4 February 2010
Management Seminar, Free, at the Northern Virginia Community College
You Are Invited to a FREE* Management Seminar.
The Manager’s Formula for Success
The One Minute (Small Business) Manager Meets the Monkey: An Introduction
How to Manage Your Staff and How to Manage Your Manager
Well-run organizations have managers and staff who work to control events, instead of events controlling them. They anticipate the future . . . adapt to the present . . . and learn from the past.
Who: Managers who need to get in control of events or to better influence results
What: An introduction to The One Minute Manager Meets the Monkey
1. The Management Equation:
Vocational Time vs. Management Time2. How Management Really Works:
The Molecule of Management3. The Who and How of Promotions:
The Freedom Scale
When: Monday, April 17, 2010, 11:00am to 12:15pm
Where: Northern Virginia Community College,
Alexandria Campus, campus map
The new Bisdorf Auditorium, room 196
3001 North Beauregard Street, Alexandria, VA 22311 street map
Parking and Directions here.
Why: Improve managerial effectiveness and staff efficiency.
Cost: FREE* Registration is helpful here. Space is limited.
The class will reference the work of Ken Blanchard and Bill Oncken in their book The One Minute Manager Meets The Monkey.
Also cited will be the Harvard Business Review article, Managing Management Time: Who’s Got the Monkey?, published in 1974, by Bill Oncken, Jr.. The article, an edited excerpt of the Managing Management Time™ seminar, has gone on to become one of the two most requested reprints in the history of the Review.
The training summarized in the article is sometimes called the “Monkey Management” seminar.
Jack Yoest, Adjunct Professor of Management and President of Management Training of DC, is a former Armored Cavalry Officer in Combat Arms.
His military leadership training and management experience guides his philosophy at the core of Managing Management Time™. He has managed software, health care and international human resource management companies.
His experience is in Military, Academia, Early-Stage, Non-Profits, Fortune 500 and Government.
Jack also served in the Governor’s Office of the Commonwealth Virginia as Assistant Secretary for Health and Human Resources where he acted as the Chief Technology Officer for the secretariat. He was responsible for the successful Year 2000 (Y2K) conversion for the 16,000-employee unit.
He was also a manager with a medical device start-up and helped move sales from zero to over $12 million, resulting in a buy-out by Johnson & Johnson. Jack has consulted in China and India.
Questions? email JYoest@NVCC.edu or call Jack at 202.215.2434 to save your spot.
Jack Yoest
202.215.2434
Adjunct Professor
Thank you (foot)notes:
*FREE. The Alert Reader knows well that there is no free lunch. But some products and services can be rendered at NO CHARGE as a component of an organization’s marketing budget. The taxpayers of the Commonwealth of Virginia have provided the compensation for Your Business Professor at NOVA.
Following is the PowerPoint for the lecture:
Suggested class reading:
Do You Have An Incompetent Manager? From The Washington Post
One Minute YouTube Introduction: The Manager’s Formula For Success.
The six part management training video.
3 February 2010
Second Lady Dr. Jill Biden Teaching at Northern Virginia Community College
Alert Readers know that Your Business Blogger(R) teaches at the Northern Virginia Community College in Alexandria and Arlington. Jill Biden, The Second Lady, is an enthusiastic supporter of the Community College system and proves it two days a week.
By teaching English at the Alexandria campus.
Even if one disagrees with her politics, everyone agrees on one thing about Dr. Biden:
She is authentic.
Following is her interview on CBS.
(Governor Sarah Palin never got a softball interview like this. Goodness, this is typical of interviews JOE Biden lounges through…)
Thank you (foot)notes:
Botox, capped teeth, hair plugs. Why does the media love Joe Biden? Because he’s authentic too…
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
Jack and Charmaine also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
1 February 2010
Hayek vs. Keynes in Boom and Bust, A Rap Anthem
Thank you (foot)notes:
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
Jack and Charmaine also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
Hat Tip: VoluntaryXchange.
Hat Tip to VoluntaryXchange.
29 January 2010
Business Terms and Vocabulary, Introduction to Business
Vocabulary and Business Terms Review Spring 2010
Source: Business 100 Pride Hughes Kapoor 10th edition
1. Free Enterprise, p. 4.
2. One question to ask in a job interview, p.6.
3. One reason to study business, p.7.
4. The purpose of Business is to create a _______________ and make a ______________.
5. Name the four resources needed for business, p. 9.
6. ___________________ - ___________________ = Profit, p. 11.
7. Capitalism, p. 12.
8. Command Economy, p. 15.
9. Productivity, p. 16.
10. GDP, p. 17.
11. Deflation, p. 17.
12. Recession, p. 19.
13. Unemployment rate, p.19.
14. National Debt, p. 20.
15. Market Price, p. 21.
16. Specialization, p. 25.
17. Microeconomics, p. 11
18. Ethics, p. 37.
19. Trade Association, p. 41.
20. Caveat Emptor, p. 50.
21. Name one right of the consumer, p.53.
22. Comparative Advantage, p. 74.
23. ______________________ - _____________________ = Balance of Trade, p. 74.
24. Import Duty, p. 76.
25. NAFTA, p. 85.
26. Licensing, p. 87.
27. Letter of Credit, p. 88.
28. Bill of Lading, p. 88.
29. Strategic Alliance, p. 90.
30. Sole Proprietorship, p. 108.
31. Partnership, p. 110.
32. Corporation, p. 116.
33. Stockholder, p. 116.
34. Dividend, p. 118.
35. Board of Directors, p. 118.
36. S-Corporation, p. 122.
37. LLC, p. 122.
38. Non-Profit, p. 124.
39. Small Business, p. 136.
40. Distribution Industry, p. 139.
41. Service Industry, p. 139.
42. Production Industry, p. 139.
42. Entrepreneur Spirit, p. 140.
43. Business Plan, p. 147.
44. Franchise, p. 152.
Printable Copy:
Thank you (foot)notes:
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
Jack and Charmaine also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
5 January 2010
Business 100 Introduction, Syllabus, Spring 2010
Syllabus Introduction to Business
BUSiness 100
John Wesley Yoest, Jr. (Jack)
Adjunct Professor of Management
Science, Technology and Business Division
BUS 100-003A LEC 12370 Introduction to Business (Lecture)
Mondays and Wednesdays 11:00am - 12:15am
A-Bisdorf/AA- Room 359
January 11, 2010 to May 10, 2010
Main Campus:
Northern Virginia Community College
3001 North Beauregard Street
Alexandria, VA 22311
NVCC phone: 703 845-6200
Fax: 703-845-6009
Jack@Yoest.org
or,
JYoest@NVCC.edu
Cell: 202.215.2434
Education:
M.B.A., George Mason University
B.S., Old Dominion University
Graduate Course Work, Oxford University
1) Course Objective:
Prerequisites: Each student must be able to
1) Read and write English fluently, and
2) Have the desire to understand how business is conducted.
Course Objectives:
The Alert Student will know the Language of Business at the course completion.
This course will provide the Alert Student with a broad overview of the components of business.
