Fifth class notes.

Ethical decision making in organizations:

We make decisions all the time, sometimes very quick and sometimes we take time to be sure before make any decision.

Programmed decision: Go to organization and culture class every Thursday at noon (routine matter).

Non-programed decision: Get a candy (new, not frequently).

There are some models of decision making as an effective way to follow up. Those are:

Rational model: Search to do things very rationally, getting notice what one is doing at a specific moment. So, here is why, because when people usually make any decision we as a human do not realize how big consequences we are facing and waiting for the results, so we have to be aware of the prior decision and think before act.

Bounded rationality model: there are limits upon how rational a decision maker can actually be.

Taking into account http://www.princeton.edu/~smeunier/JonesBounded1.pdf, Usually decision makers since they are very oriented to achieve specific objectives, sometimes do not make the right decision because have some limits for doing the best decision making due to the lack of a good procedure and also because limits that affects the person in the choises directly to the decision maker.

Garbage can model: decisions are randomly and unsystematic.

Managing risk-taking behavior: I think risk is a behavior that not a lot of people have. Managers have to manage their company or group in a risky level because how you are going to know that is true the fact that you need a fire to burn oneself without try it. Fear of taking risk stifles creativity and innovation.

Participative decision making plays an important role in the scope of this issue i am presenting and also i would rather work in a good team that perform well in order to get good result in the objectives we wanted to affront at the beginning, because decision making in which individuals are affected by decisions influence the making of those decisions. There is a mix of decisions between all people trying to get the right one. To support this idea and taking into account the next source: http://www.ownershipassociates.com/ocr2.shtm, i can argue that there are some responsibilities in the structure as a hierarchy does, in which each person of the group has to be delivered in a seriously way in order to be organize in presenting the possible decision to work in alliance with the others to get at the end a satisfactory results of those decisions.

Do you think that your ethics and values make your decisions “politically correct”, how? 

Yes, because ethics are those behavioral norms and rules in order to make the right thing. People taking into account the source: http://gbr.pepperdine.edu/2010/08/why-good-leaders-do-bad-things/, are influenced by their values and all our lives teachers at schools have teached us to act in an ethical and moral way, but people in real life do not act usually in that way because there is a friend or family that need a hand and we as a good people help her/his in a way that won’t be seen as ethical and we do not care about what will happen in response of that actions or helps. So, there its in which problems appears. For instance, I can say that if somebody did not help me in getting an objective or even an university task, and did not contribute in the workshop or homework at all i can assure that I won’t help that person in getting a good grade with me as a group, otherwise I would be acting in an unethical way because is not fair to give him/her a hand just because is a classmate or because he or she gave me a chocolate bar. Consequently, I can say that acting in an ethical way, my decisions will be carrying out in a correct way. Taking into account the example explained above i can also say that if I had acted in an unethical way, putting the name of my classmate in the homework presented without doing anything with me, I will for sure feel very bad and i will cause a damage to that person because I am allowing him or her to do not work or even worst encourage him to be lazy in all the course. Then, is better to act in a proper and ethical way to not allow people to work in a mediocrity way.

What are the impacts of culture in terms of mixed-motive decision making?

Cultural differences in decision making: there are some problems that decision makers can face when entering a culture that is unknown for them. However, they belief in their own ability to solve problems, and it is a good advice to everybody to do not be afraid in entering a new market or culture.

Taking into account http://www.jstor.org/pss/3085984?searchUrl=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3DCultural%2Bdifferences%2Bin%2Bdecision%2Bmaking%26acc%3Doff%26wc%3Don&Search=yes, I can say that we have to spread our abilities abroad to break the wall of scared in entering a new system or culture with different values and customs and systematize decision-making practice and face the challenges that culture provide us and take them like as they are daring us to entering and go for it without fear. We have to be very secure in what we do to be able to be aware of what we are doing and where we are trying to enter and feel very comfortable in all the issues to take the best decision.

Fourth class notes

What is a documentary?

A documentary is something that represent and attempts the reality. However, in the film or in a movie the scenes are chosen without showing the scripted part as a whole. Most of the times people included are not actors. The objective of a documentary is not to develop a fictional story how movies does normally, but essentially to provide a realistic and true story by presenting facts and interviews.

