Goal setting -Tower building (L02)

  

The second lecture also encompassed a discussion on the goal setting procedure that is to be efficiently and effectively followed by each of the employee in any firm. For an effective manager these goal settings are of utmost importance because they are parameters with which he judges team members. These goals can be of many types as described in the figure below.

These are goals which are to be accomplished by any employee in any firm. A tower building activity   was also organised wherein 3 major designations in an organisation and their attributes were highlighted along with the relationship between Supervisory Planning & Employee Morale, which was highlighted in an aesthetically pragmatic manner.

Some of the questions the activity answered for us were:

->How classification of goals is achieved?

->How these goals are attained?

->Why do we have fatigue in employees?

-> How the manager and top management deal with it?

 All these concepts came out brilliantly and thus there was no need to learn it through books when we could actually see it in person. Overall the entire activity can be explained in following stages:

STAGE 1:

During this session, everybody was asked to volunteer for an game called DARE TO BUILD. In the game you have to build a tower of cube but you will be blindfolded and have to use only one hand. But there was a condition involved, which was whosoever wants to be a part of this game has to bet some money. Those guys have to risk that money to accomplish this task.

The situation above is similar to a company where interested people invest money to build a entity which can thus generate some profit in return .The risk involved is also shared by those people .So as a principle for any business , You need a set of like-minded people who can work together and face problems but are determined to succeed.

Any big business want founders like that , so we had three guys who volunteered by investing a mere some of Rs. 975 to start with .

STAGE 2:

Now we got three guys who invested but none of them knew the task to perform. So here comes the concept of GOAL SETTING, which in turn means that we need to set our goals and objectives very clearly. I must tell you, Goal setting for any business activity is the most important decision taken by the founders .This boils down to a question that what kind of goals we should set. I understood and wish you people to follow the concept of SMART Objective setting approach.

STAGE 3:

Group was made and objectives are set, now it was time to implement ideas into reality .These guys have to decide the structure of their organization first before moving forward:

1.     Workforce Selection:

Blindfolded guy to perform the activity who can be considered as the work force required to     perform the operation of the project.

2.    Middle Management Selection:

A guy who can help blindfolded guy to place the cubes. This represents middle management who is responsible to direct , achieve the desired objective , optimum use of resources and maintain the timeline for the project .After doing all these work, he has to report to  top management  for discussing the progress of the project.

3.    Top Management Selection:

A guy who can strategies about how to achieve goals , direct entire company and stream line the thought process of employees in favor of companies objectives .A guy was selected to do this task .

STAGE 4:

Business or activity is in progress to perform certain task which can benefit the company or that group. A lot of difficulties have been faced by this group as it happens in case of a company. In this workers were doing hard work to make the product. Middle management was managing the whole process of tower building. Top management was involved in crucial times of difficulties, where it pitched in to advice and give motivation. This benefits both middle management guy and worker to perform as per plans.

STAGE 5:

At the end of the activity, the given task was achieved and everybody in the group was feeling a sense of achievement. This association of human beings can be seen in any group activity and this is very important. It shows the human side of a profit building entity and promotes the culture of any organization. This belongingness helps an organization to grow in healthy and focused manner. Everybody should have a defined share of appreciation as it was in the activity. So it very essential to start but more important is to finish with sense of achievement and pride.

MANAGEMENT LESSONS FROM THE ACTIVITY:

·      As top management is responsible for giving direction to whole company. So first they should be themselves clear about the goal of the company and should define it on paper. We have seen that industries help build nations and they are the building blocks. So Company leader should be ethical and socially responsible to benefit both company and society

·      As middle management, you have to be approachable and should understand the difficulties faced by workforce. You have to focus on achieving the target but also decide according to working conditions, remuneration and benefits provided to the employee. For example , when I worked in TCS, I observed that every individual wants space to work and freedom to perform in his own way .It is very essential to recognize that balance of organization policy and personal freedom given to employee

·     Workforce should also have sense of responsibility towards the organization. This is shown by hard work, on time work and dedication toward work.

·      As I have seen the activity, a lot of students other than these guys were involved in suggesting the ways to accomplish task. These days in businesses, these people are called Consultants. Consultants are people who do analysis of your company and try to give you genuine feedback and suggestions to improve running of your company.