This is an introductory course that reviews the basic terminology of the business world by examining economics, marketing, management, and law.
The course will help the student select their field of business specialization.
A satisfactory placement score for ENG 111 is strongly recommended. Presents a broad introduction to the functioning of business enterprise within the U.S. economic framework. Introduces economic systems, essential elements of business organization, production, human resource management, marketing, finance, and risk management. Develops business vocabulary.
Text:
Introduction to Business, Tenth edition. Pride, Hughes, and Kapoor. Cengage Learning, 2009.
2) Academic Requirements:
ASSIGNMENTS:
Homework: There will be reading assignments from the text for every class.
Find a friend. Exchange contact information with at least one class member to keep current on any missed classes. This is a course requirement for points. Your Business Professor is not the student’s first point of contact. You may share with any and all in the class except during tests.
Establish a domain & social media name. The student will reserve and claim a URL address, for example: www.yoest.com, www.yoest.org, www.twitter.com/JackYoest This is a course requirement for points toward final grade.
Quizzes: Expect a short quiz in the first ten minutes of every class period. Questions may be true/false, very short answer, or fill-in-the-blank.
Class Participation: The Student is expected to volunteer and help move the class discussions.
Examinations: There will be a Mid-Term and Final Exam; multiple choice and short answer. The Final Exam will be given on 10 May, the last day of class. The Final is not comprehensive.
Business in the News: Each student will be required to give a brief five minute oral presentation on a current-event newspaper article. This current-event/internet assignment will be turned in with student notes.
This presentation should be organized:
3) Your opinion/reaction to the article.
At the conclusion of the presentation you will turn in a print-out of the article, being sure to include the newspaper source, date, and website.
Current Event grading scale:
4 — Organization
4 — Overview/Reaction/Opinion
4 — Presentation
2 — Turn In
=
20 Total Points
Grade Point Allocation:
Exams: Two each, 10 points each; 20 points total
Quizzes: Twenty @ two points each; 40 points total
Current Event, Business in the News: 20 points;
Class Participation 10
Text Book: 1 points
Exchange contact info: 1
Claim Domain Name: 1
Claim Facebook/Twitter Name: 1
Extra Credit as assigned: 6
Total = 100 points/percent
Class Participation: This will be a subjective measure at the discretion of the instructor. Even with the grade structure following, making your voice heard and preparedness are important — they could make the difference in a borderline grade.
The only way to begin to earn Class Participation points is to show up.
Course Grading System:
A = 90-100
B = 80-89
C = 70-79
D = 60-69
F = 0-59
BUS 100 Semester Outline; There will be 32 class sessions.
MLK Jan 18 off
Spring break March 8 - 14
COURSE OUTLINE Chapter PowerPoint slides available here.
Jan 11, Introduction and Expectations
Jan 13, Ch. 1 Exploring the World of Business and Economics
Jan 20, Ch. 2 Being Ethical & Socially Responsible
Jan 25, Ch. 3 Exploring Global Business
Jan 27, Ch. 4 Choosing a Form of Business Ownership
Feb 1, Ch. 5 Small Business, Entrepreneurship, and Franchises
__________________________________________________
Feb 3, Ch. 6 Understanding the Management Process
Feb 8, Ch. 7 Creating a Flexible Organization
Feb 9, Ch. 8 Producing Quality Goods and Services
Feb 15, Ch. 9 Attracting and Retaining the Best Employees
Feb 17, Ch. 10 Motivating and Satisfying Employees and Teams
Feb 22, Ch. 11 Enhancing Unions-Management Relations
__________________________________________________
Feb 24, Mid-Term Exam
__________________________________________________
Mar 1, Ch. 12 Building Customer Relationships Through Effective Marketing
Mar 3, Ch. 13 Creating and Pricing Products that Satisfy Customers
Mar 15-17, Ch. 14 Wholesaling, Retailing, and Physical Distribution
Mar 22-24 Ch. 15 Developing Integrated Marketing Communications
Mar 29-31, Ch. 16 Understanding Information and e-Business
_________________________________________________
Current Events on 5, 7 & 12 April
__________________________________________________
April 14, Business Law
April 19, Ch. 17 Using Accounting Information
April 21, Ch. 18 Understanding Money, Banking, and Credit
April 26, Ch. 19 Mastering Financial Management
April 28, Ch. 20 Understanding Personal Finances and Investments
May 3-5, Year End Review
Final Exam on 10 May
__________________________________________________
Business Law Outline
Sources of Law
1. US Constitution
2. Statutory Law — Uniform Commercial Code (UCC)
3. Common Law
Public Law
Private Law — Product Liability
Contract Law
a) Requirements for a valid contract
b) Breach of contract
Sales Law — Warranties
Property Law — Real Property
Personal Property
1. Tangible
2. Intangible
3) Attendance:
Regular attendance of this course is expected. Failure to do so could have an adverse effect on the student’s course grade. Any class material and assignments missed are the student’s responsibility. Success will depend upon showing up.
It is a requirement that the student exchange names and contact information with at least one classmate.
Excessive absences, as defined in the college catalog, could result in the student receiving the grade ‘F’ for the course.
Testing and Grading:
Attendance at scheduled tests and presentations is mandatory. No make-ups will be given — there are no exceptions from Your Business Professor.
Current Events Presentations will not be accepted late and must be delivered in person.
Normally this instructor will assign only the grades of A, B, C, D, or F. Special grades such as W, I, and R will be assigned only in those circumstances prescribed in the college catalog. The grade of X (audit) must be initiated by the student and will be assigned only when the student has attended class regularly.
Failure to do so will result in the instructor issuing the grade of ‘F’.
The Successful Student will devote two hours of class preparation for each hour of class room instruction.
The student will be asked to grade the effectiveness of each test.
Withdrawals:
Any student may withdraw from this course without academic penalty within the first 60% of the session. Initiation of the withdrawal is the student’s responsibility and the grade of ‘W’ will be awarded. The last day for withdrawal, without academic penalty, for this semester/session is _______________. Beyond this date dropping a course or failure to attend will result in the grade of ‘F’ except under mitigating circumstances. Documentation of these circumstances is required AND a grade of ‘W’ implies that the student was making satisfactory progress (passing) in the course at the time of the withdrawal.
If a student misses the first two weeks of class s/he will be dropped from the class.
Special Needs and Accommodations:
Please address with the instructor any special problems or needs at the beginning of the semester/session. If the student is seeking accommodations based on disability, then s/he should provide a disability data sheet, which can be obtained from the Counselor for Special Needs.
In the event of an emergency cancellation of class, please check Blackboard for further instructions. See http://tac.nvcc.edu/blackboard/student/ for more information on how to use Blackboard.
Canceled Classes: If class is canceled for any reason, the student is still responsible for the material due. Any quiz on that material might be given at the next class, in addition to the regularly scheduled quiz.
Campus classes are closed by division, day or evening. Sometimes day classes will meet and evening classes will be canceled or vice versa. The evening division starts with 4:30 p.m. classes.
