Table of Contents Simulation Changes Project Summary How was I effective in dealing with change this week? How have I been ineffective in dealing with change this week? What attitudes and behaviors do I need to change to become more effective as a leader of change in the future? What should I start doing to begin the self-improvement process? Conclusion I am a Human Resources Specialist at Perma Power Solutions (PPS). Our company sells wireless battery mats, batteries, and will launch the new product on the market: nuclear cells with extended life cycle. The general responsibilities of the human resources specialist are to ensure that the company's departments function efficiently and that tasks are assigned correctly, considering the specifics of each department. The human resources specialist also reports to the CEO on the results of internal and external projects and informs top management on employee results. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an original essay. However, my responsibilities are much broader and, as a member of the management team, I have in-depth supervisory duties. The first is the presence of supervisory staff. This responsibility requires maintaining a time record sheet for non-managerial staff and provides accurate information for calculating payment. Another responsibility is monitoring labor relations, which is needed to implement leadership skills and keep abreast of labor issues and union activity. One of the essential duties is the execution of payroll. As part of this task, I was supposed to calculate payroll for each employee and provide financial reports to the Financial Assistant and Logistics department. Additionally, each payment report contained information about the employees who were present and who would have to deduct their fees, an amount equal to ¼ of their daily wages for each 30-minute block of absence. Additionally, this responsibility is related to payroll authorization, which requires signing and submitting the monthly payroll to the Finance department. After the presentation, the balance sheet must be verified and only then the salaries must be considered with the "paid" status. Although I must provide precise information on the efficiency of the workplace and the achievement of results, I am also asked to inform employees about their delays or absences. In the event of any disciplinary disturbance, I am obliged to handle the disciplinary procedure and take further action, such as verbal warning and dismissal. Regardless of the responsibility for disciplinary action, the HR specialist contacts and supports the dismissed employees, how they should be paid an extra session's salary at the current salary level. While obtaining this assignment, I should have monitored the severance compensation process and informed the CEO of any related changes or issues. For this project, the company forced me to create a payroll sheet and attendance recording report. Additionally, I need to track each employee's progress by creating role descriptions. In addition to these tasks, I will provide an organizational chart and TRKW fact sheet about our project and its results. Summary of changes to the project simulation During the three days of simulation, our company made several changes, planned according to the project strategy, and unplanned, as the situation within the departments and on the marketchanged based on the solutions implemented. The significant change was the correct organization of the workplace for each department to keep them focused on the task at hand and efficiently maintain high-level performance. The related unplanned change was the initial support of each unit, as the violation of the operational process was found, and led to the decrease in sales. Another situational change during the last day of simulation was the correction of prices, due to market demand and customer requests. The previous difference our team made was to revise the release date, as the latest changes took time to implement and resulted in the deadline being extended. How have I been effective in dealing with change this week? Day 1 On the first day of the simulation, our team showed a lack of communication skills and I did not understand how the project should be implemented and what changes should be taken into consideration. I take the opportunity to establish a communication link between each team member and allow them to discuss further tasks and assignments. Additionally, I tried to delegate some responsibilities to employees, as this would help my team be more involved. I suggested that such internal dialogue would map my employees, as the discussion of the project could lead to brainstorming and give them the idea of ​​some changes (Turner). Although the first customer on the first simulation day canceled their order, I appreciate our team's effort to improve the situation. Additionally, I focused on emotional attribution to our team and addressed disappointment by focusing on why the first order was rejected and how to empower my employees using open dialogues. (Maravelas). For example, after a quiet, public discussion, Lena called the client back and convinced him to make a request. After the first order of the day, we received more orders and all the sales department employees managed to deliver them, even though the quantity of products ordered was not enough to cover our goals. Day 2 During the second day of the simulation, I realized the violation of the departments' organizational process and managed to solve this problem. The first issue to reconsider was the team's inefficiency on the first day. I saw the problem