Platoon

Topic – Formal and Informal leadership.
Movie Title - Platoon

Movie Summary - This is a scene from a 1986 movie 'Platoon'. The movie is about a young recruit during the vietnam war who faces a moral crises when he is confronted with the horrors of wars. The movie shows the various phases that Chris Talyor the young recruit played by Charlie Sheen passes through when the effects of combat take a toll on him. Lt. Walfe played by Mark Moses is the formal leader of the platoon who has weak leadership qualities and hence his role is taken over by Sgt. Barnes played by Tom Berenger who displays strong leadership qualities but is undergoing a psychological meltdown. The team completely disregard Lt. Walfe although he is their formal leader and take instruction from Sgt. Barnes when the are getting deployed in the field.

Concepts - In organizations, we have both formal and informal leader. A formal leader is given formal authority by the company by title or the position held by the individual. This can be a teacher in a classroom or the father or mother in a household. Whereas Informal leaders have no formal authority but adopt the role and is supported by the others in the group or team because of their experience or respect they have earned. Informal leaders can be best leader in a team given that he was chosen sometimes by the group naturally to lead them. The above clip shows how a informal leader makes the decision and the team looks up to him to play that role while the real leader is side lined.

The Office - Business Ethics

Topic - Business Ethics
TV show - The Office, Season 5, Episode 3 "Business Ethics"

Scene Summary - Holly, the HR rep, is conducting an ethics seminar. Michael promises the entire office they can reveal anything they want. They have immunity. The confessions include: stealing company time, downloading pirated music, and finally the trouble comes in with Meredith. She admits to sleeping with a client in exchange for lower prices on supplies and Outback steakhouse coupons. Holly, considers the charges serious. But Michael brushes it off.


Concepts - Managers and employees face a mired of decisions daily that involve ethics. It can extend to something big like forging accounting numbers to simply taking one too many office supplies home.

Many companies have corporate business ethic guidelines that are clear and communicated to all employees. However, something goes wrong, and they ignore the guidelines and conduct business the way they think they should without regard for the rules.

Just as people prefer to deal with others who don’t cheat, lie, or steal or other ethically challenged behaviors. This also applies to organizations who conduct businesses with other partners or to customers. Professional ethics is key because companies more likely to do business with company they trust. They know that they will not cheat lie, steal from their partners or shareholders or employees. Therefore it is vital to conduct business ethically as it affects an organization’s reputation.

Ideally, to create a culture where ethics are important, it must start at the top. Management can’t have one set of rules while the employees have another. Strong leadership is needed to ensure everyone is adhering to company guidelines on ethical behavior.

Master and Commander : The far side of the world

Topic – Leadership
Movie Title - Master and Commander

Movie Summary - This is a scene from a 2003 movie 'Master and Commander : The far side of the world'. During the Napoleonic war a British captain Jack Aubrey played by Russell Crowe pushes his ship and crew to their limits to perform extraordinarily task of pursuing a French vessel around South America. Here in this scene, Jack makes a tough decision of letting one of his sailors drown in the water during the storm to save the ship.

Concepts - In organizations, sometimes company CEO's are faced with challenging situations and have to make tough decisions to be successful. Leadership starts with making tough decisions although we may not like it. The above scene shows a good example of leadership quality.

Most people confuse between management and leadership. They are not the same. Management is a function in any business but leadership is a relationship between the leader and the people he is leading. A leader will need the ability to influence and motivate people to achieve the required goals.

Gung Ho - Cross-Cultural Communications

Japanese Board Meeting
Gung Ho at MOVIECLIPS.com

Topic - Cross-cultural Communications
Movie - Gung Ho


Movie summary - The movie shows the themes of cross-cultural communications, values, norms, work attitudes, motivations between a Japanese firm who takes over an American car factory. Foreman Hunt Stevenson (Michael Keaton) works at a Pennsylvania auto plant that has been closed for months. He goes to Japan to convince a Japanese car company, Assan Motors, to come to America and take over the plant. After some deliberation, the Japanese executives agree, but they will bring with them their Japanese work culture and attitude to run the plant.


Concepts - In this scene Hunt is trying to convince the Japanese automakers, Assan Motors Company, to come and invest in the American plant. However, Hunt completely misses the mark on a presentation to his Japanese counterparts. He asks if they speak English. He also includes pictures and makes inappropriate jokes during the presentation. His humor is lost on the Japanese executives. For the Japanese, it creates an informal atmosphere where Hunt should have been more respectful. Hunt exhibits a lack of cultural awareness in regards to Japanese culture and Japanese work environment. He brings with him his causal presenting style that does not mesh with more formal board room.

The world is now more globally connected than ever before. Even an American company will conduct businesses across cultural borders. Or companies may employ a diverse workforce that include employees from different countries who have to work together. When communicating between cultures, we encounter problems between culture that includes differences in perception, attitudes, and values. Therefore, cross-cultural communications is an important to establish common ground and reducing personal conflicts.

Glengarry Glen Ross

Topic – Motivation
Movie Title- Glengarry Glen Ross

Movie Summary - This is a scene from a 1992 movie 'Glengarry Glen Ross'. Blake played by Alec Baldwin is sent by the corporate office to motivate the real estate salesmen to win in a competition where the third prize and below are fired. The team of salesmen turn on each other and themselves while scrambling to keeps their jobs. This indirectly pushes an employees to commit robbery.

Concepts - In this clip we can see that Blake played by Alec Baldwin motivates his employees by verbal abuse and threat about lose of job. Teams can be motivated both by positive and negative means. Both types of motivation can drive teams to achieve the intended target or goal. Motivating teams by threat has been used since ages. Alexander used force or threat of life to motivate his army march along with him on his conquests. Threats can result in desired effect for the company but the down turn is that it results in high dis-satisfaction and turn over rates.

Newsies - The World Will Know

Topic – Informal Power through Organizing
Movie Title- Newsies

Movie Summary- The movie takes place in 1899 in New York city. It details the journey of the exploited, poor child newspaper sellers, known as newsies. When Joseph Pulitzer and William Randolph Hearst raise the distribution price one-tenth of a cent per paper the newsies organize a strike. With David as the brains of the new union, and Jack as the voice, the weak and oppressed found the strength to band together and challenge the powerful.

Concepts - This clip shows the formation of the “union.” It illustrates how a group of kids, with no formal power come together and lay out plans getting their demands heard and met. It shows the communication of the initial goal, as well as how the group plans to achieve their objectives. The “brains” of the operation feeds the message to the “voice” of the group who then interprets it and puts it in language that is commonly understood by the group. It illustrates how these two different roles within the group, brains and voice, work together to communicate to the larger group. With David being a newcomer to the newsies population he is not fully trusted yet, and doesn’t speak the same language, which is more slang in nature, as the rest of the group. Jack doesn’t have the knowledge to lead the movement, but he is considered the informal leader of the group. By working together they create a synergistic relationship in which they can accomplish their goal of forming a union to stand against the newspaper publishers. The clip ends with the entire large group of newsies being unified in their stand against Pulitzer and Hearst and declaring their goal of letting the world know they will not be taken advantage of.