Cheating:
The following will be considered cheating in this course:
3. Talking or discussion of any kind during a graded test without specific permission of this instructor.
4) Notes and suggestions and hints:
Last Day for Schedule Adjustments with Tuition Refund is ____________.
Last Day to Withdraw Without Grade Penalty or Change to Audit is _________.
Attendance will be taken at each class.
Check the course catalog first for questions.
Be sure to log onto Blackboard to follow assignments and current grade.
Expect to be asked to contribute to each class session.
Do not text-message during class.
When Your Business Professor says “Tomorrow” he means the next class meeting — not the next day.
It is normal and customary to wait for any late Professor for 20 minutes.
Draft Your Own Reference Letter.
Additional information and public speaking helps.
Refer your friends to take this business class.
Be sure to grade Your Business Professor at www.RateMyProfessors.com Key word search Yoest
Other exciting Business Division courses:
|
ACC 211 Accounting |
BUS 165 Small Business Management |
|
AST 107 Editing and Proofreading |
BUS 200 Principles of Management |
|
AST 236 Software Applications or IST 117 |
BUS 241-1 Business Law I and II |
|
BUS 280 International Business |
|
|
BUS 100 Introduction to Business |
FIN 215 Financial Management |
|
BUS 125 Applied Business Math |
ITE 115 Intro to Computer Applications and Concepts |
JACK YOEST
John Wesley (Jack) Yoest Jr., is a senior business mentor in high-technology, medicine, non-profit and new media consulting. His expertise is in management training and development, operations, sales, and marketing. He has worked with clients in across the USA, India and East Asia.
Mr. Yoest is an adjunct professor of management in the Science, Technology and Business Division of the Northern Virginia Community College.
He is also the president of Management Training of DC, LLC.
He has been published by Scripps-Howard, National Review Online, The Business Monthly, The Women’s Quarterly and other outlets. He was a columnist for Small Business Trends, and was a finalist in the annual 2006 Weblog Awards in the Best Business Blog category for Reasoned Audacity at www.yoest.org which covers the intersection of business, culture and politics. The blog has grown to receive over a million unique visitors in five years.
Mr. Yoest served as a gubernatorial appointee in the Administration of Governor James Gilmore in the Commonwealth of Virginia. During his tenure in state government, he acted as the Chief Technology Officer for the Secretary of Health and Human Resources where he was responsible for the successful Year 2000 (Y2K) conversion for the 16,000-employee unit.
He also served as the Assistant Secretary for Health and Human Resources, acting as the Chief Operating Officer of the $5 billion budget.
Prior to this post, Mr. Yoest managed entrepreneurial, start-up ventures, which included medical device companies, high technology, software manufacturers, and business consulting companies.
His experience includes managing the transfer of patented biotechnology from the National Institutes of Health to his client, which enabled the company to raise $25 million in venture capital funding.
He served as Vice President of Certified Marketing Services International, an ISO 9000 business-consulting firm, where he assisted international companies in human resource certification. And he also served as President of Computer Applications Development and Integration (CADI), the premier provider of software solutions for the criminal justice market. During his tenure, Mr. Yoest negotiated a strategic partnership with Behring Diagnostics, a $300 million division of Hoechst Celanese, the company’s largest contract.
Mr. Yoest served as a manager with Menlo Care, a medical device manufacturer. While at Menlo, Mr. Yoest was a part of the team that moved sales from zero to over $12 million that resulted in a buy-out by a medical division of Johnson & Johnson.
Mr. Yoest is a former Captain in the United States Army having served in Combat Arms. He earned an MBA from George Mason University and completed graduate work in the International Operations Management Program at Oxford University.
He has been active on a number of Boards and competes in 26.2-mile marathon runs.
Mr. Yoest and his wife, Charmaine Yoest, Ph.D., who is president and CEO of a public interest law firm, live in the Washington, DC area with their five children.
# # #
Drop with tuition refund census date — Jan 28
Withdrawal with out grade penalty or change to audit — March 26
Introduction to BUSiness 100; Northern Virginia Community College; Alexandria, Virginia
Your Business Blogger(R) teaches Business, Management, Sales and Marketing at the local college.
My basic course, Introduction to Business 100, is a foundational course that reviews the language, the vocabulary of business.
If your boss says that “American Express will be making our payroll,” you will know what it means and what to do.
Introduction to Business 100, PowerPoint slides, Northern Virginia Community College, Alexandria, Virginia; Spring 2010.
Thank you (foot)notes:
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
Jack and Charmaine Yoest, Ph.D., also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
31 December 2009
Year 2000 Roll Over, 10 Years Past: Technology or People Management?
The Y2K Bug
Credit: Hannah Yoest
The world was coming to an end at midnight 31 December, 1999.
We had planned for it for years. It was, as one techno-wag said, “a disaster with a deadline.”
The Year 2000 roll-over was going to be big; world wide. No escape.
We knew this would be no mere technology challenge to be solved with exceptional American ingenuity. Y2K was problematic with unknown unknowns.
The internet would crash. Cell phones dead. The power grid dark.
Armageddon.
In the late 1990’s one-half of the world’s internet traffic passed through the Commonwealth of Virginia, thanks to America On Line - AOL.com. And maybe another Northern Virginia entity in Arlington: the Pentagon. I think that was a secret.
Your Business Blogger(R) had the Y2K responsibility for Health and Human Resources, a $5 billion enterprise in the Virginia government. The boss, governor Jim Gilmore, a former military intelligence officer, knew what we could and couldn’t do to combat the Y2K Bug.
There was a lot we couldn’t do. And it wasn’t all technology.
It was a condition of continued employment that there were to be no interruptions or adverse incidents to the citizens of the Commonwealth and the rest of the World.
(We worker-bees could not get it wrong. The world ends AND get a bad employee appraisal. A sub-par job performance would not be a simple career-ending/world-ending mistake. Going out with a bang, so to say.)
Business literature notes the adrenaline rush of the “peak experience.” The Governor of Virginia had this as he had The Whole World In His Hands.
The web had to run for the wide world and more: Virginia’s hospital doors had to remain open; the prison doors closed. Fresh water and waste water valves had to direct flow in the correct and desired directions.
Local first responders had to be able to coordinate communications across jurisdictional silos. Governor Gilmore was among the first to realize the importance of seamless radio traffic between Fed-State-Local law enforcement. (It still wouldn’t be fixed years later. Re: 9.11).
Lots of challenges beyond government resources. So Gilmore hired the biggest IT consulting firms on the planet and bought their solutions packages. In my weekly staff meetings I had a dozen of the smartest experts in the business. I was not one of them.
They let me think I was in control at the head of the table. And maybe so. But these consultants wouldn’t let me, a mere bureaucrat, make a mistake.
But there were some mistakes the professional tech-gurus could not save me from.
One of the first steps was to inventory hardware, software for both the public sector and those private vendors who supplied the government. Every computer and bit of software that touched the government had to be inspected and brought into a procedure for standardized compliance. Verified with a form. With signatures. Every laptop. Everywhere.
