Nurturing Creativity in Business

Why would anyone want to be the boss?
It is not always easy to be the one in charge,
Being the boss comes with many challenges.

Communicating via Blog

Communication is an important character trait of a person. Without communication people wouldnt be able to talk to one another. I thinking blogging is a very good and a very interesting way to find out about people. Communication isnt only about blogging, there are numerous amount of ways to communicate with one another. For instance, have a cup a coffee at Starbucks, while talking to a person you find out details about their life with a drink of just one coffee. You can also go out for lunch, and talk about what happened on the news today. Theres many different forms of communication. Without this blog , i wouldnt have known about the goals and thoughts about many students in my class . Blogging is just another form of communication outside of a classroom. Blogging is a benifital source for student who were absent
and need to get assignments and homework. When a student recieves his/her final grade, they will see how blogging has made a great impact on their final grade.

The ABCs of DISC

The test accurately gauged my management orientation. The test said that I am a C which depicts me accurately. My tendencies include attention to key directives and standards, concentrating on key details, thinking analytically, weighing pros and cons, being diplomatic with people, using subtly or indirect approaches to conflict, checking for accuracy, analyzing performance critically and using a systematic approach to situations or activities. The test got it right, however I wish I was another type like a D because they are the people that speak up and are good managers. I think it is helpful to determine people’s management “type” to better understand where they are coming from because a test like this helps in other personal interactions.

Extra Credit

Since I was a little kid I enjoyed and craved for fast food restaurants particularly McDonalds until the movie “Super Size Me” came out in theaters. This movie is a 2004 American documentary film directed by and starring Morgan Spurlock, who follows a 30-day time period during which he eats only McDonald's food. The film documents that eating McDonald’s food drastically effects on consumers physical and psychological well-being, and explores the fast food industry's corporate influence, including how it encourages poor nutrition for its own profit. This movie made me realize that McDonalds is nothing but a multi-billion dollar company that creates influence on individuals by means of great marketing strategies.

I was very interested in fact how McDonalds employees and management would contribute towards my precise order. As I waited on the line I observed that only two employees were working in the front of the counter, one was working for the drive through window and about four workers in the back making the sandwiches. After about five minutes it was my turn to place this specific order; a hamburger with four pickles and small fries well done with no salt. The first and foremost step involving this order was when the McDonald’s employee recorded my order on the register. The second step was when that same employee yelled out to the staff in the back that he needs a hamburger with four pickles. The third step occurred when he went over to the counter where the french fries were cooked and grabbed a small paper bag made specifically for fries, moreover filled up that small bag with fries that were already cooked. After this the McDonalds employee went on to take care of the next customer. Once he placed the customer’s order on the register he came back to my order and last but not least, he took the hamburger that was already made by another employee in the back and put it inside a small paper bag along with the french fries.

In total two people had to get involved in this special order and receipt generation. During ordering, and while I was waiting, the employee was treating me very nice and with respectful manners. I had no problems in the way the personnel were treating me or other customers. Unfortunately as I opened the bag, my order was not completed correctly. The hamburger had four pickles inside, however the french fries were salty as I tasted them. Right after that I went up to the employee that had given me my order and requested french fries but this time I really stressed out the words “well done with no salt”. The second time around the fries were not salty at all.

Effectiveness of the manufacturing process was significantly fast however not accurate since the fries came in salty. It took the staff about six minutes to complete this special order. In a fast food restaurant, this is an acceptable wait. The employees and the structure of the restaurant were very organized. The communication pattern involved in this special order was very efficient and prompt. The employees in the front communicate with the employees in the back which was very efficient in the end result. The management challenges presented by my special order are that the fries had to be separately cooked with no salt and the hamburger had to be made with exactly four pickles. The customer service was efficient and effective in that restaurant. If I was brought in as a consultant to McDonald’s to help them improve their efficiency, the recommendations that I would make to improve the management processes during special orders are first of all complete the exact needs and orders of the customers and second I would introduce new form of communication amongst the employees by the use of headsets with microphones.

The Power of Vision

I think about what im going to become in the future, maybe not everyday but most of the time. Its easy to imagine your self in one place , but to actually achieve it, it takes time. It takes work and more work to become something in life. You can't plan your life out and just simply write how your future is going to look on a piece of paper. In order to achieve an accomplishment you have to work towards it every day, if your mind is set to it anything can be made. After Baruch i would like to go to NYU or Columbia to study for Accounting. I would like to get married and have children. I want to open up my own Accounting Firm and have people working for me. That way I can spend more time with my family. In order to make your goals in life come true, you cannot be lazy. Saying you want to be succesful is very easy but actually doing it is the harder part.

Decision Making

I personally used accommodation to handle the potential for chaos during the class decision making exercise because I thought that students that did really bad on the test should have a voice of how the next test is going to be like. Since I scored above the average of the class I figured that this issue was more important to others than self. Given that I know now the pattern of communications, the reactions of classmates, and the results of the decision making process, another way to handle conflict that I could have chosen to get a more desirable result would be collaborating since it requires bargaining and negotiating among groups and multiple group insight is required. I think that we should of split into groups and come up with the best idea from each group and then decide on which group's idea to stick with. This would have been better because there would be less chaos in the classroom and everybody could focus on a great idea that is beneficial to everyone.

An Eggs-cellent Way to Plan

We succeed at building an effective egg protector because of our careful and thorough planning. We began with step number one from the planning process which is to define your goals and objectives. We knew where we wanted to go and understood the time limits. Our goal was not to break the egg and protect it using straws and tape. The second step in the planning process is to determine your resources and current status vis-a-vis objectives.

We knew where we stand in reaching the objectives from the start; we identified resources, group strengths that work in our favor and group weaknesses that can hold us back. We decided that the shortest person is going to go up to throw the egg because of less distance from the ground. We generated alternative scenarios for what may happen; we identified for each scenario things that may help or hinder progress toward our objectives. We evaluate alternatives to assess strengths and weaknesses of each. Then we choose the action alternative most likely to accomplish our objective; we described what specifically must be done to implement this course of action; and we allocated jobs/roles throughout the team. Last but not least, the last step was to implement the plan and evaluate results. We took the planned action; measured progress toward objectives as implementation proceeds; we took corrective actions and revise our plan as needed. I evaluate my team’s ultimate performance given the effectiveness of my planning to be great due to the success of it.