Question

Do you believe that the diagnosis and resulting profile prepared by Management Analysis Corporation were necessary steps in the process of finding a potentially successful group of general managers? Explain. Case study: A New Leadership Position. Please anwer the question in minimun 200 words.

Case for Analysis:   A New Leadership Position    

At Dancey Electronics company in a suburb of Dallas, management forecasts have indicated that the company should enjoy moderate growth during the next 10 years. This growth rate would require the promotion of three employees into newly created general manager positions. These individuals would then be required to spend most of their time working with departmental managers and less time on production, output, and cost issues.    

A majority of the candidates for the three new positions have been with the company for at least 15 years. They’re all skilled in the production aspects of operations. Company vice president Don Kelly believed, however, that none of the candidates had the training or overall insight into company problems to move smoothly into the general manager positions. Despite these anticipated problems, the board of directors decided that the three new general managers would be recruited from within Dancey.   

I n attempting to find the best candidates for the new positions, Dancey hired a consulting firm, Management Analysis Corporation (MAC), to perform an internal search for qualified individuals. Through interviews, testing, and a review of company records, the consulting firm generated a list of six candidates.   

One candidate was Joe Morris. The analysis used to assess Joe involved the study of environmental variables and his current style of leadership. Exhibit 1 profiles Joe’s leadership style and various environmental factors that have some effect on this style.

Joe’s present leadership style, which is high in task orientation and low in relationship orientation, is similar to the leadership styles of the other five general manager candidates. The expectations of the company, the potential subordinates of the general manager, and the new position of general manager aren’t consistent with any of the candidates’ present leadership styles. The intersecting area indicates where the expectations of the company, the new position, and the subordinates would be consistent. According to MAC, this is the ideal leadership style for candidates to use as the general manager. If Joe or any other candidate were to accept the general manager job, he would have to significantly increase his relationship orientation. If he didn’t, the probability of failure, according to the consulting firm, would be high.    

Don Kelly was adamant about not going outside Dancey to find three potentially successful managers. He and the entire board of directors wanted to use a recruitment-from-within policy to secure the three best general managers. It was Don’s belief that a leader could modify his style of leadership to meet new situational demands. This belief and the internal recruitment plan led Don to call a meeting to discuss a program to improve the compatibility between the three general managers finally selected (Joe Morris, Randy Santiago, and Ann Shumate) and the environmental factors (the company, the subordinates, and the requirements of the new position).

Answer 1

Yes, I believe so. The board of directors and company Vice President Don Kelly wanted to recruit the general managers only from inside Dancey Electronics though none of the candidates selected had the training or overall insight into company problems to move smoothly into the general manager positions. The majority of the candidates are with the company for more than 15 years which shows their loyalty and commitment towards the company. Hence the recruitment process should be fair, efficient and transparent so that the selection would not hurt any of the members. It is better to recruit an external agency to find the best candidates to avoid complaints of favoritism and discrimination. Most of the candidates have good experience in the industry and are almost equally talented. The list generated by the consulting firm MAC after interviews, testing, and a review of company records shows the same and the six candidates chosen are also similar in leadership style which makes the selection difficult. Hence diagnosis and resulting profile prepared by Management Analysis Corporation were very important in analyzing the advantages of choosing each candidate to ensure selection of best candidates available from the list and to justify the selection as the chances of complaints are more while recruiting from within the company.