I started by reviewing the vendors for the $400 million Department of Health. It had over 11,000 suppliers.
—Easy MBA 101 stuff—
So I directed the staff to report on the number of vendors that did most of the business with us, say 80-90% of the dollar volume.
—More smarty-pants MBA inquiries—
To no one’s shock and awe, save mine, we learned that 900 vendors did 90% of the business with that government agency.
I addressed the staff. “You mean,” says I, “We have to manage over 10,000 vendors to deliver 10% of our purchase orders?” My chin thrust with smug disbelief.
“So?” the staff asked as one man.
—Shortly, know-it-all MBA would meet political realities—
I strongly suggested that we should look to consolidate some vendors and look at ways to reduce the number of transactions and paper work. Time and motion studies demonstrated that processing each purchase order cost $150. I would fix this! The efficiency of Frederick Taylor.
The staff left the room. Slowly. They knew something I did not.
But they got on the job and the machinery of government began to move. I so pride myself on getting completed staff work.
The staff saw the wisdom of my directives. The efficiency! The simplicity! The savings!
I leaned back in chair pleased with the MBA-intellect the governor hired.
The Governor would have done better to hire a politician.
In mere hours the calls came in. No, not from disgruntled vendors, but from locally elected officials representing the disgruntled vendors who were about to be shut out of government business.
No one was happy that rice bowls were going to be broken.
And the fact that this all took less than a day alerted me that back channels were working at the speed of light.
The vendors and the politicians were aided and abetted by an army of helpful bureaucrats who pushed all that paper around.
The populace clamors for efficient government as long as suppliers and jobs are cut in someone else’s backyard.
I didn’t have a chance. Nor did the citizens’ tax dollars.
This was my first rude lesson in ‘multiple points of accountability.’ In government a civil servant answers to his boss, of course. But he also must be mindful of other politicians, the press, the public, the unions, the lobbyists and peers making a grab for his budget.
The supply chain efficiency fight wasn’t worth the political capital necessary to win. There are real reasons why governments seem to be so inefficient.
My lesson learned, I quickly moved on to other battles where I had half a chance.
Virginia spent $215 million and nothing happened here or the rest of the world. There were some problems in Nigeria. We now think it was some kind of scam.
Nothing crashed. Except for that super-secret three-letter-agency satellite…and some defibrillators. Not my fault. No one died.
The lesson learned was that managing technology was the easy part. The real challenge was in managing people.
It always is.
Jack Yoest is an adjunct professor at the Northern Virginia Community College. He teaches management, sales, marketing and new media.
Thank you (foot)notes:
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
Jack and Charmaine Yoest, Ph.D., also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
15 December 2009
Practice Questions Business 200 Exam 2 Management
1. ____ is the process of finding, developing, and keeping the right people to form a qualified work force.
a. Functional resource planning
b. Human resource management
c. Work force forecasting
d. Recruiting
e. Human resource implementation
2. Which of the following statements about federal employment law is true?
a. This body of law has not changed during the last two decades.
b. The intent of anti-discrimination law is to make factors such as gender, race, or age irrelevant in employment decisions.
c. Federal law prohibits the use of gender, race, and age as the basis for employment decisions under all circumstances.
d. All federal laws are administered by the Department of Labor.
e. Federal employment laws do not deal with training and development activities.
3. To which of the following aspects of the human resource management process does federal employment law apply?
a. selection decisions
b. compensation decisions
c. performance appraisals
d. training and development activities
e. all of these
4. The fact that a 98-pound job candidate is not hired as a dock worker to move 60-pound boxes of produce is legal as a result of ____.
a. the four-fifths rule
b. adverse impact rulings
c. bona fide occupational qualifications (BFOQs)
d. gender selectivity
e. benefits and features for occupational quality (BFOQs)
1. Diversity ____.
a. exists in all organizations
b. is used to create affirmative action
c. is federally mandated
d. can exist in an organization’s employees and its customers
e. is accurately described by all of these
2. A modem factory owned by 3Com in Morton Grove, Illinois, has 1,200 workers who speak 20 different languages. This factory illustrates ____.
a. acculturation
b. diversity
c. affirmative action
d. cultural organization
e. organizational plurality
3. In order to achieve diversity, organizations must have variety among their employees and their ____.
a. regulatory agencies’ inspectors
b. customers
c. external environments
d. shareholders/investors
e. all of these
1. According to the text, ____ is the set of forces that initiates, directs, and makes people persist in their efforts to accomplish a goal.
a. attitude
b. self-management
c. persistence
d. motivation
e. compliance
2. The three components of ____ are initiation of effort, direction of effort, and persistence of effort.
a. compliance
b. self-management
c. motivation
d. performance
e. efficiency
3. According to some industrial psychologists, ____ is a function of motivation times ability times situational constraints.
a. leadership skill
b. creativity
c. job performance
d. performance valence
e. compliance
4. According to some industrial psychologists, job performance is a(n) ____ function of motivation, ability, and situational constraints.
a. circular
b. multiplicative
c. nonlinear
d. additive
e. corollary
5. Asa and Ruby both sell insurance. Asa is married, has three children, and a new house. Ruby is single and has recently purchased a new Lexus. According to some industrial psychologists ____.
a. they will be motivated by the same needs
b. Asa can be motivated through need, and Ruby cannot
c. Ruby has no needs
d. how well their employer motivates them relates directly to their individual needs
e. none of these is true
6. A sales manager has carefully selected the members of two sales teams so that they have, as nearly as possible, identical skills and abilities. Both are assigned potential customers in the same industry. Both groups are offered the same rewards. One team makes the sale, and the other does not. This information tells you that ____.
a. performance and motivation are unrelated
b. the concept of synergy is faulty
c. one of the components that leads to job performance was weak
d. nothing motivates some people
e. all of these are true
1. Effective managers define ____ as the process of influencing others to achieve group or organizational goals.
a. management
b. leadership
c. interpersonal influence
d. supervision
e. autonomy
2. Which of the following is a major concern of managers (as opposed to leaders)?
a. maintaining the status quo
b. inspiring and motivating others
c. taking a long-term view
d. promoting change
e. organizational improvements
3. One of the criticisms of the television industry is the networks’ desire to maintain ratings by thinking in terms of next week’s programming. The networks are also more concerned with how to get high program ratings quickly than achieving the ratings through giving viewers time to become acquainted with high-quality programs. Problem solving in terms of show placement or guest stars seems to be more important than inspiring great television innovations. This criticism assumes ____.
a. doing the right things is more important than doing things right in the television industry
b. the television industry benefits from strong leadership
c. long-term strategy is more important than tactics in the television industry
d. the television industry has a shortage of effective leadership
e. the television industry attracts more architects than builders
4. Which of the following is a major concern of leaders (as opposed to managers)?
a. controlling and limiting the choices of others
b. solving problems so that work can be done
c. preserving the status quo
d. inspiring and motivating others
e. a focus on productivity and efficiency
5. Ford Motor Company has always attracted and nurtured capable managers, but it has failed to do the same for leaders. So, as part of an overhaul of the automaker’s organizational culture, Ford is embarking on a sweeping attempt to mass-manufacture leaders. It wants to build an army of “warrior-entrepreneurs.” Ford’s “warrior-entrepreneurs” will be expected to ____.
