Bridesmaid - Problem solving

Topic: Problem solving

Movie title: Bridesmaid

Movie summary - The movie is about a competition between the maid of honor and a bridesmaid, over who is the bride's best friend, threatens to upend the life of an out-of-work pastry chef. The plot centers on Annie (Wiig). Annie has hit a rough patch but finds her life turned completely upside down when she takes on the Maid of Honor role in her best friend Lillian’s (Maya Rudolph) wedding. In way over her head but determined to succeed, Annie leads a hilarious hodgepodge of bridesmaids (Rose Byrne, Melissa McCarthy, Wendi McLendon-Covey and Ellie Kemper) on a wild ride down the road to the big event.

Concepts - In Bridesmaids, in order to prove the ‘number one’ friend of the bride the girls were constantly at each other. Within minutes of meeting each other, Annie and Helen are already vying. After that the movie is a continuing reel of them hurting each other in order to get ahead.  Because of this fight, Annie sees her life turns upside down and her battle with Helen almost screws up the wedding. This situation is very similar to the business atmosphere where a person in a team trying to show their bester performance over other person. This fight has bad effect on the team’s productivity. Not just simple as in the movie, when one of the bridesmaids tells Annie “You are your problem. You are also your solution." To solve this conflict, a team should apply the problem solving process which requires the critical thinking and problem solving skills. The problem solving skills are: Making judgment, analytical skill, decision making, collecting information, and planning. Out of those skills, apply for human, analytical skill is the most important as the more people communicate; the better they get to know each other.

Kung Fu Panda 2 - Managing individual stress

Topic: Managing individual stress

Movie title: Kung Fu Panda 2

Movie summary - Po the Panda is now living his dream as The Dragon Warrior, protecting the Valley of Peace alongside his friends and fellow kung fu masters, The Furious Five. But Po's new life of awesomeness is threatened by the emergence of a formidable villain, who plans to use a secret, unstoppable weapon to conquer China and destroy kung fu. He must look to his past and uncover the secrets of his mysterious origins; only then will Po be able to unlock the strength he needs to succeed

Concepts - Po's martial arts master informs him that the time has come for the next phase of training: mastering inner peace. However, in order to reach that level, Po has to overcome his own stress about his family memories, which has bad effect on his attitude toward the fight with the Peacock. Since he fights alongside the Furious Five his crisis time, he needs to manage his own stress in order not to affect the team’s duty. As Po is a hardy person, he has the sense of commitment, he can respond to difficulty as a challenge and an opportunity, and finally he has sense of control over one’s life. That’s why the fortune teller believes that he will be the one who beats the Peacock up. However, his problem is somehow conflict with his duty that he needs to face his own problem before he can handle his mission. This is just like work and family stress on employee, which can create the depression on employee. In the movie, Po experience both emotional effects (anger, anxiety, lowered self-esteem) and behavioral effects (poor performance, absenteeism).

Apply to organization behavior, when an individual got stress, he/she can manage it by: planning ahead and practicing good time management, having good personal health management practice, maintaining a positive perspective, balancing work life and personal life, and learning a relaxation technique. Besides, as employee working in a team, their stress can have bad effect on the team’s performance; team should understand and help them to manage it better. 

Suits - Power

Topic - Power
TV Show - Suits, Season 1 Episode 8 "Identity Crisis"

Scene Summary - Suits is a show about corporate lawyers in New York. The show centers on Harvey Specter and his protégé, Mike Ross. In this scene, Louis, a junior partner in the firm, is trying to get in to see Harvey. However, he is stopped by Harvey’s assistant, Donna.

Concepts - Managers can amass several types of power in an organization. They use their power to get things done. Organizational bases of power include legitimate, reward, coercive, information, referent, and expert power (Champoux 332).

In this case, Louis is a junior partner in the law firm, and Donna is only an assistant. By being a junior partner in a prestigious law firm, Louis is able to exert legitimate power and influence over Donna. Louis also tried to use coercive power by describing himself in the firm’s food chain as a “humpback whale” while Donna is just lowly “phytoplankton.” He also uses reward power by trying to bribe her.

However, despite Louis’s power, Donna is able to counter it by her location in the communication network (Champoux 335). Although Donna is only an assistant in title, she works for Harvey, who is a senior partner in the firm. Therefore, she can also command great power in her own right. She controls Harvey’s schedule and also acts as a gatekeeper for those wishing to see Harvey. Additionally, she has information power. She knows something about Louis that will get him into trouble with Harvey. We also pick up shades of Donna’s personality in this brief clip that is part of her power. Power can also come from personal attributes (Champoux 332). She is resourceful enough to be able to get this information and use it as leverage. She is not intimidated by Louis, even though he is a junior partner in the firm.

In an organization, it’s always mindful to pay attention to those who may, on the surface, not command great notice but who hold great power because of their position. Assistants is one of those jobs.

Office Space - Motivation Problems

Motivation Problems
Office Space at MOVIECLIPS.com

Topic - Motivation
Movie - Office Space


Movie Summary - Office Space, at its core, is about employees who hate their jobs. Peter Gibbons is one such employee. He works at Initech, a technology company. The company wants to downsize, so they hire two consultants. In this scene he is asked by the consultants, whose job it is to figure out how to cut costs in the company, what Gibbons does every day.

Concepts - Gibbons displays a poor attitude toward working at this company. He tells them it’s a problem of motivation. He spends the majority of his time spaced out and working just enough not to get fired.

