Blog Check #1 Feedback

I have now completed posting my feedback for your team.  The feedback is posted in my "comment" that appears on your team's most recent blog post that was posted by the deadline of midnight on Feb. 23.   My feedback includes my general sense of what your team has done so far and several suggestions for improving your blog.  That will give your team some idea of the issues that you particularly need to address when you meet on Monday, Feb. 28, and will hopefully help you in your planning and decision-making.

Team Blogs are now linked in the left column

All of the Team Blogs in our section of MQM 221 are now linked in the left column.  Blog links in the left column will appear in the order of the most recent posts (the most recent will be listed first).  At times, you may need to roll your mouse over the link for it to become visible.  Below is a finalized list of the topics that each team chose.

Team 1 Big Bang

Team 2 Glass Ceiling

Team 3 Small businesses, leadership

Team 4 It’s Always Sunny in Organizational Behavior

Team 5 The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Team 6 The Dark Side of the Force

Team 7 Shake It Up

You should check at least a couple of other teams’ blogs (as well as your own team) and make comments on a couple of their posts each time you make your own post in your blog (or even more often, if you like—the blog introductions sound like they will be really interesting).   Remember that the assignment recommends at least weekly individual blog posts contributing to your team blog—more are welcome! 

Also, remember to “sign” each of your own blog posts (type your name at the bottom of it) with your real name.  I will need to know who posted it in order to give credit for your individual points (see assignment file for both team and individual grading criteria). 

I hope that, once you become comfortable with the blogging process, you will begin to actually enjoy this assignment and post some really worthwhile and interesting questions, issues, stories, media, etc. that will spark the interest of the whole class.  Of course, please see me if you have any questions or concerns.  Have fun!

Welcome Message

Hi Everyone!

Wecome to the MQM 221 Section 1 Blog!  My first post will just be an introductory welcome.  The second post (below) will list some possible blog topics that your team may want to consider.  However, these are just examples, and you are quite free to propose your own idea for a blog theme.  Professor Sheep will have to approve your theme, but you are encouraged to be creative and to make your blog as interesting to others as possible.  Make sure that you read the blog assignment on Blackboard when it is posted before you create your blog or post anything to it.  There will be specific instructions for how to get started in the assignment.  

Blog Theme Examples

Here is the list of possible examples (which you are free to use).  These are first come first served to the team that signs up for this theme first.  There will be no duplicates.  We are striving for variety in the blog themes for the section.

1.  “Shake It Up” Blog:  Recent examples and stories of ways in which companies (or leaders) motivate their employees (you should often relate your blog content to theories and concepts in Chapters 5, 6, 7, and 12).  You might also feature stories about business practices that are demotivating to employees and how to improve them.

2.  The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly Blog:  Ethics and scandals, business and leadership ethics, corporate social responsibility (CSR), environmental heroes and villains, and so on.  You should often relate your blog content to theories and concepts in Chapter 1 and ethics-related issues in all of the other chapters in the book.

Examples:  Bill Gates, Warren Buffet (for their philanthropic initiatives) Bernard Madoff, Wayne McLeod (for their financial scandals), the BP oil spill, examples of environmentally-responsible companies or companies that are starting new initiatives “to go green.”

3.  Shattering the Glass Ceiling Blog:  Gender (or other types of “managing diversity”) issues--recent examples in the news.  You should often relate your blog content and stories to theories and concepts in Chapters 1 through 4.  Remember that diversity includes many types of “individual differences”—e.g., different personality types, different cultures, many demographic variables, and so on.

4.  Big Bang Impact Blog:  Recent leaders of change or stories about dramatic organizational change:  Change agents who have made a real difference in their organizations/society (and why they have been successful—or perhaps, if you can find examples, unsuccessful).  Examples:  Mark Zuckerberg, Barack Obama, Nelson Mandela, Steve Jobs.   Big changes in organizations might also include mergers and acquisitions, or downsizings, etc., and how such changes impact people in the organization. You should often relate your blog content to Chapters 11 through 14. 

5.  “Dream Teams” Fantasy League Blog:   Well, unfortunately for some, we’re not just talking about sports teams here, although you might find some business analogies to successful sports teams to use as examples.  However, the main focus would be how teamwork is effective in work organizations (and analyzing what makes them successful—or perhaps unsuccessful).    You might find material to post and discuss on extremely effective teams that have developed new products (such as the iPad) or started new projects or companies (entrepreneurial duos or teams), and so on.  You should often relate your blog content to theories and concepts found in Chapters 8 through 12 in the book.  Find stories about team-based organizations and team-based initiatives in organizations that have worked well (or perhaps those that have not and how to fix them). 

6.  “It’s Always Sunny in Organizational Behavior” Blog:  This blog would emphasize discussions and analysis of stories about what is known as Positive Organizational Scholarship (POS).  POS includes topics that focus on “what is working” and “what is right and good” about human behavior and performance in organizations—as opposed to a problem-centered approach.  It includes topics like optimism, hope, resilience, confidence, authentic leadership, making positive connections, and so on. 

There is not a great deal in your book about this, but your team could borrow a book from Milner library (or inter-library loan from I-Share libraries):

Positive Organizational Scholarship: Foundations of a New Discipline

By Kim S. Cameron, Jane E. Dutton, and Robert Quinn, editors (2003)

Published by Berrett-Koehler Publishers, Inc. ISBN: 1-57675-232-1

There is also a good online resource for POS topics from the University of Michigan:

http://www.bus.umich.edu/Positive/Center-for-POS/

This would be a good choice for a team that is already choosing Option 2 for the Team Project, as it relates to many of the same topics.

7.  Dark Side of the Force Blog:  Opposite in its approach to 6. above, this blog would focus on examples in organizational behavior that one would not want to emulate—e.g., leaders gone wrong, disastrous decision-making, de-motivating practices, what makes teamwork fail, and so on.  You should relate all of these to theories and concepts in the relevant chapters in your book (e.g., Chapters 12, 11, 5 and 6, 9 and 10, respectively for the examples given in the previous sentence).

Examples:  Michael Scott (The Office), Ken Lay (Enron), Adolph Hitler, leaders whose actions or inaction may have been responsible for various types of disasters or their bungled aftermath.

Note:  Of course, if you choose to use this theme (#7), your main emphasis should be on how to fix these problems, or how they could have been improved.  Don't just dwell on the negative, but show us the positive improvement that could be made if the concepts and theories of Organizational Behavior were used more intentionally.

You can certainly propose others:  An International Cultures blog, Effective Networking and Cutting-Edge Communication Practices Blog, etc.  Be creative!!