a. take a long-term perspective
b. inspire and motivate employees to embrace change
c. realize that results are more important than processes
d. be architects rather than builders
e. do all of these things
6. Airline companies have blamed their recent financial problems on labor unions, the events of September 11, and a weak economy. Those airlines in financial difficulties have tried to solve the problem through short-term price reductions, firings and early retirements, and asking for employees to take pay cuts. The CEOs of these companies have not tried to motivate employees to create long-term solutions to the problems facing the companies. The CEOs of these troubled companies ____.
a. are true leaders
b. are more interested in doing the right thing than doing things right
c. are promoting long-term change
d. tend to focus on organizational visions, missions, goals, and objectives rather than organizational efficiency and productivity
e. are more than likely managers rather than leaders
7. When Jack Welch went to work for General Electric, he immediately began to make drastic changes in the company’s structure and product lines. He envisioned a bloated, inefficient General Electric becoming an efficient, profitable organization over time. He inspired and motivated his employees to change. Jack Welch ____.
a. would be characterized as a leader
b. had a short-term perspective
c. emphasized means rather than ends
d. acted as a builder rather than an architect
e. would be characterized as a manager
1. Which of the following statements about the importance of communication is true?
a. Many of the basic management processes cannot be performed without effective communication.
b. Oral communication is the most important skill for college graduates who are entering the work force.
c. Poor communication skill is the single most important reason that people do not advance in their careers.
d. Communication is especially important for top managers.
e. All of these statements about the importance of communication are true.
2. The last step in the perceptual process is ____.
a. Interpretation
b. Retention
c. Attention
d. Organization
e. Action
3. In the perceptual process, ____ is the process of noticing or becoming aware of particular stimuli.
a. retention
b. organization
c. interpretation
d. attention
e. activation
4. In the perceptual process, ____ is the process of remembering interpreted information.
a. apprehension
b. organization
c. interpretation
d. retention
e. activation
5. Which of the following statements about perception and perceptual filters is true?
a. People pay attention to similar things.
b. People organize and interpret what they pay attention to similarly.
c. People remember things similarly.
d. People are unaffected by differences in stimuli.
e. People perceive according to personality-, psychology-, and experience-based filters.
6. ____ is the process by which individuals attend to, organize, interpret, and retain information from their environments.
a. Active hearing
b. Passive listening
c. Perception
d. Apprehension
e. Participative communication
7. Because of ____, people exposed to the same information will often disagree about what they saw or heard.
a. defensive biases
b. feedback variables
c. differences in communication media
d. perceptual filters
e. communications deviations
8. Perceptual filters may occur as the result of ____.
a. stimulus-based differences
b. physiology-based differences
c. situation-contextual differences
d. personality-based differences
e. all of these
9. The steps in the basic perception process include all of the following EXCEPT ____.
a. attention
b. organization
c. analysis
d. interpretation
e. retention
10. The steps in the perceptual process in order are ____.
a. interpretation, attention, organization, action
b. organization, attention, interpretation, retention
c. attention, organization, interpretation, retention
d. attention, interpretation, organization, retention
e. attention, decision, intention, and action
1. The basic control process begins with ____.
a. either benchmarking or keystoning
b. the establishment of clear standards of performance
c. the comparison of actual performance to expected performance
d. problem identification
e. determining what corrective action will be if actual performance does not equal or exceed expected performance
2. ____ is the regulatory process of establishing standards that will achieve organizational goals, comparing actual performance to those standards, and then, if necessary, taking corrective action to restore performance to those standards.
a. Implementation
b. Goal-setting
c. Control
d. Suboptimization
e. Benchmarking
3. ____ are a basis of comparison for measuring the extent to which organizational performance is satisfactory or unsatisfactory.
a. Standards
b. Potentials
c. Autonomous goals
d. Degrees of centralization
e. Resource goals
4. The objective of the company that manufactures Jägermeister liqueur is to grow its international business. It determined its success in the international market in 2005 by comparing its annual exporting data for that year with the data gathered in 1998, the first year it had double digit growth in exports. For this company, the 1998 exporting data provide a(n) ____.
a. autonomous measurement
b. standard
c. value ratio
d. dependence measurement
e. performance predictor
5. In October 2005, Cadbury Schweppes said higher commodity prices and the bankruptcy of one of its U.S. bottling plants had increased its production costs and led it to scale back its financial projections for the remainder of the year. These financial projections were ____ for the beverage company.
a. autonomous measurements
b. standards
c. value ratios
d. dependence measurements
e. performance charts
6. Companies may determine standards by ____.
a. benchmarking other companies
b. implementing vertical loading
c. using outsourcing
d. taking corrective action
e. doing all of these
7. Ford Motor Company has been attacked by its own sustainability committee for failing to do enough to cut vehicular greenhouse gas emissions. According to the committee’s 2005 report, “Ford has failed to define a goal for reducing global emissions from the company’s products.” The report called for the company to set clear targets to improve fuel economy and to cut factory emissions. This committee wants Ford to establish emission control ____.
a. autonomous measurements
b. standards
c. value ratios
d. dependence measurements
e. performance predictors
8. ____ allows a trucking company not only to compare its safety performance with other companies but to also adopt those practices found to be superior. A trucking company can gather data on how its competitors deal with total accidents per million miles, numbers of high severity accidents by type, missed deliveries, spills, driver out-of-service by type, and vehicle out-of-service by type and use this information to improve its own safety record.
a. Benchmarking
b. Data decentralization
c. Information processing
d. Mirroring
e. Comparative criterion
9. When Marriott decided to improve the quality of service it offered its customers, it asked special corporate guests to comment on the good and bad issues of their stay and also to tell what the competition is doing that is better than Marriott. The Marriott acted accordingly. In other words, it used ____.
a. benchmarking
b. data decentralization
c. information processing
d. mirroring
e. comparative criterion
1. According to ____, the cost of computing will drop by 50 percent as computer-processing power doubles every 18 months.
a. Moore’s law
b. Gordon’s law
c. the Peter principle
d. the rule of e-commerce
e. Gresham’s Law
2. The term ____ refers to facts and figures depicted in a manner that is not usable.
a. nonspecific information
b. processed data
c. raw data
d. perceived knowledge
e. relevant information
3. The first company to use new information technology to substantially lower costs or differentiate products or services often gains ____.
a. first-mover advantage
b. lower profits
c. less market adaptability
d. increased synergy
e. all of these
4. According to the text, ____ is derived from ____.
a. information; raw data
b. raw data; perceived knowledge
c. perceived knowledge; raw data
d. raw data; information
e. influential knowledge; perceived knowledge
5. Pages listing all of the felony crimes perpetrated in New York during the last decade would be an example of ____.
a. a resource allocation table
b. traditional knowledge
c. raw data
d. perceived knowledge
e. information
6. Why is information strategically important for organizations?
a. Information can be used to obtain first-mover advantage.
b. Information is derived from perceived knowledge, which limits its availability.
c. Information cannot be used as a medium of exchange.
d. Information creates suboptimization opportunities.
e. All of these are examples of why information is strategically important for organizations.
