Category: managing and leading in business

Competency
In this project, you will demonstrate your mastery of the following competency:
Identify yourself as a leader and follower to be effective as an individual and team contributor
Overview
Many well-known leaders wrote and continue to write in journals, reflecting on their actions and decisions in their leadership roles. These reflections allow leaders to revisit their choices and learn how to improve their actions and decisions to become more effective leaders in the future.
Directions
Write a reflective paper describing your leadership style and skills. Reflect on what you have learned throughout the course, and think about how you can use this knowledge to further your career. Use the results of your self-assessments, leadership map, and other course materials to guide your reflection. Begin your reflection with a single statement that concisely summarizes your leadership style and approach. The statement should be one that you could later share on LinkedIn or your resume. You could also use it to guide your professional development.
Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:
Leadership Approach:
Leadership Skills: Describe your primary leadership skills and describe how these skills will help you effectively lead a team. Additionally, describe skills or attributes you would like to develop and improve upon in order to become a better leader.
Leading and Following: Explain the importance of being able to both lead and follow when working as part of a team, along with how well you are able to lead and follow on a team while in a leadership role.
Leadership Style: Describe your personal leadership style and explain how you intend to use that style when working with a diverse, dynamic team.
What to Submit
To complete this project, you must submit the following:
Your submission should be a 1- to 2-page Word document with 12-point Times New Roman font, double spacing, and one-inch margins.

Decision-making models are critical for making informed and consistent decisions. In this discussion, you will use what you have learned about decision-making models to solve the organizational problem below.
Scenario
Imagine that you are an organizational consultant for the SNHU Pet Supply Company. You have been asked to recommend who should lead a new initiative to expand the company’s online presence. After several discussions and interviews, the leadership team has shortlisted two candidates. Each candidate brings a different set of skills and expertise to the table, and each also poses a few challenges.
The first candidate, Myra, is a 15-year veteran of the organization who has worked her way up from an intern to a very capable product manager. She has extensive knowledge of the company’s products and services and embodies the company’s culture and vision in her work. Myra is not well-versed in e-commerce and the technologies that will be needed to implement and launch the company’s online initiative. However, she is a fast learner, and the management position doesn’t require too much in-depth knowledge of technologies.
The second candidate, Michael, was hired six months ago and shows great promise as a leader and manager. He has an MBA from a reputable university and worked for a technology startup for three years before joining the company. He has no experience in pet supplies or related industries, but knows how to launch an online company from the ground up.
In your initial post, address the following:
Compare and contrast two different decision-making models addressed in your course resources, explaining how each would be used to approach the hiring decision.
Recommend which of the two decision-making models would be the best suited to help make the hiring decision, and why.
In your response posts to at least two peers, explain how the model you recommended using compares with the model your peers recommended using and how it would influence the decision-making process and outcome. You may use the following questions to help develop your response:
What can examining a business problem through the lens of different decision-making models teach us about decision making?
What other business decisions or situations would your peers’ recommended decision-making models be most appropriate to use for, and why?
What other business decisions or situations would your recommended decision-making model be most appropriate to use for, and why?
Do you have questions for your peers about why they recommended the model they did?

Overview
In this assignment, you will evaluate a current organizational structure and recommend structural changes that can help address the concerns the organization identified regarding collaboration, communication, and autonomy.
Scenario
You work for an organization that has traditionally been very formalized, and managers have had a very broad span of control over direct reports from multiple departments and functions. This worked well in the past; managers were able to oversee a high number of direct reports because there were many rules and regulations dictating how their work should be performed. However, there were downsides. Employee talent was underused, and there wasn’t a strong team culture, as most work was done independently according to standard operating processes.
Recently, the organization has been shifting to less formalized working structures to support more creative, innovative work and provide employees with more autonomy. While employees are happy with the purpose of these new changes, managers are feeling overwhelmed, and employees are feeling under supported. This has impacted function-specific work the most, because in the past, managers didn’t need to understand in-depth, function-specific tasks (such as the technical aspects of graphic design work or the intricacies of project management). Instead, they had the ability to rely on rules, regulations, and standard operating processes. Employees have also noticed a lack of communication around current projects, which has led to a lack of updated information and duplicated work across management teams.
You have been asked to work with the human resources department to recommend a new organizational structure that addresses these identified management and communication concerns.
Prompt
Use the Module Six Assignment Template located in the Guidelines for Submission section to create an updated organizational structure chart for the organization. Then, in a separate Word document, write a brief explanation for your recommended changes and how they will impact both organizational communication and overall team dynamics.
Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:
Updated Organizational Structure Chart: Create an updated organizational structure chart that addresses management and communication concerns.
Explanation of Changes: Explain your reasoning for why you made the changes you did to the company’s organizational structure. Include how your changes differ from the original and why you believe they would benefit the organization.
Impact on Organizational Communication: Describe the impact these changes will have on the company’s overall organizational communication.
Impact on Team Communication: Describe the impact these changes will have on the company’s overall team communication and reporting structure.
What to Submit
Submit your completed Module Six Assignment Template PPT as a PPT file. Submit your separate, written submission as a 2- to 3-page Word document with 12-point Times New Roman font, double spacing, and one-inch margins.
A text-only version of the template is available: Module Six Assignment Template Text-Only Version Word Document. If you use this template, submit it as a Word file.

Overview
Imagine that you have been hired as a consultant to investigate the social responsibility of two companies, TOMS Shoes and Ben & Jerry’s. Your manager finds both of these companies to be inspirational. She would like the SNHU Pet Supply Company to become more socially conscious and has asked you to investigate what Toms and Ben & Jerry’s are doing. You are responsible for researching how their socially responsible practices impact both the companies and their customers. Your manager would like you to make some suggestions about how the SNHU Pet Supply Company can become more socially responsible and make ethical decisions.
Prompt
You will create an opinion brief about the two companies and suggest a social change for your company. Be sure to use evidence from the course (such as the definition of social responsibility found in your readings) to support your response and suggestions.
Specifically, you must address the following rubric criteria:
Socially Responsible Efforts: Describe each company’s efforts to promote ethical and social good.
Benefits: Describe the organizational benefits from adopting socially conscious policies.
Socially Responsible Policy: Suggest one socially responsible policy that the SNHU Pet Supply Company could put into place, and explain how this would benefit the company and its consumers.
What to Submit
Submit your brief as a 1-to-2-page Word document using 12-point Times New Roman, one-inch margins, and double spacing. Sources should be cited according to APA style.