There are other companies out there just like Initech, who have employees who feel the same way Gibbons does about his job. It’s very important for companies to be mindful of their employee’s motivation and job satisfaction to get the most out of their effort. One way to do this is by looking at “job design.” (Champoux 182). Either redesigning their job or by tweaking their job responsibilities, can increase motivation and work effort. Another strategy would be to introduce incentives and increase recognition (Thompson 49-50.) The consults does suggest to him, what about if the company offers you some stock options or equity share. Gibbons is non committal but doesn’t rule it out.

Gibbons complains to the consults that he has 8 different bosses. When he makes a mistake, he has to answer to 8 different people, thus lowering his morale. One solution is by streamlining the management hierarchy. Employees should hear from their boss regularly and not only when they make a mistake ( Thompson 50). Feedback is good for employees, but there is such a thing as too much feedback and not constructive feedback. Another fix to increasing his morale is instituting positive recognition, which can range from simply giving out stationery or merchandise for a specific task, to cash rewards or celebrating successes by having party or going out to dinner (Thompson 50). This a simple task that can result in increase morale as well as increase socialization and commitment to the organization.

Moneyball

Topic – Negotiation
Movie Title - Moneyball

Movie Summary - This movie is a true story based on the Oakland's A's general manager Billy Beane's successful attempt to put together a baseball club on a budget by hiring baseball players based on the input from the computer generated analysis. This movie is less about sports and more about corporate wrangling and intrigue. Bill Beane is played by Brad Pitt has to run and manage his expenditure on a shoe string budget. He plans on recruiting players based on the statistical data and place a value on them. He has to hire, fire, lie and negotiate to get the players he needs.

Concepts - Negotiations is a part of everyday life. Negotiation is a dialogue between two or more people or parties to reach an understanding or resolve a conflict. The main aim of negotiation is to reach a compromise between the parties. Manipulating others to get what you or your party wants is not negotiation. An ethical negotiator does not use the shortcuts or ploys but instead uses a methodical or professional approach to negotiate and reach an understanding. Their are different approaches to negotiations. But they all agree that the individual needs to plan his/her strategy in advance as to what they want, what they think they will get etc. Due to rapid globalization negotiation in forms of teams is widely being used.

The Informant

Topic – Organization Culture
Movie Title - The Informant

Movie Summary - This movie deals with the greed within Corporations. This is a true story of Mark Whitacre played by Matt Damon who works for a lysine developing company who after working for many years is now the vice president in the company. He learns about the price fixing going on in the company and decides to become a spy for the FBI. The U.S. government decides to go after the agri-business giant with a price-fixing accusation, based on the evidence submitted by Mark. But as his incessant lies keep piling up, his world begins to crash around him.

Concepts - Organizational culture is a set of shared assumptions within an organization that guide interpretation and action by defining what is an appropriate behavior for various situations. A strong culture is said to exist in an organization when people in the organization are aligned with the organizational values and a weak culture is said to exist when the employees are not aligned with organization culture or values. Having a strong culture can sometimes be detrimental to the company if the employees are doing the wrong thing and they think it is right as per the company organization culture. Strong culture sometimes leads to 'Groupthink' where employees begin to think in a similar way for the sake of unanimity and do not look at alternative solutions. Apple, Mary Kay are some of the companies with strong organization cultures. In this movie clip 'The Informant', the organization culture prevalent in that particular agro company was greed and the employees would strive to do anything to make money for the company and themselves and hence lead to price fixing.

Legally Blonde: Red, White, and Blonde - Personality and Perception

Capitol Barbie
Legally Blonde 2: Red, White & Blonde at MOVIECLIPS.com

Topic - Personality and Perception
Movie - Legally Blonde: Red, White, and Blonde


Movie Summary - Elle Woods goes to Washington to get a ban on animal testing bill passed in honor of her pet dog. At Washington, she works for the office of Congresswomen Victoria Rudd. There she must learn to overcome people’s misconceptions about her and learn to navigate the politics of Washington.

Concepts - Grace is reading Elle Woods profile to the other staff members. In that profile, Elle is describe as “one of the leading political minds of our time.” When Elle Woods does actually walk into the office, the rest of the staff are shocked to find that this is the same person as the description. Elle come in wearing an all pink outfit, which shocks the other members of the office. They are dismissive of her appearance, and they mistake her for an intern. All the other members wear dark or black colors. Grace, Congresswomen Rudd’s chief of staff, Grace also dismisses her intelligence by telling her slowly where the interns orientation is.

Grace and the other office staff have biases and stereotypes. They stereotype Elle Woods as a dumb blonde Barbie and calling her Capitol Barbie. Grace mocks her, calling her an intern and telling her where to go. Not only does her appearance shock the staff. Her personality also stands out. Elle Woods is a type A personality. However, the atmosphere at Washington is more serious, subdued. And Elle stands out there.

Personality has great effect on team group dynamics. It affects everything from the way each person communicates to how they go about their work. In designing teams, acknowledging each person’s personality similarities and differences can help get the best out of the team and can help forge team synergy. Each person can bring something unique to contribute.

Congresswomen Rudd says of her staff, “this is one of the most collaborative bunch on the Hill.” This is important because Elle and the rest of the staff have to learn to overcome their own perceptions and personality differences to work together on the bill. Although Elle is unconventional by Washington standards, she is actually smart and capable of the task. She just does things a little different, but her methods are effective. It takes a while for the team to see that, but they eventually give her respect.