7. A table showing the order frequencies as well as the average dollar value of the orders of different segments of a catalog retailer’s market would be an example of ____.
a. an MIS
b. perceived knowledge
c. raw data
d. information
e. influential knowledge
8. In 1921, realtor Billy Ingram closed his real estate company and opened White Castle restaurants to sell hamburgers. In 1921, hamburgers were thought to be made from rotten beef and not fit for human consumption. Ingram ground fresh beef in front of customers to prove it was safe and was the first to successfully sell hamburgers to the middle class. Today Ingram is credited as the founder of the fast-food industry. Understanding that Midwesterners wanted clean, convenient food when they were away from home was the information Ingram used to ____.
a. acquire a source of perceived knowledge
b. create a tactical advantage
c. create a first-mover advantage
d. pioneer sales in the consumer food industry
e. sustain a competitive advantage
9. Which of the following is one of the critical issues companies need to address in order to sustain a competitive advantage through information technology?
a. Who will have access to the information technology?
b. Will the purchase of the information technology be viewed as an expense or as an investment?
c. Does the firm’s use of the information technology violate any ethical standards?
d. Is the firm’s use of information technology difficult for another company to create or buy?
e. What government regulations may influence the company’s use of information technology?
10. The key to sustaining competitive advantage is ____.
a. faster computers with more memory
b. using information technology to continuously improve and support the core functions of a business
c. the Internet
d. the ability of the managers to delegate
e. how important the company’s culture perceives conceptual skills
11. In 1921, realtor Billy Ingram closed his real estate company and opened White Castle restaurants to sell hamburgers. In 1921, hamburgers were thought to be made from rotten beef and not fit for human consumption. Ingram ground fresh beef in front of customers to prove it was safe and was the first to successfully sell hamburgers to the middle class. Today Ingram is credited as the founder of the fast-food industry. Yet, today White Castle has 330 locations, and McDonald’s has 25,000 stores. From this information, you know ____.
a. tactics are more influential than strategies
b. the competitive advantage White Castle achieved from being first was not sustainable
c. White Castle lost its pioneering differential
d. product diffusion rates were slow
e. none of these
1. ____ is a measure of performance that indicates how many inputs it takes to produce or create an output.
a. Reliability
b. Performance accountability
c. Productivity
d. TQM
e. Effectiveness
2. At their core, companies are ____ systems that combine inputs such as labor, raw materials, capital, and knowledge to produce finished products and other types of output.
a. organizational
b. production
c. social
d. predictable
e. sociocultural
3. Which of the following shows the correct relationship for productivity, outputs, and inputs?
a. productivity = (inputs/outputs)
b. productivity = [(inputs outputs)/100]
c. outputs = (productivity/inputs)
d. productivity = (outputs/inputs)
e. inputs = (productivity/outputs)
ANS: D PTS: 1 DIF: Moderate REF: 327
TOP: AACSB Analytic KEY: Operations Management
4. Which of the following statements about productivity is true?
a. Productivity is a ratio of benefits to costs (i.e., benefits divided by costs).
b. For companies, higher productivity can lead to lower costs.
c. For countries, higher productivity produces a lower standard of living.
d. Productivity decreases make products more affordable.
e. All of the statements about productivity are true.
5. Why is productivity important to countries?
a. Productivity matters because it produces a higher standard of living.
b. Greater productivity results in lower wages.
c. Productivity increases supply and reduces demand for products.
d. Productivity reduces taxation.
e. None of these statements explains why productivity is important to countries.
e
6. ____ productivity is a measure of performance that indicates how much of a particular kind of input it takes to produce an output.
a. Breakdown
b. Segregated
c. Unifactor
d. Partial
e. Fractional
7. The CEO of a company that manufactures maple wooden cutting boards has determined that it takes a piece of maple lumber 18 inches square and two inches thick, 2 hours of labor, a planer, a sander, an electric saw, and $5.67 to make one maple cutting board. The CEO has determined the ____ productivity of his company so he can compare its operation with that of its competition.
a. Integrated
b. Multifactor
c. Segregated
d. Functional
e. Breakdown
8. ____ productivity shows how much labor, capital, materials, and energy it takes to create an output.
a. Temporal
b. Multifactor
c. Functional
d. Continuous
e. Quantitative
9. If the manager of a company that manufactures signs was interested in how much glass tubing was needed to produce a Las Vegas casino neon sign, the manager would be interested in ____ productivity.
a. Composite
b. Multifactor
c. Partial
d. Breakdown
e. Fractional
10. In general, managers should use ____ to directly compare their overall level of productivity to that of their competitors, and ____ to analyze the contributions of individual components to that overall productivity.
a. efficiency measures; a productivity analysis
b. partial productivity; multifactor productivity
c. integrated productivity; segregated productivity
d. fragmented productivity; complete productivity
e. multifactor productivity; partial productivity
11. The American Society for Quality defines quality as ____.
a. a product free of deficiencies, or the characteristics of a product or service that satisfy customers’ needs
b. a product that customers perceive as free of deficiencies
c. any product made from error-free components
d. a product produced according to a sacrificing design plan
e. none of these
11 December 2009
7 Rules for Organizational Communication
Gossip, by Norman Rockwell
Ten percent never get the word, Army cliche.
Alert Readers know Your Business Blogger(R) teaches management at the local college and trains leaders to develop teams that can take appropriate action in the absence of orders.
But.
Most of the time the managers are more concerned with having the direct reports do what they are told. Simply to do what the organization needs: compliance to directives.
The CEO’s directives get lost in translation.
Norman Rockwell’s painting, Gossip illustrates the chain of custody of information as data moves between people. As the reader can well imagine, the tidbit of info at the start of the exchange is very different from the last transaction. Note that the lady who starts the linkage is also seen in the final conversation.
From her expression, The Alert Manager will sympathize: The direction that was first given is not what s/he may now be hearing down deep in the corporate hierarchy.
The Manager’s initial order was not what was received by the troops in the trenches.
This is why managers make and deserve so much money– dealing with the imperfection of the crooked timber of the human condition.
Even technology has this challenge seen in dropped cell phone calls and packet loss on the internet. However, technology can be improved much faster than human interaction. This is why we need higher education and continuous improvement (which is, in fact, assured continuous employment for consultants, thankyouverymuch).
IBM recently ran a print advertisement on a study on data. It showed that some 43 percent of the information on which managers base decisions is wrong. [citation needed] IBM was correctly selling the pain of working with incorrect information.
So. Managers, ten percent of your team will never get your commands.
Data will be garbled in transmission.
The information will be wrong.
The team will execute the directive wrong.
And the manager will make the wrong decision about half the time.
