Babson College
Organizational Behavior
MOB - 7010 Section - 071 FALL 2000
Tomasso - 209 Wednesday 6:30 - 9:00 PM
Professor John H Stamm Office Hours: Tu, Wed & Thur
Office - Tomasso 310 5 - 6 PM & by appointment
Tel No : (781) 239-4415 Secretary - Sheila Faherty
FAX No: (781) 239-5272 (781) 239-4390
e-mail:
Course Overview
Organizational Behavior (OB) is a course on managing individual and group behavior. The purpose of the course is to help you develop your skills in diagnosing problems of individual and group effectiveness and in taking action to solve them. To accomplish this aim, the course will examine a broad range of issues and recurring problems that managers face, including motivation, performance assessment, conflict management, influence, team work and leadership. The goals of the course are to provide you with a better understanding of the manager's role, constraints, and opportunities; to enrich your understanding of organizations; and to give you concepts, tools, and practice in applying your knowledge. The course's emphasis is on both understanding the underlying dynamics of organizational behavior and on using that understanding to take responsible, purposeful and effective action.
Course Material
To accomplish the course's goals we will use a variety of materials and methods: case analysis, large and small group discussions, lectures, videos, role-plays, and exercises. The course case packet, available through the bookstore, includes most of the cases and readings - additional materials will be distributed. The text, Emotional Intelligence by Daniel Goleman, is also available in paperback from the bookstore.
One class discussion (12/6/00) will be based on a movie, 12 O'clock High, which students must arrange to see outside of class. It is available for rent in most video stores and a copy is on reserve at the video desk of the library.
Course Requirements
Grading for the course will be based on the following criteria and weights:
Class Contribution: 30% Group Case and Observation 30%
Individual Case: 15%
Final Case Exam: 25%
Class Contribution. All class sessions involve analysis of the assigned case and discussion and evaluation of possible strategies for action, with a focus on both the theoretical issues involved and the practical implications of theories. You should be prepared to express your opinions, share your ideas and experience, and listen to others'. Effective discussion and learning depends upon your willingness to take risks in communicating ideas and to engage with others about their ideas.
Regular participation in discussion is expected. You should prepare the cases and readings for every class session (thorough preparation will probably require 6-8 hours per class session). In every class, individuals are called upon to share their analysis and plans. It is essential that you attend all course meetings. If you must miss a class meeting due to unusual and unalterable reasons, you should notify me in advance. In the event you must miss a class, I am teaching three evening sections on a Wednesday-Thursday-Tuesday cycle and it would be better to attend one of the other evenings than entirely miss the materials for that session. (For Wednesday evenings the same material is assigned the following evening (Thursday) and Tuesday the next week.) You are still responsible for the material covered in your Wednesday evening class. Also, it would be useful for each student to do a written self-debriefing as soon as possible after each class, reflecting on that class as well as the course to date.
Individual Case. One case will be assigned for you to write an analysis and an action-plan by yourself, outside of class. The discussions in the class sessions prior to this assignment will provide you with the basic approach to doing this assignment. The assignment must be typed, with a maximum length of 6 double-spaced pages, 12 point with 1" margins. The write-ups should identify key problems and underlying causes, apply course concepts and theory to assess the causes and recommend a specific action plan. Because of the page limit, case data should be used selectively and carefully to make specific points, rather than summarized. Please be sure to number your pages and do not use folders or covers. A title page with one staple is sufficient.
Group Case and Observation. A case will be assigned to groups of students for developing and writing a joint analysis and action plan. Each individual is also required to write up her/his observations of the group's process for doing this work together. The maximum length of the group’s analysis and action plan is eight (8) double-spaced pages, with the limit for each individual observation being two (2) double-spaced pages. Groups of 5 or 6 students must be formed at least three weeks prior to the due date for the project.
Final Case Exam. The final case will be an individual take-home assignment of analysis and action plan, similar to the one assigned as an individual case with a maximum length of 6 double- spaced pages.
Course Schedule
Class Date Assignments
1 9/6/00 Course Introduction; Causal Analysis in OB
Discussion of cases: Chris Cunningham
Bob Lyons (time permitting)
(Remember - self-debriefing)
UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING INDIVIDUAL BEHAVIOR
2 9/13/00 What and Who Motivates Whom? HOW?
Case: The Soul of a New Machine
Intro. - The Soul of a New Machine
Reading: A Brief Note on Social Motives
Text: Aristotle’s Challenge, p.p. ix - xiv
Questions to begin your analysis:
1) What makes the Eagle group work so hard?
2) What actions has Tom West taken to shape this culture?
3) What motivates Tom West?
