Nissans Need for Leadership and Change

Nissans Need for Leadership and Change Case Summary The case point of departure is Nissans troubled financial position and loss of credentials in 1999. As a Japanese company Nissan had built impressive manufacturing platform for its 43 car models. However due to poor business decisions in the past the company profitability suffered, hence the need for a new leadership. Carlos Ghosn stepped in at 1999 promising to turn the company around in two years. The case describes the challenges that he dealt with in restructuring the company, building trust trough transparency in operations and promoting new type of leadership styles at Nissan. There are internal and external factors that affected the Nissan performance prior to Carlos Ghosn arrival as COO. The internal factors refer to the current management style that focused on short-term performance and technology development and neglected the customer satisfaction and service. The management showed ignorance to designer trends and customer preferences, which had weaken the Nissan brand image. The external factors refer to the devaluation of the yen in relation to the US$. The economic conditions were not in a favor for Nissan as the government support to the industry seemed to evaporate. The rating agencies: Moody and Standard Poor threaten to lower the Nissan investment rating from investment grade to junk if Nissan did not acquire support from another car company. The exam requirement is about evaluating the Carlos Ghosn approach in turning Nissan around in relation to the following aspects: 4 Question 1 Resistance to change Was resistance inevitable? What were the underlying causes of the resistance? With Carlos Ghosn becoming the new COO the managers and the employees probably had mixed fillings about what his intentions were in relation to their job security. Known as the Le Cost Killer Ghosn did not hesitate to challenge the current organizational culture and internal processes. The core of the resistance at Nissan was the COO Brazilian ethnicity with Lebanese heritage and cultural differences of approaching the problems. It is well known that the Japanese management culture is masculine with large power distance and obedience to the higher ups (Hofstede). Ghosn had shown a proactive management style at Renault by improving cost-efficiencies and due to the good management record previously, he was headhunted and become a COO of Nissan. It is logical to assume that the new COO should be someone who knows the local culture and customs, but in this case Ghosn was probably aware of the fact that despite of his shortage of knowledge about it, he had an advantage to have worked on four continents and overcome cultural differences. Previously in 1991 Nissan had been successful by producing good quality cars, but the company distanced itself from the customers needs of stylish, innovative cars. The company stall and later the disruptive management style which was short-term market share oriented, instead of long-term profitability oriented, contributed to the Nissan need of strategic change. The keiretsu investments in suppliers equity and real-estate had created a false security net. The keiretsu tradition is wide spread in Japan and in that sense Nissans managers believed that the investments equal to loyalty and cooperation within the suppliers family. It could be assumed that despite the higher purchasing costs the Nissan managers did not terminate the unprofitable relationships due to vertically-integrated long-term interdependencies. The managers involved in the negotiations and decision making probably had been afraid of losing their jobs and status quo if the plant closes down and discontinue the supplie rs relationship. In order to overcome the challenges Ghosn implemented the Nissan Revival Plan. In the plan he set strategic targets to be reached by 2001. His plan was to reduce cost by closing down unprofitable plants, terminating keiretsu agreements, developing new cars and improving the Nissan image. One of the reasons why Ghosn was careful about the Japanese culture was the agreement that Hanawa made with Renault before the strategic alliance took place. The agreement stated clearly that the new COO has to stay sensitive and in respect to the Japanese culture. Without the cross-functional teams the resistance of implementing the change would have been too strong for Ghosn to execute its plan. The CFTs were members of key business operations and with their sub-teams they reported back to the supervisors. Ghosn put and emphasis on accountability and responsibility by eliminating positions that did not have direct influence on the company performance. The resistance was inevitable due to Ghosn mana gement style, however in the process of restructuring he managed to convince the managers that the new strategic approach of decentralization will benefit Nissan, respectively the employees on the long run. Question 2 Organizational culture In your opinion how did different parts of the Nissan organization feel about Ghosn and why? Was Ghosn successful in enlisting their support? The paradigm of the delayed decision-making process and the informal meetings in order to achieve consensus as well as aligning the decision making process must have caused tensions with the Ghosn arrival. However when he assembled the CFTs, he restructured the organization by flattening the decision making process. Within the organizational restructuring Ghosn implemented the matrix structure, which required change in the leadership styles within Nissan, as well as change in the working process. Five factories were closed and 21,000 jobs within management, manufacturing and dealer net