hidden in the lack of communication and well-established connections between the different working groups. As a result, I organized a roundtable for all employees to involve them in the sales operations and allow them to stay focused on our mission. Additionally, I organize another table for the heads of each department where we can discuss further steps and strategies and not interrupt staff from their assignments. This change was made as an answer to the question: why couldn't these departments work together as one unit (Weisbord). This separation, as well as the workplace organization, helped the company get the big order from Sony, as our sales managers started working with high stakes. Another achievement of the second day was the creation of partnerships with Apple and Samsung. The sales department reacted quickly to these two orders and organized the delivery with the highest quality. Additionally, our sales managers contacted Apple and Samsung representatives asking them to split the orders. This step helped us avoid logistical failures and gave us more time to deliverefficient and punctual shipments to new customers. Furthermore, the traditional sense of urgency and creating a short-term plan to win helped people follow through with these demands and not miss the opportunity to obtain orders (Kotter, 1996). While orders from two manufacturers were underway, our company faced a shortage of employees, as some of them had undergone training dedicated to our new nuclear batteries. However, every department tried to help and the problem was resolved and we did not lose customers and orders. The second day ended with no profit margin, as we did not reach the sales target. The workplace was properly organized and every employee was involved in the process, understanding that our success depends on everyone's efforts and input. This understanding was a result, which can be seen in the flywheel effect, when people line up, stimulated by the results, achieved by a small success from the partnership with Apple and Samsung (Collins). Day 3The third day of the simulation began with the launch of the new product, nuclear batteries. The sales and marketing departments developed the plan how to get potential customers interested in using our products. However, we failed to attract new customers; so I and the heads of each office proposed to decrease the unit price. Furthermore, we proposed to everyone who was interested in purchasing our new batteries that our company would send a specialist to educate and guide companies about our products. The latest strategic plan helped us find new customers and increase prices by 20% to reach our goal of a profit margin of $5 million. How have I been ineffective in dealing with change this week? Day 1 My inefficiency based on lack of experience in supply chain management, ability to measure response and organize well-planned time management. The first day was overwhelmed by small and unexpected failures. First I should set broader goals for my employees and only then allow discussion. This step should have helped them discuss more specialized topics and encouraged them to develop a joint action plan. The joint venture of each department would save time, and it is believed that the workspace should be organized during the first day, rather than during the second. Furthermore, after discussing some specific ideas and topics, the sales manager, Lena, did not refuse our first order, even when the amount was less than the expected minimum. Furthermore, the experience in supply chain management helped me to consider that our problem also lies in the logistics system, and that is why we often fail to deliver on time. I believe if I made organizational changes in logistics and improved our shipping process. Another problem that demonstrated my inefficiency was that the R&D department failed to get permission to launch new batteries. I imagined that if I took control of this process, we could get our product to market without delay. I guessed the main problem was that I hadn't rephrased the question correctly and hadn't clarified my team's primary goals. I also did not see the nature of the problem, which was in the company's supply chain. This misleading did not allow me to specify the exact problem and caused an error on the first day of the simulation (Turner). Day 2 The second day required my skills intime management, as two employees from the logistics R&D, packer, and forwarder had nuclear battery training. I couldn't check the daily homework list. As a result, I was prevented from working on the line and bringing in people from other departments to cover the shortage. Despite being flexible and participating in multiple tasks, I showed irresponsibility in allowing such misunderstandings to occur. Day 3 The third day started with the launch of the new batteries, but our marketing department had not developed a strategy. I was able to organize our team to evaluate the most direct approach to completing the project; so I only took into consideration the price value but not the needs and demand of our customers. This strategy caused a decrease in potential customers, and furthermore, our unresolved shipping problem continued to bother our customers. Furthermore, I was focused on achieving sales goals and did not consider the opportunity to improve overall service quality with the launch of nuclear batteries. Furthermore, we received orders only because our customers needed cells on a long-term basis, and it can be argued that such tactics are ineffective for long-term partnerships and contracts. Furthermore, the current supply of specialists