Page 177 - Fundamentals of Management Myths Debunked (2017)_Flat

176 Part 2 • Planning
accept the goals. However, it must be sincere participation. Practicing the Skill
That is, employees must perceive that you are truly seeking Read through this scenario and follow the directions at the end
their input, not just going through the motions.
of it:
• Prioritize goals. When you give someone more than one
goal, it’s important to rank the goals in order of importance. You worked your way through college while holding down a
The purpose of prioritizing is to encourage the employee to part-time job bagging groceries at the Food Town supermarket
take action and expend effort on each goal in proportion to chain. You liked working in the food industry, and when you
its importance. graduated, you accepted a position with Food Town as a man-
agement trainee. Three years have passed and you’ve gained
• Rate goals for difficulty and importance. Goal setting experience in the grocery store industry and in operating a
should not encourage people to choose easy goals. large supermarket. Several months ago, you received a promo-
Instead, goals should be rated for their difficulty and tion to store manager at one of the chain’s locations. One of
importance. When goals are rated, individuals can be the things you’ve liked about Food Town is that it gives store
given credit for trying difficult goals, even if they don’t managers a great deal of autonomy in running their stores. The
fully achieve them. company provides very general guidelines to its managers. Top
• Build in feedback mechanisms to assess goal prog- management is concerned with the bottom line; for the most
ress. Feedback lets employees know whether their level part, how you get there is up to you. Now that you’re finally
of effort is sufficient to attain the goal. Feedback should a store manager, you want to establish an MBO-type program
be both self-generated and supervisor-generated. Feedback in your store. You like the idea that everyone should have clear
should also be frequent and recurring. goals to work toward and then be evaluated against those goals.
Your store employs 70 people, although except for the
• Link rewards to goal attainment. It’s natural for managers, most work only 20 to 30 hours per week. You have six
employees to ask, “What’s in it for me?” Linking people reporting to you: an assistant manager; a weekend man-
rewards to the achievement of goals will help answer that ager; and grocery, produce, meat, and bakery managers. The only
question. highly skilled jobs belong to the butchers, who have strict training
and regulatory guidelines. Other less-skilled jobs include cashier,
Based on E. A. Locke and G. P. Latham, Goal-Setting: A Motivational Technique That
Works! (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 1984); and E. A. Locke and G. P. Latham, shelf stocker, maintenance worker, and grocery bagger.
“Building a Practically Useful Theory of Goal Setting and Task Motivation,” American Specifically describe how you would go about setting
Psychologist, September 2002, 705–17.
goals in your new position. Include examples of goals for the
jobs of butcher, cashier, and bakery manager.

Winwood Performance Plus Experiential Exercise
To: Hannah Paul, Human Resources Manager
From: Eric Winwood, CEO
Subject: Environmental Issues

Hannah, as you know, our entertainment consulting busi- waste. I would like you to create a company-wide program
ness has had a remarkable couple of years. The success for controlling paper waste. Before we get our associates
we’ve achieved wouldn’t be possible without the hard involved, I’d like you to set some goals and develop some
work our associates do, and I’m honored to be surround- plans for this program. Get me your report (keep it to one
ed by such committed and talented individuals. I feel that page, please) outlining these goals and plans as soon as
our next push as a company should be to become more you can.
environmentally responsible. All of us (me included) gener- This fictionalized company and message were created for educational
ate a lot of paper as we do our work, so I think our first step purposes only, and not meant to reflect positively or negatively on manage-
(and main focus right now) should be on controlling paper ment practices by any company that may share this name.