How on earth can organizations get anything right…?
Let us return to IBM (an unpaid endorsement).
From IBM, click to enlarge,
It’s 1940 and these 22 young men are operating an electric accounting machine installation somewhere in IBM. We know it’s an IBM installation because visible in the photograph are an IBM job time recorder (for logging the start and end of various accounting jobs), one photo of Thomas J. Watson, Sr. and five THINK signs. Can you spot them?
So what do managers — even today — want most from their teams, including outside vendors?
To simply,
How to get people, indeed the organizational organism, to think, to anticipate, to learn?
To communicate effectively?
Following are seven rules for effective (note: not efficient) communication:
1) A real Effective exchange of information is done in real life in real time. IRL. A direct conversation is Effective. See indirect Gossip above. This is not efficient: In-person is effective.
(The Alert Manager is Effective; s/he may not be Efficient)
2) An Efficient exchange of information can be done on email. But it may not be Effective. Imagine the errors and misunderstandings. Fast, but wrong, because,3) 85 percent of all communication is non-verbal.
4) Communication is a sales pitch. In every transaction in office politics someone is selling and someone is buying. The highest close rate in sales is face-to-face.
5) If an in-person-pitch is not possible, write out the missive and have it hand-delivered by a trusted messenger.
6) Teach Completed Staff Work emphasizing the Commander’s Intent.
7) Keep it short. Winston Churchill and Proctor & Gamble are legendary for keeping memos to a single page. War and Marketing. Sometimes hard to tell the difference… Think Napoleon’s Corporal.*
Finally, a short story from our British brethren on communication across large organizations.
Friend, the story is told of a Colonel who issued the following statement to his executive secretary:
“Tomorrow evening at approximately 2000 hours Haley’s Comet will be visible in this area, an event that occurs only once every 75 years.Have the men fall out in fatigues, and I will explain this rare phenomenon to them. In case of rain, we will not be able to see anything, so assemble the men in the theatre and I will show them films of it.”
The executive secretary passed the order on to the company commander: “By order of the Colonel, tomorrow at 2000 hours, Haley’s Comet will appear above the battalion area.If it rains, fall the men out in fatigues, then march to the theatre where the rare phenomenon will take place, something which happens only once every 75 years.”
The company commander passed the order on to the lieutenant: “By order of the Colonel in fatigues at 2000 hours tomorrow evening, the phenomenal Haley’s Comet will appear in the theatre.
In case of rain in the battalion area, the Colonel will give another order, something which happens once every 75 years.”
The lieutenant told the sergeant: “Tomorrow at 2000 hours, the Colonel in fatigues will appear in the theater with the phenomenal Haley’s Comet, something that happens every 75 years.
If it rains, the Colonel will order the comet into the battalion area.”
The sergeant gave the following orders to the squad: “When it rains tomorrow at 2000 hours, the phenomenal 75-year-old General Haley, accompanied by the Colonel, will drive his Comet through the battalion area in fatigues.”
From Steve Myers, USNA-At-Large@yahoogroups.com and BlackfinSS322@aol.com
Thank you (foot)notes:
* Napoleon’s Corporal, is described by James (Jim) E. Hall, cited in his Keynote Address to the 7th International IEEE Conference on Intelligent Transportation Systems, Monday, October 4, 2004. Mr. Hall was President Clinton’s Chair of the National Transportation Safety Board.
[T]he tale of Napoleon’s corporal. The story goes that Napoleon would always have a corporal at hand who was judged to be the stupidest man in his entire army. Every time Napoleon wanted to issue an order, he would first read it to the corporal and then have him explain what he’d just heard. Napoleon would not issue the order to his entire army until his dumb corporal could understand it. The point is that we must never underestimate the human ability to misunderstand and to fail, for accidents to happen.
I don’t need to remind you that 80 percent to 90 percent of all transportation tragedies are the result of human error.
Aviation maintenance documents are written at a third-grade level - not because mechanics are illiterate - but to ensure that the instructions can be easily understood. However, the same approach is not being used in regard to the computer systems designed to fly the planes. As a result, we are seeing more and more aviation accidents caused by a failure in the interface between human and computer.
Be sure to follow Your Business Blogger(R) and Charmaine on Twitter: @JackYoest and @CharmaineYoest
If the sales pitch/communique is important, show up in person. There are three events in life that demand, command a person’s presence:
Births
Deaths
Marriages
Jack and Charmaine also blog at Reasoned Audacity and at Management Training of DC, LLC.
5 December 2009
Career Management Tips for Military Officers
John Howland from USNA-At-Large@yahoogroups.com posted this career advice. It deserves a wide audience.
Career Tips:
How to get ahead the “smart” and ethical way and avoid running your career aground—
My point of view
by Dick Nelson ‘64
1. Always remember and apply the basic leadership trilogy: “Know your Stuff; take care of your people; and be true to yourself.” This one says it all.
2. Keep your head on a swivel. Threats come at you from 360 degrees, especially when you least expect it. Why do you think the Japanese picked a Sunday to attack Pearl Harbor? Review the Japanese and U.S. tactics in the Battle of Leyte Gulf, which demonstrate—on both sides—how easy it is to be caught napping by making the wrong assumptions. Remember what happened to USS Stark, USS Cole [Good Plebe questions!] and the World Trade Center [WTC]. When you stand a watch, the welfare of the ship and the crew (or the Marine unit) has been entrusted to you. That’s why you get the “big bucks.” Don’t let them down.
3. Trust your subordinates, but verify their performance. Corollary: Trust your superiors, but quietly back them up by cross-checking their assumptions, especially in matters of navigation. Cliché: Watch my back, and I’ll watch yours!
4. Never quit learning—no one is smart enough to completely master the environment for which he/she is responsible. If you think you know everything there is to know about a professional topic, you are likely to get a nasty surprise.
5. Empower your subordinates, especially in front of their people. Corollary: Never tear your subordinates down in public.
6. Adapt Admiral Lord Nelson’s custom (no relation) of getting input from subordinates before a major operation for which you are responsible. More ideas and points of view can never hurt. Also, the key players are then invested in a successful outcome, and will feel that they have ownership in the results.
7. Be decisive and execute your plan aggressively. However, when conditions change unexpectedly, be flexible and adapt. Always have an alternative, or tactical option. Don’t forget to bring the rest of your team along as you change tactics. Every ball-carrier needs blockers. By the way, all of life’s challenges can be distilled into a football metaphor. Even I know this, and I was cut from Plebe football.
8. Whatever your specialty is, try to learn the fundamentals and terminology of other specialties that are part of the Navy-Marine Corps team. If you are a Marine aviator, spend some time with the Grunts. If you are a Naval aviator, learn how the ship works, and try to get qualified as OOD underway. Don’t be a pest, but be professionally inquisitive. Find out how and why your organization members do things. As you rise in rank, you will need to even understand how the other Services operate and how best to integrate their capabilities into a total force response.
