. Checklists are changed, operating procedures are updated and everything has to be done on the same day, at the same time. You can only imagine how hard that is to do for the entire flying public. One small implementation/change affects the whole industry basically over night. So when the FAA determined that LUAW was better then TIPH, they essentially implemented a small change that effected millions of people. We can only speculate what incidents or issues arose from that one “little” change.

Example Two

A couple of years ago, there was another change with the FAA that trickled down to have a major effect on the contract air traffic control industry more than anyone else. If you can recall from the news, air traffic controllers were falling asleep on the job. They linked this to overtime, lack of sleep, and crazy schedules. The FAA regulated that:

-Controllers will now have a minimum of nine hours off between shifts.  Currently they may have as few as eight.

-Controllers will no longer be able to swap shifts unless they have a minimum of 9 hours off between the last shift they worked and the one they want to begin.

- Controllers will no longer be able to switch to an unscheduled midnight shift following a day off. (FAA, 2011).

Now these changes did not reach the contract air traffic control environment right away. Sometimes what works for one organization will not work for another. It also takes time for the rules to apply themselves downward on occasion. When the schedule changes did reach the contract world, it changed a lot of things. Like the things listed above from the FAA, our company also had to implement the changes to our needs while following their direction. Overnight, controllers schedules changed, the time they come and go from work changed and the overall schedule they worked drastically changed. In that event, people had to change the way they operate within their family, how they schedule their free time and work around the demands of the new system. Although we often face changes at work procedurally, we often times do not face things like this that change things that much. The ramifications are endless. Imagine how many things changed because of those rules being implemented in the contract tower world.

Conclusively, there are numerous implications for complexity and changes in our industry. When a small change occurs, there has to be some detailed look into how big that change is actually going to have on the system and the operators in the system. Sometimes what seems small is rather large, hence the butterfly effect. I can’t speculate on how large the actual ramifications are at this point because this is a rather new procedure and we have not felt the full change yet. I can’t imagine how vast the reach of these changes actually were.

References

FAA. Press Release – FAA Announces Changes to Controller Scheduling. (2011, April 17). Retrieved August 21, 2015.

Obolensky, N. (2014). Complex adaptive leadership: Embracing paradox and uncertainty (2nd ed.). Burlington, VT: Gower Publishing Company.

A633.1.2RB_SeabournBeau

 Has your own attitude to leaders changed in your life, and if so how?

As I have gotten older, I find that my perception and attitude about leaders has changed. The first major change that I’ve come to realize has to do with trusting someone in a leadership right away. Generally speaking, there are reasons why people are in leadership roles and we trust that they are there for their competencies and qualifications. I joined the Navy right out of high school. After I completed my training and moved into the operating field, I was surrounded by “leaders” who were suppose to help guide me and who were at the facility to help complete the mission. What I found however is that not all of these people were actual leaders. I didn’t understand that at the time, I just assumed anyone who out ranked me was a leader. I know now as an adult and someone who has been through the leadership courses that these individuals lacked any real attributes of a leader. Our reading this week says it this way “leadership in any form cannot produce results without a context within which to exist” (Obolensky, 2014). So my major observation from then until now is that I am skeptical and analytical when it comes to who I assign the role “leader” to. Leaders now also have to prove to me that they are capable of leading me and not the other way around. I don’t want to take advice from someone who has less experience in a certain area than I do. I guess that is probably an annoyance to some people based on their age and their tenure.

If we take as a starting point the attitude to those in authority/leaders as held by your grandparents, and then look at those attitudes held by your parents, and then by you, and then the younger generation, is there a changing trend? If so, what is it?