required more planning and we will probably insist on establishing the new department or bringing in external companies to collaborate. What attitudes and behaviors do I need to change to make me more effective as a leader of change in the future? After analyzing the problems related to my inefficiency, I can say that I need to improve my motivation and gain experience or knowledge in leadership studies and supply chain management. Taking these facts into account, I need to improve my communication skills without which it would be impossible to select the right candidates and communicate with my team. Excellent communication skills would also be a great assistant to establish a good connection with management and social media. The position of change leader will not tolerate the flaccid personality who is afraid of creating conflict. The person who corresponds to this post should act as a confidant for employees, he should be convincing and credible. Beyond this, the true change maker should possess excellent conflict management and decision-making skills. Being introverted and shy will also prevent me from carrying out my work duties properly. Therefore, I should treat the outside world more affably and work on my interaction with other people. I believe that I should become more flexible in my attitude towards employees and I need to be able to listen to my team members and take into consideration their advice, proposals and requests. With such skill, I can efficiently evaluate goals and missions for each department, since knowledge of their field of activity will help me see the bigger picture and not overload departments with additional tasks. Furthermore, information on each member's skills and requirements will allow me to hand off assignments to those who can handle them without problems or difficulties. I assumed that the best basic analysis would be the SWOT analysis. This approach could help us define the strengths of our product and production process, such as quality, innovation, long-term life cycle. Furthermore, the SWOT could provide a brief description of our weaknesses as well as how we could solve them or improve our situation before the simulation begins. Furthermore, this method couldbring us insight into possible opportunities and threats, meaning my team and I could predict how customers and the market would react to our batteries (Collins & Porras). From these three days of simulation, I recognize that my skills and abilities in evaluating problem areas of the business should be improved. For example, I believe that professional knowledge on supply chain management will benefit me in future projects. Regardless, I will add that the violation in interdepartmental communication could be resolved in the previous stage of the simulation if I could clarify our main goal. Furthermore, I believe that if my team had a clear mission and an efficient work environment it could achieve better results if I only delegated responsibilities properly among employees and assigned the specific person to a particular task without distributing a task to the entire department. Furthermore, I should improve my time management skills, as I failed to control the training schedule and insisted on covering the gap with available sources. Although I have gained experience in the new position, it just shows that I need to focus more on my tasks. Also, I should improve my leadership skills to be more persuasive and inspire people to work in a team. I want to involve my employees in collectively achieving company goals, but I feel like I have a lot to do with it. Furthermore, I should reconsider my responsibilities and skills related to the financial sector and price evaluation. During the simulation, we tried to adapt our prices to market demand. However, I did not consider factors such as quality, shipping and control of our storage surcharge. My team also didn't evaluate the impact of the effort, as we didn't make a clear statement about what we should focus our sources on. The time limit did not give the opportunity to evaluate all possible options and I did not analyze what has the highest rate and what is lowest (Turner). All in all, I also feel that I have not set a correct goal and consider my emphasis on marginal profits as a failure. It can be said that our company had a reputation among our consumers as reliable, but the delivery failure and poor quality in this industry have an impact on us and decrease the reliability rate. I propose to change my behavior regarding the evaluation of objectives, since the only way to succeed is to improve the quality of the services provided, the organization of internal communication and a planned and well-prepared approach to solving problems. What should I start doing to begin the self-improvement process? Undoubtedly, the process of self-improvement cannot be called simple. First of all, I should improve my multitasking skills. In the rapidly developing modern world, individuals are required to meet deadlines and deadlines as well as correspond to updates. Specialists who perform a certain task no longer have value on the labor market. Therefore, to be an effective employee I have to combine my skills to work on different tasks. It will help me save time and will become additional training for improving my professional skills (Alvesson). Secondly, I should improve my knowledge of company documentation. It will be useful in reporting the management of the work carried out. It will also help my self-organization and teach me to maintain order. It would be an excellent aid in time management and would help me organize everything.