Month: April 2023

Categories
MGMT 453

Creating Better Job Descriptions

Updating job descriptions is essential to workplace planning. In my experience with job descriptions, I have used them to understand a job’s scope, size, and compatibility with my skills and characteristics before applying. However, they serve as more than the design of a job advertised for recruiting. They can also serve as a training development plan and help gauge employee performance and compensation. In addition, updated descriptions are helpful as a legal defense, protecting organizations from employee claims. To improve efficiency and employee job satisfaction, organizations need to produce better job descriptions.

Firstly, to create an effective depiction, experts recommend that job descriptions be updated annually. The longer you wait to update your job descriptions, the more difficult it will become; you may need to pay for in-depth job analysis, allocate more of HR’s time to reworking descriptions, and limit HR’s availability to resolve other organizational issues. Secondly, HR should never assume they know more about the job than the person working. It is helpful to have managers’ and workers’ input on descriptions and their approval before standardizing them.

To rewrite a job description, you need to perform a job analysis. This assesses the work and employee characteristics required to perform the job successfully. An analysis will result in a list of tasks that workers regularly fulfill. From here, it is simple to identify the KSAO, or knowledge, skills, abilities, and other characteristics HR is looking for in strong applicants and current employees. Information for analyses can be sourced from professional organizations, the internet, and experts in the field, like supervisors and incumbents. This information can be collected through interviews, observations, questionnaires, or employee diary-keeping.

Tyler, K. (2013, January 1). Job Worth Doing: Update Descriptions. SHRM. Retrieved April 28, 2023, from https://www.shrm.org/hr-today/news/hr-magazine/Pages/0113-job-descriptions.aspx

Categories
MGMT 453

Cross-Cultural Management and Job Satisfaction

Cisco, Kimpton Hotels & Restaurants, and The Cheesecake Factory Incorporated are all companies that made Fortune’s 2020 “Best Companies to Work for” list. Each of the companies has cultivated cultures that encourage and reward employees. As a result, people like their jobs and stick around. The cultures at these companies all have one thing in common; employees say you are made to feel welcome when you join the company. If all employees feel welcome, these workplaces are inclusive of everyone’s cultural backgrounds and values. This is the result of effective cross-cultural management.

I want to be a leader who has curated a robust global leadership toolbox by expanding my cross-cultural knowledge and improving my cultural intelligence. Workplace diversity is good; it results in more powerful performance and innovation. However, you must be the right manager to capitalize on diversity as a competitive advantage. The right manager appreciates and understands cultural differences with enough cultural awareness to lead people based on cultural values. They also possess the cultural intelligence required to facilitate the socialization of employees using effective cross-cultural communication. Finally, to capitalize on diversity in the workplace, the right kind of manager contributes to creating an open and unbiased organizational culture that embraces the value of diverse cultures.

Managers face four challenges when leading a multicultural team. These are direct versus indirect communication; trouble with accents and fluency; differing attitudes toward hierarchy and authority; and conflicting norms for decision-making (Brett, 2006). In Western cultures, people rely on direct communication to understand what others are thinking. In non-Western cultures, people rely on inferences and non-verbal communication to convey their thoughts. The two distinct communication styles can result in simple miscommunications in a diverse workplace. However, communication is essential for a team to complete deliverables and achieve goals. Overcoming obstacles created by direct versus indirect communication could be the most challenging aspect of a manager’s job.

Sources Cited:

Brett, J., Behfar, K., & Kern, M. (2006, November). Managing Multicultural Teams. Harvard Business Review. Retrieved April 7, 2023, from https://hbr.org/2006/11/managing-multicultural-teams