According to http://portal.unesco.org/ci/en/files/24367/11757852251documentary_script.pdf/documentary_script.pdf Documentaries always try to deal with facts, not with fiction. Most importantly, documentaries show real events, real issues, real conflict, real people and real emotions. Basically, real life face all these kind of issues that a producer can present in a film as a documentary because of life existence and life actions that perhaps could be interesting for all the world.

Which is the difference between corporation and company? And make an example.

A corporation is under the law a legal person that is only concern about stakeholders to conduct business. I can argue that those corporations have some good and bad things that we as a society have to noticed and be aware of it. Corporations can make our lives better because they are very related to be responsible for human lives and other kind of issues that can make economy grows up in a wonderful way because of the big amount of stakeholders interested in invest and make a corporation the biggest one of all in a territory. However it can cause the loose of work for a lot of employees due to the entering corporation trying to buy everything and will ensure to their own people more work or even they are the only to have the right to choose their employees. Furthermore, employees can tend to be very upset and not interested in working hard because of the profit motivation; Corporation abuse most of the times of labor hand and they as a corporation take this advantage to be rich easily without care about employees.

There is a very important website that can help us understand a bit more the advantages and disadvantages of a corporation and realize better how it works. That is http://www.allbusiness.com/business-planning/business-structures-corporations/686-1.html , and I can say that since a corporation is a separate legal entity is very attractive to investors and there are a lot of advantages very interesting to carry out in being part as a corporation. Taking into account that shareholders do not participate in the operations of the corporations, they select directors who have the responsibility of managing everything. It does not mean that is easy to be part of, because it cost a lot of money to enter, and it is necessarily because of the corporation needs to be bigger everyday by investing.

http://www.ehow.com/facts_6828187_difference-between-company-corporation.html

The difference between corporation and company is that in a corporation the most important aspect is the limited liability (which means that shareholders has very low percentage of responsibility of managing the corporation and are not allow to make important decisions). That is, shareholders have the right to participate in the profits, through dividends, but are not held personally liable for the company’s debts, as i said before shareholders select directors to be able to manage everything. For the other hand, a company is similar a corporation but also is known as a proprietorship, partnership or other form of enterprise that engages in business. Consequently, I can say that an individual can own a company; A corporation is owned by several people, such us stockholders, business partners, group of people who has the possibility to invest, etc.

For instance Bancolombia represent a Colombian corporation due to it buys other banks in order to be more big and powerful every single day without any sort of competition around.

As a legal organizational model, how does the rise of corporations influence the aspects of culture in pursuing profit?

 Taking into account: “Organizational capital as competitive advantage of the firm. Gregorio Martín-de-Castro, José Emilio Navas-López, Pedro López-Sáez and Elsa Alama-Salazar. Departamento de organización de empresas, Universidad Complutense de Madrid, Madrid, Spain.” I can argue that  an organizational culture is a complex set of values, believes assumptions, and symbols that define the way in which a firm drives its business. The collection of values and norms that are shared by people and groups in an organization that control the way they interact with each other. Then, the rise of corporation influence a lot in the aspects of culture because stakeholders interact every single day outside the organization and since they are a legal entity they have the power to buy and make whatever they want with money investments because have the right to do so and obtain profits influenced by aspects of a specific culture and also may change a little bit the culture in a territory because of that power and the path of achieve the goals imposed at the begining. Furthermore, the rise of corporations should pursue the appropriate standards of behavior organizational members to take advantage of it and achieve the objectives.

http://sloanreview.mit.edu/executive-adviser/articles/2010/3/5231/the-case-against-corporate-social-responsibility/

taking into account the link, i can deduce that corporations sometimes can do well by doing good, more often they can’t. because in most cases, doing what is best for society means makes some sacrifices of profits. However, this do not happen a lot because they as a group of investors influence the aspects of culture to take advantage of it and get as much profits as possible. They try to assure good quality or effectiveness for society but at the same time the objective for them is profits at the expenses of others.

Third class notes:

Is economic retribution enough to motivate employees?.

R= No, because not only economic retribution stimulate desire and energy in people to be continually interested in and commited to a job, role, or subject, and to exert persistent effort in attaining a goal.   