were reduced in the process. As a gaijin Ghosn had to prove to the media, the investors and the stakeholders that his NRP requires the Nissan employees full cooperation and trust. The performance based incentive 6 system in terms of cash and stock options was unknown in the Japanese culture before. Also the seniority reward system had been removed and replaced with KPI (key performance indicators). This caused insecurity within the workers and lack of cooperation, especially among the older managers who probably had expected their rightful rewards. There must have been strong resistance within the different parts of the organization due to Ghosn carrot and the stick way to put things in perspective. By dissolving unprofitable production and demanding responsibility from the managers he showed determination and also concern about the Nissan organizational culture. In the process he enlisted the organizational parts on his side by letting the managers to be involved in the restructuring as well. Ghosn successfully executed the NRP as the case describes, Nissan had the best financial performance in history. He also managed to reduce the purchasing costs by 20%, the supplier base and the keiretsu influence. Question 3 National culture How pronounced have cultural differences been between Ghosn and the organization? Was culture a helper or hinder for Ghosn? As described in the text under Addressing national cultural issues career advancement can only be achieved by Nennkou Jyoretu, where the senior manager had the power, and the responsibility of the decision-making. Although the managers had control over the operations, the team-members were hindered of contributing in the decision-making, hence the slow development process. The fear of loosing face and failure disrupted the value chain at Nissan and when Ghosn came on board, he had to make some restructuring changes and to adjust the power distance. Japan is known for high employment security country and employees take pride in their work. However, Ghosn faced a challenge discovering that every team believed that their department is not responsible for Nissan problems and therefore unaware of the fact that the company is close to bankruptcy. The formal and informal decision making was not efficient at Nissan as the managers did not follow-up on their orders. There was too much focus on the functional structure and cost per unit. 7 Instead the managers should have focused on the customer satisfaction and meeting the investors demands for improving the earnings and the stock value. Ghosn listed five urgent problems that Nissan was facing and despite the cultural differences he believed that diversity was a strength rather than weakness. He communicated the 3 managerial principals to the employees: transparency, execution and communication. With his open management style he turned down barriers of power and empowered the middle management by establishing the cross-functional teams. Despite the major cultural differences between Ghosn and the organization it worked well in the end due to Ghosn leadership skills of letting the employees to contribute to the changes by involving them in the decision management the initiation process and the implementation phase. Question 4 Luck and timing Would Ghosn and his cross-functional team been able to make the same changes a few years earlier? There are some pros and cons in answering this question. As mentioned in the text the government practice of bailing out troubled companies did not appear in the case of the bankrupt financial house Yamaichi. This event played a psychological role for the Nissan employees and Ghosn used it cleverly to steer his new strategy. Carlos Ghosn has a background as VP at Renault. The management skills and resources acquired at Renault most evidently helped him to execute the strategy changes at Nissan. This raises the question whether he could be capable to execute such a management Excellency at Nissan without the management experience at Renault, probably not. A few years earlier Ghosn would not have had the support from Hanawa. The cross-functional teams worked well due to the internal and external economic conditions. They were with the sole purpose to drive change and transform Nissan from a consensus culture, where those with different opinion did not have to chance 8 to pledge their point of view to a consensus culture with roots to the western organizational culture style. In 1999 Nissan had probably reached the lowest point in financial performance and brand equity. Few years earlier the situation was bad, but not worse in the financial sense. 9 Additional question Other aspects of the evaluation Renault Nissan alliance The CEO Hanawa gained an alliance with Renault who took 36,8% equity stake in Nissan. Hanawa negotiated agreement as follows: Nissan retains its own name The Nissan CEO would continue to be selected by Nissan board of directors Nissan would take the principal responsibility to implement the revival plan Benefits Economy of scale New markets Shared distribution Sharing technology and know-how Developing new technology based on the shared experience Being able to react timely to the market needs Benefits for the both companies By selecting the most committed suppliers, the number of the suppliers can be reduced, hence gaining advantage of controlling the suppliers for price negotiation Sharing the same platform in production To secure smooth transition in the alliance Cooperation comity secured the implementation of the decisions taken during the transition period The managers acted upon the transition decisions, become better to give feedback and follow through New ideas of synergies merged in the aftermath