3 9/20/00 What are We Doing With Performance Appraisal?
Case: Old Colony Associates and
James Cranfield; OR Eugene Kearney (A)
Reading: Note on Performance Appraisal
Text: Chapter 3 - When Smart Is Dumb
Questions:
1) What is your evaluation of Eugene Kearney's performance?
What are his strengths and his weaknesses?
2) If you were assigned Jim Cranfield, how would you plan to
conduct the appraisal interview with Kirby? What are your goals?
Be prepared to discuss the issues you would raise, and why, and
to describe the process of the interview (i.e.: how you would start,
what you would do in the middle, and how you would end).
3) If you were assigned Kearney, how would you plan to conduct
yourself in this interview? What are your goals? How would
you try to influence the process?
4) Be prepared to role play the appraisal interview in class as either
Cranfield or Kearney.
UNDERSTANDING AND BUILDING WORK RELATIONSHIPS
4 9/27/00 Authority and Influencing Behavior
Case: Karen Leary (A)
Text: Chapter 4 - Know Thyself
Questions:
1) Analyze Karen Leary’s situation.
2) What is your assessment of Ted Chung’s performance?
3) What assumptions, what perceptions do each have of the other?
4) Based on your analysis develop an action plan (even script-out)
for Leary.
5 10/4/00 So How Can You Influence People?
Case: Amelia Rogers at Tassani Communications (A)
Reading: Influence Without Authority: The Use of Alliances,
Reciprocity, And Exchange To Accomplish Work
Questions:
1) What is going on here? Why did Burns call Johnson? Why did
Johnson call Rogers?
2) What should Rogers do? Please be specific about the influence
tactics and/or currencies she should use.
6 10/11/00 How do You Communicate?
Case: Donna Dubinsky and Apple Computer, Inc. (A)
Reading: Power of talk, who gets heard and why
Text: Chapter 5 - Passion’s Slaves
Chapter 9 - Intimate Enemies
Questions:
1) Analyze the situation, which Donna faces.
2) What are the key factors contributing to her problem(s)?
3) Based on an understanding of the above, create an action
plan for Donna - be very specific and consider the resources
at her disposal as well as the constraints she with which she
must contend.
UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING GROUPS
7 10/18/00 How and Why do Groups Develop Their Own Culture?
Case: The Slade Company
Readings: Framework for Analyzing Work Groups
Text: Chapter 8 - The Social Arts
Questions:
1) How do people, task requirements and formal organizational
systems lead to the development of the Plating department's culture?
2) How would you describe the Plating department's culture?
3) How would you assess it?
4) What should Ralph Porter do about the "punch-out system"?
Handout: Individual Case Assignment (Due next week)
8 10/25/00 So How Can You Influence a Self-Managing Work Group?
Case: In-Class Video
Reading: Note on Process Observation
Text: Chapter 7 - The Roots of Empathy
Individual CaseAssignment Due
Handout Group Case Assignment (Due in three weeks)
9 11/1/00 What's All This About Teams?
Case: Mod IV Product Development Team
Reading: The Trouble with Teams
Text: Chapter 10 - Managing with Heart
Questions:
1) What is the problem faced by this team?
2) What caused this problem(s)?
3) What should Linda Whitman do?
UNDERSTANDING AND MANAGING LEADERSHIP
10 11/8/00 Team Talk - Mod IV (continued)
11 11/15/00 How Should Teams Be Rewarded?
An In-Class Exercise
Group Case Assignment DueWhat's All this About Leadership Style?
Case: Thurgood Marshall High School (May Discuss)
Reading: Why change programs don’t produce change
Text: Chapter 11 - Mind and Medicine
11/22/00 THANKSGIVING RECESS - No class
12 11/29/00 What Exactly is Leadership?
Case: Sun Hydraulics (To be distributed)
Reading: Building A Learning Organization
Bob Koski seems to have some unconventional views of what
an organization should look like and what stands in the way of
maximum effort. As a consultant (with at least 11 classes of
OB in your background) to Bob what would your advise Bob.
You may share (some of) his unorthodox ideas, but how practical
are they and what about the future?
Handout: Final Individual Case Assignment (Due in one week)
13 12/6/00 How Do You Manage Your Own Leadership?
Case: Movie to be viewed outside of class, 12 O'clock High
Readings: Managing Organizational Transitions
Prepare Your Organization to Fight Fires
Questions:
1) What was the problem that Pritchard was solving by
sending Savage to the 918th?
2) What were the various hypotheses about the causes of the problem?
3) What was Savage's action plan?
4) What relevance is this war movie to your career?
Course Wrap-Up
Final Individual CaseAssignment Due