SAMPLE

Personal Application Assignment

Introduction Early in 2004, the company I work for implemented a new computer system in order to become fully integrated into the system used by our parent company. As a result, our entire organization went through a process of tremendous change. Virtually every function had to be performed differently in the new operating environment. Two of the most significant changes that took place were that both the customer service and production scheduling functions started being performed by personnel at the corporate office instead of being performed by local site personnel. While it was difficult enough for the production workers to operate the new system in order to be able to produce finished product, there was sudden chaos surrounding the order processing and production planning functions. As a result, the production department was getting further and further behind and our customers were quickly losing patience with our inability to supply them product when needed. In an effort to address the worsening situation with our customers, our company president constructed a letter to our customers outlining new “business rules” that would have to be adhered to while our company worked through the process of this change. He asked me and two other members of senior management to meet in his office to discuss the contents of the letter before having it mailed to our customers. In the following pages, I will discuss the meeting that took place and will relate it to both the game theory of power and politics and Richard Emerson’s power-dependence theory of social power as are outlined in our textbook, Organization Development (French & Bell, 1999).
Concrete Experience The meeting took place with all members of the company’s business board present: the president, the operations