Mother Tongue-Based Multi-Lingual Education in Philippine Schools Essay

Scenario: A Waray-speaking couple from Samar decided to relocate in Cebu for job opportunities. Tagging along with them is their first-grader girl. Deficient of finances, they decided to enroll the kid in a public school. It so happened that the Philippine Department of Education (DepEd) has introduced the Mother Tongue-Based Multi-Lingual Education (MTB-MLE) program. This is a program that uses your mother tongue (language at home) as a medium of instruction inside the classroom. Will the girl be given special attention knowing that she speaks Waray and be separated from the rest of her Cebuano-speaking classmates? If the language at home will be the medium of instruction from Kinder to Grade 3, how will this affect a multi-language group? According to DepEd, 12 major Philippine languages will be introduced beginning this school year 2012-2013 to improve literacy and instruction: Tagalog, Kapampangan, Pangasinense, Iloko, Bikol, Cebuano, Hiligaynon, Waray, Tausug, Maguindanaoan, Maranao, and Chabacano. The objectives of the program include: l. anguage development which establishes a strong education for success in school and for lifelong learning; 2. cognitive development which focuses on Higher Order Thinking Skills competencies in each of the learning areas; and 3. academic development which prepares the learner to acquire mastery of language and culture. 4. socio-cultural awareness which enhances the pride of the learner’s heritage. The program hopes that by using the mother tongue (first language or L1) as a medium of instruction inside the classroom in the early grades, it will hasten the basic communication skills of the students. When students develop fluency in speaking, reading and writing in the first language, the L1 can then be utilized as a bridge or transitional to learning the second (L2) and third (L3) languages (e. g. Filipino and English). The introduction of languages in this method will give students confidence in learning academic concepts. From DepEd Order No. 74, 3c: â€Å"In terms of cognitive development, and its effects in other academic areas, pupils taught to read and write in their first language acquire [educational] competencies more quickly. † Director Yolanda Quijano of DepEd’s Bureau of Elementary Education stressed in a press release, â€Å"[These] studies proved that learners who begin in their first language have more efficient cognitive development and are better prepared for more cognitively demanding subject matter. In other words, a learner tends to be smarter if he starts his education using the mother tongue. † How will DepEd implement the program? Below, I tabulated a progression plan for teaching and using the three languages (mother-tongue, English, Filipino) based on how I understood the program. Basically, the program starts with pupils learning their lessons through the use of their mother-tongue — first orally and then in written form. It finishes with kids being fluent in (or at least learning fast) English and Filipino when they finish grade 6. Will this kind of plan succeed? I believe so, if planned properly. Even UNESCO endorses the use of Mother Tongue Multilingual Education and highlights the important features of the process: 1.  Education begins with what the learners already know, building on the language and culture, knowledge and experience that they bring with them when they start school; 2. Learners gradually gain confidence in using the new (official) language, before it becomes the only language for teaching academic subjects; and 3. Learners achieve grade level competence in each subject because teachers use their home language, along with the official school language, to help them understand the academic concepts. Also, MTB-MLE has long been used by other developing countries. Here are benchmark studies from UNESCO: 1. Modiano’s (1973) study in the Chiapas highlands of Mexico found that indigenous children efficiently transferred literacy skills from the L1 to the L2 and out-performed monolingual Spanish speakers. 2. The Six-Year Yoruba Medium Primary Project (Fafunwa et al. 1975; Akinnaso 1993; see Adegbiya 2003 for other references) demonstrated unequivocally that a full six-year primary education in the mother tongue with the L2 taught as a subject was not only viable but gave better results than all-English schooling. It also suggested that teachers should be allowed to specialize in L2 instruction. 3. The Rivers Readers Project, also in Nigeria, showed how mother tongue materials of reasonable quality could be developed even where resources were scarce and even for previously undeveloped languages with small numbers of speakers (Williamson, 1976). Communities themselves provided competent native speakers and funds for language development, producing over forty publications in fifteen languages. 4.  Large-scale research on Filipino-English bilingual schooling in the Philippines (Gonzalez & Sibayan, 1988) found a positive relationship between achievement in the two languages, and found that low student performance overall was not an effect of bilingual education but of other factors, especially the low quality of teacher training (see also Dutcher 1995). If the program works in other developing countries, I believe, it should also work in the Philippines. But this isn’t easy. Getting to the goal takes a lot of groundwork. Look at the figure below. For the program to achieve long-term success, DepEd must go through each and every step. It looks like DepEd has already done the necessary research and already raised awareness about the program through its Region, Division, District, and School Heads, as well as through Local Government Units (LGUs). But what about the rest of the steps? Do we have enough teaching and learning materials ready that are built specifically for a particular language? Next, have we trained enough teachers and staff to efficiently implement the program? Most importantly, do we have the funding and full support from the government to sustain this effort? Now, let me go back to the challenge I mentioned in the first paragraph. – How will the program resolve classrooms with multiple home languages spoken by pupils? – What is the solution when teachers that are available to teach do not even speak the pupils’ mother-tongue? – Should we place books and reading materials written in different home languages in each classroom? While I support mother tongue-based education, I think DepEd must spend some more time to resolve some lingering questions and prepare the materials needed to facilitate effective classroom interaction with this new approach to basic education. Success stories in Papua New Guinea (Klaus 2003), and the Rivers Readers project in Nigeria (Williamson 1985) should become inspirations for the Philippines. More time is also needed for human resource development. To remedy this situation, the case of the bilingual intercultural education in Bolivia must be looked into (refer to ETARE 1993, Albo & Anaya 2003). Are you one with the DepEd in the implementation of the Mother Tongue-Based Multi-Lingual Education (MTB-MLE) program this coming school year? Leave some comments below.