I think that there is a changing trend. I think there have been a wide variety of changes to attitudes in leadership as generations have progressed. For instance, my grandparents lived in a much different economical time then we did. Those economical influences played a large part in why a leader might be the way they are. People set in an economy were jobs are sparse are more willing to work for leaders that they might not normally want to based on the opportunities available to them. As for the gap between my generation and the next one, I’m not sure there is that big of a gap. I’m sure people would argue that there may be one, but I feel as though the economic impacts, experiences and technology haven’t jumped as they had between my parent’s generation and mine. I think the trend has to be the work ethic changing from manual, hard labor, to smarter less aggressive work styles. There isn’t a need to be close minded in leadership positions and people are able to freely leave organizations now based on benefits, personnel, and need. That wasn’t always the case. One article I read describes a way to create a culture fro all generations. They state “you want to tailor your generational bridge-building to suit the specific needs of your enterprise. For some companies, the need is more urgent than others. Take an inventory of where things stand and develop your plan accordingly” (Biro, 2013).

Why do you think that this has occurred?

I think this has occurred because of the experiences that different generations have had. For instance the baby boomers have gone through Vietnam, woman’s rights, civil rights, and rock and role. Generation X has gone through dual earning parents, high divorce rates (I link the two together) and a poor economy. Millennial’s have experienced September 11^th, 2001, a better economy, and more diverse families (Scouts, 2014). Assuming that these events change generation’s perception on things such as business, leadership and personal interests, I would make the conclusion that people and generations are the way they are from those events. I do think that the rotation might be cyclical though. I think it varies with the success of the economy. Leadership is present always, in every environment but I think people gain the most knowledge from leadership through a bad experience. I would point out that people can recall good leaders too but I would imagine people often say to themselves “I don’t want to be like “______” because they were terrible to work with. So based on experiences and world events, our leadership and authority towards leaders is formed.

References

Biro, M. (2013, October 13). Five Ways Leaders Bridge the Generational Divide. Retrieved August 13, 2015, from http://www.forbes.com/sites/meghanbiro/2013/10/13/five-ways-leaders-bridge-the-generational-divide/

Obolensky, N. (2014). Complex adaptive leadership: Embracing paradox and uncertainty (2nd ed.). Burlington, VT: Gower Publishing Company.

Scouts of America, B. (2015, August 11). Unique Experiences Shape Generational Differences. Retrieved August 14, 2015, from http://www.scouting.org/Home/Marketing/Resources/MarketingResearch/UniqueExperiences.aspx

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Reflect on the three key lessons you take away from the course. Reflect on your perceived value of this course.
The first lesson I’ve learned is that often times, ethical decisions are based on a number of different contributing factors and that given a situation, people might respond differently. Each person is different. Their past and their experiences help shape who they are today and based on those experiences, they make moral and ethical decisions. Through the course we were often times given ethical choices to make and we all made different choices. It was the reason we made the choice we did that stood out to me the most. I learned that people make choices based on what is best for them, or their perceived notion of being right; not someone else's.

Second, I learned that making ethical decisions is hard. I think we all know that but to actually justify why you would do something or react a certain way is tough. During the class, we were all given the chance to answer ethical dilemmas and justify why we made the choice we did. What I sometimes assumed I would do actually changes as I tried to identify why I would actually do that. I think, thinking about a situation really shines light on why we choose to do something or not. This class has taught me to rethink my ethical and moral choices in some ways.

Lastly, the reading states “the best overall moral practice is one in which normative questions arise from our attempts to wrestle with concrete moral decisions” (LaFollette, 2007). What I think I took away the most is, just because I think something is right, doesn’t mean it is. I don’t mean that in the simplest terms, I mean deep down when we think we are right, we may not be in some situations. The situation and the circumstances will dictate what actions we take to do something, or not to do something. We can all argue about things until we are blue in the face but until we all understand one another and each other’s perspective, we will never truly understand the point of view of the next person. This course has really opened my eyes to a lot of exciting perspectives, judgment calls, and critical thinking objectives. It really did help me to understand why I think the way I do and why I make the moral and ethical decisions I do. I was a true honor to learn about the things we did.

Reference

LaFollette, H. (2007). The practice of ethics. Malden, Mass.: Blackwell Publishing