Now, according to http://www.jstor.org/pss/3381267?searchUrl=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3FQuery%3Dorganizational%2Bmotivation%26acc%3Doff%26wc%3Don&Search=yes I can argue that the increasing of quality and efficiency of public management not only depends on the economic retribution, the organizational commitment create an organizational behavior of employees that makes them feel comfortable in their jobs.

Managers need theories to understand the rest, employees, customers, etc. Some of the important theories that we have to take into account are: Internal (considerate individual behavior and motivation), External (elements in the environment) and Process (interaction between individual and the environment). Due to these theories above explained, there is a need in which toward an outcome or reward generate an interesting movement.

Adam Smith says that people are motivated by self-interest of economic gain. However, taking into account: http://www.jstor.org/pss/25075105?searchUrl=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3Facc%3Doff%26Query%3Dadam%2Bsmith-%2Bmotivation%2Bin%2Bcompanies%26gw%3Djtx%26prq%3Dorganizational%2Bmotivation%26hp%3D25%26wc%3Don%26acc%3Doff&Search=yes I can argue that he besides says that individuals must pursue interest both the self and society but in the economy of today because we are facing that people pursuit the self-interest economy at the expense of other. Besides he argued that in order to maximize benefits and minimize costs of a capitalist system, the interest of both self and society must be considered.

Now talking again about the first question mentioned above, the economic retribution is not only the main point to motivate employees. Exist several retributions that companies can implement in their daily activities and work, such us: economic or material form, employee recognition programs, flexible benefit packages, symbols of distinction (certificates, mugs), annual holiday parties, etc. all these sort of motivation to every employee must be implemented every month or a specific period of time.

The Maslow’s need hierarchy provide some important needs to take into account. Due to he was the father of humanist approaches to management, explain very clear what are those needs for humans and it’s a clear model as the set of needs implemented. It is important to have an interesting source like:  "Maslow's Hierarchy." Changing Minds and Persuasion -- How We Change What Others Think, Believe, Feel and Do. Web. 28 Feb. 2011. In which i can deduce from any Maslow’s need hierarchy  that: self-actualization (It’s mainly to achieve the individual objective), Esteem (It’s the power we and other can obtain), Love-social (It’s a good affection you get in a group), Safety and security (It’s the need to avoid danger), physiological (It’s the need to the health and body maintenance in a good way).

There is an important question that can be answered in a long paragraph and adding too much information but I am trying to be very specific and asserted: What combination of needs are present in the best managers?. Well, the main combination of needs that must be presented as managers are recognition, power, respect and assertiveness. Furthermore, the best managers has the responsibility to continuously improve the work conditions within their own control, and the best source of information of all the work in the company it is their employees, then managers has to listen all employees because they are the main people who knows what is happening inside the company because the managers mostly do not have time for the knowledge of everything, so, information is the key element in side of any group, institution or company. This link http://www.jstor.org/pss/40398245?searchUrl=%2Faction%2FdoBasicSearch%3Facc%3Doff%26Query%3Dneeds%2Bof%2Bmanagers%26gw%3Djtx%26prq%3Dneeds%2Bmanagers%26hp%3D25%26wc%3Don%26acc%3Doff&Search=yes explain the importance of information flow in this case by employees that are the key element of the knowledge of the daily and movement work in the company in which managers has to take into account every single word employees tell them.

Another good question to search for a good answer is: How can motivate people to cooperate with organizational goals?. This answer is very related to the last one because in order to motivate people to achieve goals is necessarily to them for example provide stock, incentives and all elements of motivation explained in the last question. Besides, if employees consider their motivation better than any other or even they can compare what they receive as motivation with others and its essential feel comfortable, will be for sure an optimum increasing cooperation to the organizational goals and very ideal for the enterprise.

Consequently, the point is that every single company must adequate some sort of motivation in order to make employees confortable in their job, and managers will realize that organizational goals will be more open, developed and visible from any angle. As everybody knows the main objective in an entity or company is increase and develop every day, so, if employees do not work well, you as a manager won´t get results. Managers has to motivate employees in different aspects and methodologies explained before in order to have a good team, communication, and hard-work inside the company in which there are some needs and procedures to follow to get the satisfaction of everybody and get the energy necessarily to carry on improving and getting better. Finally, if you take a risk of trying to get employees very comfortable in your company you probably do not fail in any issue you as a manager.