Question 1
Discuss the problems at the school. Include in your analysis a discussion on the issues at various levels. Thurgood Marshall High School , opened its doors as the newest of the six high schools in Great Falls, Illinois. It was an important breakthrough in inner-city education. The school designed for the “house system” concept. There were 300 students, a faculty of 18 and a housemaster. There were 4 houses mentioned as A,B,C,D, and each of them had its own entrance, classrooms, toilets, conference rooms and housemaster’s office. Staff and teachers had been selected due to their success, background and reputations in their previous jobs. Everything had been carefully balanced even races of students. These students mostly came from toughest and poorest areas of the city. Before Kane had started his new job as the principal , his predecessor Dr. Louis Parker was in charge. He had faced with many problems during his two years in Marshall’s. The very first thing that prompted the issues was the conflicts between housemaster and the six subject area department heads. It can be considered as an organizational conflict. Jones describes, “organization conflict is the clash that occurs when the goal-directed behavior of one group blocks or thwarts the goals of another”.(p391) Sometimes conflicts can be good for an organization and can improve organizational effectiveness but in our case, it is fair to consider our conflict as the prompt of the issues. The conflicts started due to curriculum policy on required learning and course content. Then a teacher was assaulted in her classroom. That was the first debate on hiring security guards. The conflict had continued on this particular subject. The first root cause was Parker’s decision of refusing security guards. He felt that they would represent everything the school was trying to change but I don’t agree with this statement. Security guards are needed in schools in case of every emergency situation. Due to Marshall’s community culture, one group of staff felt that the presence of guards would repressive and would destroy the sense of community. Moreover, Parker’s mind hadn’t even changed when a teacher was robbed and beaten in her classroom after school hour later than the first incident. Parker’s poor decision making had led security concerns to rise. The second year had started with budget problems due to external stakeholders. Budget cutbacks ordered and Parker was not able to replace eight teachers that resigned during the summer. He made a new approach called, “flexible staffing”. According to the policy, students in the eleventh and twelfth grades were able to to take some courses in other houses. I think this decision from Parker , destroyed the sense of “one house” mind. Wesley Chase, one of the housemasters wrote a letter to Great Falls Times and accused Board of Education of subverting the house concept by cutting fund. Contrary to his job description, Burt Wilkins, a Marshall housemaster assumed the scheduling function in addition to his duties as housemaster which took most of his time. I can say that Parker had also failed in assigning job descriptions. Overall, Parker failed in organizational decision making. According to Jones, “organizational decision making is the process of responding to a problem by searching for and selecting a solution or course of action that will create the most value for organizational stakeholders”.(p.334) However Parker insisted on not having security guards. His decision damaged the stakeholders a lot when three sophomores were assaulted due to refusing to give up their lunch money during “shakedown”. Parker’ s every decision in providing a secure condition failed. He thought he could deal with outsiders by assigning Bill Jones. Bill tried to secure most of the doors but this attempt had failed too. Things went out of control when 30 teachers staged a walkout that was joined by over half of the students. Question 2
Assess and critically analyze Kane as a leader. I believe that after Parker’s lecture on “how not to be a leader”, David Kane showed some good leadership skills. He spent his first week on interviewing individually with the school’s key administrators and department heads. That was a good approach because as a new principle, he had to listen everyone’s need, thoughts and complaints. I would describe his leadership style as a democratic leader because this style of leadership encompasses discussion, debate, and sharing of ideas and encouragement of people to feel good about their involvement. Kane’s first interview was with William Jones, who was one of his vice principles. He played an important role to save the school from blowing apart in the preceding year. Kane felt the potential in Jones and gave importance to Jones’s thoughts in security issues. Kane’s approach made Jones to rethink his possible move to another nearby school’s director of counseling position. Kane thought Jones would be a good asset for the school. Kane was faster to analyze that the door problem was a big issue, unlike Parker. Kane also showed decent management skills when several teachers were circulating a letter requesting Wilkin’s removal as a housemaster. He had believed that Wilkins had a good reputation for supporting academic standards and working tirelessly with new teachers. Kane did show good management skills when his meeting with Francis Harvey. During the meeting , Harvey let Kane know that, he would write a letter to the regional accreditation council telling them how standards had sunk at Marshall. Kane was aware of bad accreditation review of Marshall’s from the previous year and he managed this situation effectively by persuading Harvey in order to change his decision. He didn’t afraid the hard work, that’s why he decided to fill both vice principal positions. Significantly, he decided to make a racial balance among the Marshall administrative group. Question 3
Analyze the inherent limitations of the alternatives available to Kane. Use the textbook material to support your analysis. Kane showed some great management skills and made good decisions upon his arrival to Marshall. However , his decisions had also have some downsides. First of all, he failed to manage diversity. There were diverse races in Marshall. Eleanor Dodd stated her concerns about this situation,’’ a confrontation between Drobna and Chase might create tensions along race lines within the school even though both Drobna and Chase were generally quite popular with students of all races.’’ Kane didn’t have a plan on managing diversity. Jones tells; differences in the race, gender, and national origin of organizational members have important implications for the values of an organization’s culture and for organizational effectiveness.(p.14). Failing to build organizational design leads unwanted problems in organizations. That is why Kane should have put this issue on his priorities. Secondly, Kane definitely failed in terms of authority. As a newly hired principal, he should have had more authority over teachers, housemasters and other administrative staff. During the Friday afternoon meeting, Chase threatened Drobna that he would break her neck. In addition to that when Harvey departed by saying that if Wilkins was transferred, then he, Harvey, would write a letter to the regional accreditation council telling them how standards had sunk at Marshall, Kane was very desperate. For both cases Kane should have been more authoritarian. Because he was the principal. He is on top of all other staff in the organization in terms of hierarchy. Considering his position in Marshall, Kane should have applied rational-legal authority. According to Jones rational-legal authority is the authority a person posseses because of his or her position in an organization(p135). Question 4
Using scholarly material from the textbook, what are your recommendations? First of all, Kane must make managerial decisions to bring control and consistency among the actions of the staff. He can reallocate staff and fire certain members and put people where their skill sets may be most effective. Jones describes the importance of reallocating staff in managing for business effectively. Firing staff who make trouble and unrest can be beneficial. Because these behaviors don’t contribute to the education. Reallocating staff will also solve the conflict between department heads and housemasters. Secondly, door issue must be solved immediately. I would assign security guards for all the doors of the school. Additionally, instead of locking each houses doors what is suggested in the article, I would provide additional security guards to the each entrance. This will provide trust for parents and student as well as prospective students. Kane should also measure organizational effectiveness. Due to his findings he can clearly communicate expectations with staff weekly, strictly define and assign duties(p16). In my point of view, the biggest innovation Kane can do is to eliminate the house system. Schools are good for education as well as building social relationships. By eliminating house system, there will be more connection between students and teachers. Students can find more options for their education and less division between students can decrease conflicts. This approach can be a good example for organizational change. According to Jones, changing and redesigning organizations can improve their effectiveness. When we look at targets of change in the textbook, there are three steps. First one is human resources. Human resources are an organization’s most important asset says Jones. Due to our information, Marshall doesn't have a human resources department. Creating one should be Kane’s first priority. Functional resources is the second step. Alterations in functional structure can help provide a setting in which people are motivated to perform. At the organizational level, an organization has to provide the context that allows it to translate its core competences into value for its stakeholders which is the third step.(p.275) Lastly, I would suggest to manage diversity at Marshall. Jones tells, many companies have helped their workers to manage diversity by providing support for advanced education and training. There is a strong need for training in Marshall. Teachers and other staff have to take a training on managing diversity.