Discuss about the Organisational Change Management for Management Studies.
The case reflects on a decision undertaken by an Australian University for merging three departments viz. Economics, Accounting Finance and also Management Studies for forming a separate Business School. The setting up of the Business School was carried out by the Australian University for covering up the annual deficit of the university. The annual deficit that was quite low during the formation of the Business School is currently recorded at around $200k. The economics department’s current deficit amount is recorded at $750k. The growing deficit amount of the Economics Department is observed to account for specific reasons like the staffs bearing an unrealistic opinion about their own that affects the incorporation of new and effective teaching methods. Further, maximum of the experienced and effective staffs operating in the Economics Department are observed to be effectively promoted to higher grades in the Australian University thereby making the stated department suffer from shortage of trained and potential staffs. Only six members of average age 58 years are observed to be the long-serving category staffs but are evaluated to be unproductive in nature. All the above factors thus potentially contribute in making the Economics Department as the source of the annual deficit faced by the University.
The teaching practices continued at the Economics Department were carried out by the staffs in a committed fashion. However, the staffs declined to follow the formal review and quality assurance practices carried out by the University authorities and rather focused on adhering to their informal practices regarding management and student affairs. The staffs of the Economics Department restrained from meeting the standards by the University’s quality assurance department in that they viewed the practices to be bureaucratic in nature. Adherence made by the Economics Department to non-standardised and informal practices contributed in generation of low scores by the University Review Team regarding the aspect of student support and quality teaching. The gaining of low scores by the Economics Department also affected the situation of the other two departments like Accounting and Finance and also Management Studies.
The staffs belonging to the Accounting and Finance Department though tend to reflect increased morale and commitment in generating quality teaching services yet they fail to work in an integrated fashion with other staffs operating across other departments of the Business School. The same tends to limit their scope of performance within the Business School. The Accounting and Finance Department compared to the Economics Department tends to reflect a culture for carrying out essential research in the respective field. The staffs of the Accounting and Finance Department reflect increased commitment on conducting research activities rather than focusing on rendering of teaching services.
At the very outset, the Management Studies Department reflect a shortage of manpower resources such that where the academic staffs record a growth from 13 to 16 the number of students on the contrary reflect increased growth from 265 to 318. The mismatch recorded between the levels of supply of management teachers compared to the increased flow of students in the Management Unit tends to generate increased pressure on the academic staffs operating in the stated department. The staffs operating in the Management Department increasingly complain of lack of needed motivation and encouragement from their Department Heads. The staffs of the Management Department further complain that revenues generated by the teaching services provided by them are generally used by the business school authorities for recruiting new appointees associated with the Accounts and Finance Department and also in meeting the deficit generated by the Economics Department. The above facts tend to significantly affect the morale of the staffs and thus cause a decline in the performance and productivity parameters. The Management Department of the Business School though reflects existence of effective teaching and research potentials yet the same tends to suffer from the problem associated with retention of quality researchers for lack of potential financial opportunities. The Management Department observes that owing to the lack of quality teaching staffs in the Management domain it would not be possible to transfer the teaching staffs from the teaching to the research wing of the business school.
The study of the Business School case reflects on potential issues faced by the B-School as a whole and also the three main departments like Economics, Accounting and Finance and also the Management Studies constituting the B-School.
The Business School as a whole reflect the problem associated with increased deficits that rose from a nominal amount from the period of its inception to $200k during the current period. The Economics Department of the Business School is identified as the potential contributor to the increased deficit amount of the management institution. Further, the B-School also reflects other holistic issues like the failure of the different departments in generating cost-effective innovation strategies for enhancing the quality of the teaching provided by them. Further, the academic staffs associated with the different departments in the B-School increasingly complain that owing to the lack of effective support staffs they are required to be potentially involved with activities concerning admissions, examination, setting of timetables and also with other types of administrative activities. The lack of potential integration among the different departments and units in the B-School requires the individual units to focus on the development of internal administrative offices that would cater to the admission and other official requirements. Further, the lack of integration between the different departments affects and limits the scope of development of educational programs related to the amalgamation of two units like Economics with Management, Management with Accounting and Finance and also Economics with Accounting and Finance. The lack of existence of the above programs thus fails to attract considerable number of students to the B-School. It thereby affects the potential of the B-School to earn needed revenue and develop an effective presence in the educational industry.
The Economics Department of the Business School is identified with gross issues like lack of experienced, committed and productive staffs and also the adherence to their traditional informal approaches associated regarding management of student and teaching affairs. The lack of needed support and conducts from the Economics Department staffs for getting effectively prepared to be reviewed by the Quality Assurance Team of the University happened to generate low scores both for the Economics Department and also for the B-School as a whole. The low quality management scores associated with teaching review and student support also affected the position of the other two departments like Accounting and Finance and also the Management Studies.
The Accounting and Finance Department of the B-School reflect potential issues associated with the lack of effective integration with the other departments like Economics and Management Studies. The failure of the accounting and finance staffs in carrying out effective integration with the other departments tends to affect their productivity and potential in generation of effective teaching guidance and support to the students.