9. Sooner or later, you will find yourself working for a difficult superior. Never criticize that person to anyone, because “a bird of the air will tell the matter,” and you will regret it. Moreover, your criticism will not change anything for the better. Many, if not most of these poor leaders inherently know they have deficiencies, and they don’t appreciate being reminded. If, in your ego-centric moments you really think you are a better officer, there are three things you should do:
a. Talk privately with the superior, and ask him or her how you can improve your performance, and what he/she expects of you, beyond the obvious. Thank the superior for his/her suggestions. This is not “butt kissing.” It merely reaffirms that you know who is in charge, and that you are not going to be pulling in the wrong direction. Even problematic personalities can’t resist seeing themselves as teachers or coaches, and this approach opens the door for a positive relationship.
b. If you see that your superior has problems in some administrative or operational process, take it private again and ask if you can help by taking some of that load. Show that you are sincere in wanting to be a team player. Obviously, you don’t need to say “You’re doing a lousy job, and I can do it better.” Just say, “Sir, with your oversight, I would like to take that problem on.” Examples might be maneuvering in formation, preparation for airborne assault, or in-port ship handling.
c. Always conduct yourself in a manner that shows the rest of team that you are loyal and backing up your superior. Don’t fool yourself—everyone can read your tone of voice, body language and facial expressions as well as verbal content. Whether you know it or not, your Sailors or Marines are always watching your every move.
10. When your troops screw up, stick up for them with your boss when possible, and counsel them in private. For example, you can earn a lot of loyalty from your troops if you go to Mast with them, and if appropriate, request that they be placed under your direct “probation” supervision instead of having the book thrown at them. If they subsequently let you down, then unload on them as appropriate. This sends a powerful message.
11. Always empower your CPOs or SGTs [non-commission officers]. These people make the Navy and the Corps work. Without them, and their respect and support, you are DEAD, sometimes literally. Try to work through them, especially in personnel matters, and don’t circumvent them, which diminishes their authority with the team.
12. Early on, get your senior non-comms (see above) in a private one-on-one and simply say something like, “I have a lot to learn from you, and I promise you I will be a fast learner. I need you to keep an eye on me until I get some experience.” This sounds like you are abdicating your rank, but the effect is just the opposite. The non-comms will respect you because you are honest, and because you recognize their vital role and experience in the organization. These fine people can keep you out of a world of trouble and make you look good, if they want to.
13. Remember that no one cares about your Academy record after you graduate. In the eyes of the Fleet and the Corps, all graduates are the same: newbies. Just because you were a Regimental Commander, were on the Supe’s List, or were a big jock, save that information to bore your grandchildren. The Fleet and Corps are going to judge each of you only on your current performance as officers, and some of you Academy “stars” are going to have problems with this cruel transition. Life is really unfair. And by the way, the value of a post-graduate degree is debatable, unless you are leaving the Service. If I had my choice for a combat command position between an officer with a Masters and one with superlative years of operational experience, it’s a no-brainer. I want someone who knows which end of the weapons to point at the enemy.
14. Show that you are willing to take more than your share of the tough assignments or missions. This is one of the ways t hat you will form your reputation as an officer. It is also important that your peers see you as a team player, and not just out for yourself and your own image factor.
15. Whatever your specialty is, learn it cold. You should strive to be the best bridge watch-stander, the best engineer, the best pilot, the best navigator, the best weapons officer, the best platoon leader, the best logistics manager, etc. You will never achieve perfection, but you can be the best.
16. If you are the junior OOD on the bridge (or the Marine platoon leader), when you see something going off track, even if the CO ordered it, let someone know in the most appropriate manner. This keeps platoons from getting ambushed, ships from running aground, and aircraft from crashing. Even if your concerns are unfounded, at least you showed that you were paying attention to detail. Better to be embarrassed than stupid and let your entire unit be devastated.
17. Navigation errors are particularly unforgiving, whether you are a Marine platoon leader or an OOD on the bridge. Maintain situational awareness at all times—your life and the lives of your people depend on it. This is not a profession where you can relax and day-dream. If there are two words to live by, they would be “constant vigilance.” Nothing will destroy your credibility faster than getting “lost.”
18. Lend your peers a hand and don’t be a “know-it-all.” Don’t be like that guy or gal in class that quickly raises their hand after every instructor’s question. If you know your Stuff, it will quickly become known and you won’t need to advertise it. Be helpful to peers when they have a problem, and never usurp credit for their successes. Doing favors for others, such as trading watches, etc., will also make your stock go up faster with everyone. Even if you are competing with your peers for advancement, you want them to like and respect you. Your peers can often help your career later in unforeseen ways. Never be a “back-stabber” to get ahead, because that will become part of your reputation.
19. Push hard to get the “career path” assignments. Do everything you can to avoid getting side-channeled. For Navy ship and sub types, staying at sea—especially in combatant ships—is crucial. For Naval Aviators, get every flying billet possible, especially in combat squadrons. For Marines, stay with the Air Wings or the ground combat units. For all, avoid the temptation of taking “Hollywood” jobs like embassy assignments, admiral’s aide, White House or Congressional liaison, or any training command billet. If you want to reach Flag rank, push to always be “at the point of the spear,” or in a major staff that aims it, like the theater commands such as CENTCOM. While it seems like you will be a junior officer forever, remember that you only have a small, finite block of time during your career to amass the necessary professional experience and show what you can do before the big lottery begins at about the O-6 level. Each assignment is of cumulative importance. Don’t waste it on “gedunk” billets that don’t advance your career ball. Who would you want for a battle group commander, an officer that had been Naval Attaché to Liechtenstein, or a hard-charger that had amassed combat experience and excelled at several prior unit commands? What factors would you look for if you were in charge of making important operational assignments and approving promotions? Just like in a NASCAR race, it is very easy to get bumped off the track, into a graveyard assignment. Fight hard, but professionally, for your career assignments. Learn to use your “detailer” at BUPERS to achieve your goals.
20. When you are in a difficult operational environment (e.g., combat), construct a mental playbook of threat responses or tactical engagements. You can’t think of everything, but you can “pre-program” your response and reduce your reaction time as a leader if you have thought through the most likely or most troublesome scenarios. How should I maneuver? What weapons should be employed? Where should my assets be deployed? What logistics issues will arise? What are my communications protocols? What “external” assets are available (armor, artillery, air support, unmanned vehicle surveillance, other force units, etc.)? This is why football teams have playbooks, and adjust as necessary at the line of scrimmage with “audibles.”
21. Learn to play an excellent game of golf. This sounds silly, but it’s absolutely true! In the military, as in the private sector, the game of golf carries a disproportionate influence. It becomes a common denominator and upscale social activity that can be enjoyed by all genders and ranks. You will meet influential people on the golf course that you never would have met otherwise, even if you are a top operational performer. For junior officers, it presents an opportunity to have many hours of informal conversation with Flag or General officers, or civilian government officials. Many important deals have been forged, and professional relationships have been established while playing golf, and you need this skill and exposure! (Sadly, I was a tennis player—and I can tell you tennis doesn’t work!)
Good luck and smooth sailing!
by Dick Nelson ‘64