Toyota and Uber

As the competition among autonomous driving businesses is getting intense, Toyota and Uber will try to catch up by deciding to partner in developing self-driving cars. They plan to use technology from both companies into Toyota's Sienna minivans to be deployed across Uber's ride-hailing network from 2021. Together, they aim to design and produce safe autonomous vehicles for the mass market. This deal benefits both Toyota and Uber, and will still likely benefit both companies even in their individual endeavors. Their partnership profits Uber in many ways. Firstly, CEO Khrosrowshahi's strategy of Uber developing autonomous vehicles through partnerships has successfully began to progress. Secondly, it brings revival to Uber's self-driving business after a self-driving Uber SUV killed a pedestrian in Arizona back in March, which moved Uber to remove its robot cars from the road, lay off hundreds of test drives and closed its autonomous testing hub in Arizona. Lastly, Toyota's investment raised the valuation of Uber by $4 billion from the deal Uber had with Alphabet Inc. Uber totaled $891 million losses in the second quarter where the self-driving unit is a significant contributor. However, it can compensate its losses through this partnership. With combined technology, their goal of a safe autonomous vehicle is likely to happen. And with this success, profits from their self-driving business will surely compensate the losses Uber previously occurred. Toyota also profits from this agreement through its transformation to a mobility company as they help provide a path for safe and secure expansion of mobility services like ride-sharing that includes Toyota vehicles and technologies. Its statement that it would not combine its research efforts with Uber may somewhat have a negative impact on the partnership's progress in producing safe automated vehicles. But, Toyota benefits from the deal when they gain more information regarding self-driving technology as they work with Uber. Together, they make a great teamwork. Uber's autonomous driving system and Toyota's commitment to safety and its renowned manufacturing skills is surely to bring a safe self-driving car. Uber have experienced many problems in this path: they had further setbacks in development and testing due to the crash in Arizona, and also has met difficulties with regulators and politicians concerning safety. But Toyota's Guardian technology, which offers automated safety features, can cover Uber's flaws. Toyota may be less aggressive than some rivals on moving toward full-fledged autonomous driving but their investment in research and plans to begin testing self-driving cars in the future is a great move. They won't be able to survive the competitive autonomous self-driving business if they continue to focus on partial autonomous systems. This partnership is a great start for them in their journey to produce fully developed self-driving cars. Toyota's decision to not combine its research efforts is also a good move since Uber has other partnerships like their partnership with Daimler AG, and a deal with Volvo which does not have the same level of intense labor as Toyota does. This could lead to misunderstandings or conflicts of interest, so it is best that they keep some plans to themselves. Their previous partnership on a car-leasing program for Uber drivers, where Toyota invested in Uber and which Uber decided to close its U.S. leasing business, is also a factor that can affect their relationship. This could mean distrust between the companies that can badly affect their current deal. Overall, their partnership brings great opportunities to both companies. Toyota benefits from the agreement and Uber does, too. Their goal in producing the world's safest self-driving cars on the Uber network is surely to become reality if they work together in covering each other's flaws and leveraging their expertise.

Psychology And Its Effect On A Person s Actions - 784 Words

Psychology has revealed how the learning perspective is concerned with the environment and experiences leading to effects on a person’s actions. Within this perspective, behaviorists focus on the environmental rewards and punishers that maintain or discourage specific behaviors. B.F. Skinner once stated, I am sometimes asked, ‘Do you think of yourself as you think of the organisms you study?’ The answer is yes. So far as I know, my behavior at any given moment has been nothing more than the product of my genetic endowment, my personal history, and the current setting. (Skinner, 1983). In the average college classroom, behaviorism effects students’ way of learning in that their behavior is shaped by either positive or negative reinforcement. According to Peter Boghossian, in the traditional behaviorist model, learners undergo some form of conditioning. The ultimate goal of conditioning is to create a behavioral result. In an academic venue, changing behavior is more difficult to measure than in other contexts, like a karate class, where there are observable physical behaviors that result from physical stimuli. For example, in the hypothetical karate class, if students do not form straight lines they are punched in the shoulder (stimuli), after a few people get out of line, and get punched, the line becomes noticeably straighter (behavioral response). However, in an academic context, behaviorists substitute verbal behavior (e.g. responding appropriately to a question) forShow MoreRelatedSocial Psychology: The Study of Influences Essay1420 Words   |  6 Pagestrying to understand criminal behavior, â€Å"why† has always been a question that has been explored. Psychology, or the study of â€Å"why†, has been attempting to answer such questions for centuries. 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