The Management Department of the Business School reflects potential issues associated with the lack of needed morale owing to lack of effective recognition by the B-School authorities regarding the teaching activities generated by them to the students. The staffs also complain of another issue where the revenue generated by the teaching services provided by them is mainly used in meeting the deficits incurred by the Economics Department. Further, the Management staffs also reflect of another potential issue associated with potential mismatch related to the limited number of teaching staffs compared to the growing number of students on an annual basis. The lack of the number of effective teaching staffs in the Management Department of the Business School is also observed to significantly reduce the chances and interest of the academic staffs in pursuing research in the management field. The above issue thereby significantly affects the productivity and performance of the staffs.
The lack of quality and potential teachers in the different academic departments like Economics, Accounting and Finance and also Management is identified as a potential problem in that it affects the reputation of the B-School in the greater market and thus reduces the scope for gaining of quality students (Rolstadas, 2012). Similarly, the lack of effective regulatory mechanisms for reviewing the quality and performance of teaching staffs and also support mechanisms in place tends to contribute in retaining and enhancing the fear of the academic staffs regarding rigid guidelines of the universities (Hessle, 2016). The existence of proper quality guidelines and conducts would help in enhancing the productivity of the teaching and support mechanisms (Cardy & Leonard, 2014).
Different types of alternative solutions can be undertaken by the B-School for attracting of potential students from the market. The management of the B-School needs to effectively focus on the integration of the three different departments like Economics, Accounting and Finance and also Management such that it would help in the development of a common support unit catering for admission and exam related activities (Rolstadas, 2012). The generation of the same would not only help in reducing the need for academic staffs to be involved in administrative activities but also in reducing the cost of the institution relating to the appointment of administrative staffs (Momba, 2014). The management needs to focus on the development of effective codes of conduct and administrative policies that would require the staffs of the accounting and finance department to honour and follow the university directives associated with the evaluation of the quality review of the teaching and student support programs (Cardy & Leonard, 2014). The development of an integrated framework would potentially assist the B-School authorities for involving the staffs of the different departments for generation of the right kind of policy framework to generate review mechanisms as required by the University (Rao, 2016). Gaining of higher scores related to the quality review would effectively help the B-School as a whole for gaining educational grants and funds. The management of the B-School is also required to focus on the enhancement of academic staffs through appointment of new and effective staffs along the three main departments (Pulakos, 2009). The inclusion of new and effective academic staffs would contribute in enhancing the educational productivity of the institution. Further, the B-School management is also required to effectively focus on the development of a novice program including all three or any two of the different departments. The new academic program visualised needs to be effectively implemented and promoted through the use of multichannel marketing and promotional channels both traditional and digital in nature. The same would help the B-School in promoting and marketing its presence in the management educational market (Chew, 2012 ).
Out of the different solutions enlisted above the management of the B-School is needed to give increased priority to the aspect of integrating the different departments and functional units (Marr & Gray, 2012). The same would not only contribute in generation of a new academic program reflecting increased social and business value but also in reducing the cost of the educational institution relating to the requirement of appointment of new academic staffs (Osman, 2013)..
The above recommendation can be potentially implemented by the Business School through development of formal training programs such that the same would help in enhancement of the cross-functional potential of the different staffs (Mone & London, 2014). Training programs are required to be developed for helping the academic staffs related to the Economics Department to gain working knowledge of management subjects associated to marketing and human resources and also accounting and finance while for the Accounts and Finance Department Staffs to be acquainted with the aspects of Financial Management (Marr & Gray, 2012). Development of ‘Train the Teacher’ program would ideally contribute in generation of effective modules to enhance the cross-functional know-how of the academic staffs (Ashdown, 2014).
References
Ashdown, L., 2014. Performance Management. United States : Kogan Page Publishers.
Cardy, R. & Leonard, B., 2014. Performance Management: Concepts, Skills and Exercises. New York : Routledge.
Chew, E.K., 2012. Knowledge Driven Service Innovation and Management: IT Strategies for Business Alignment and Value Creation: IT Strategies for Business Alignment and Value Creation. United Kingdom : IGI Global.
Hessle, S., 2016. Human Rights and Social Equality: Challenges for Social Work: Social Work-Social Development, Volume 1. New York : Routledge.
Marr, B. & Gray, D., 2012. Strategic Performance Management. New York : Routledge.
Momba, J., 2014. Zambia Social Science Journal Vol. 3, No. 1 (April 2012). United Kingdom : Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Mone, E.M. & London, M., 2014. Employee Engagement Through Effective Performance Management: A Practical Guide for Managers. New York : Routledge.
Osman, I.H., 2013. Handbook of Research on Strategic Performance Management and Measurement Using Data Envelopment Analysis. United Kingdom : IGI Global.
Pulakos, E.D., 2009. Performance Management: A New Approach for Driving Business Results. United Kingdom : John Wiley and Sons.
Rao, T.V., 2016. Performance Management: Toward Organizational Excellence. New Delhi: SAGE Publications India.
Rolstadas, A., 2012. Performance Management: A business process benchmarking approach. United Kingdom : Springer Science & Business Media.
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