Explain how you understand the saying.

A person is born with a liking for profit. (Xun Zi, a Chinese philosopher )

 

B. Discussion

Work in groups discussing the following.

Analyze facts and comparisons before making a profit statement.

C. Role play

Prepare for a role play. Read the situation and the roles, and follow the procedure.

The situation

The company has had a difficult year. Find the evidence for these facts:

e.g. Fact - Competition was very tough.

Evidence - Turnover has fallen.

The company has borrowed money to buy new equipment.

Their customers have been demanding that they keep lager stocks.

The customers have also been demanding longer credit periods.

Their suppliers have been insisting on shorter credit periods.

The roles:

The owners of the company; The auditors; The suppliers; The customers.

 

VII. Writing

Write an essay on the following topic.

Prepare a balance sheet for a small trading company. Comment on some figures. Say which figures have gone up, which figures have gone down this year.

 

Unit 18 TEAM BUILDING

I. Anticipating the Issue

Discuss your answers to the following questions.

1. Do you have any qualities which would be useful for a team? What are they?

2. Is it difficult to work in a team? Why?/ Why not?

 

II. Background Reading

Read the following text. Focus on the meaning of the boldfaced words. Determine whether what you anticipated coincides with the text.

Team Building

1. Team development

Team building potentially includes a very wide variety of methodologies, techniques, theories and tools, values and philosophy. At the foundation of good team building is compassion and humanity - genuine care for others. This is what sustains and fuels people in organizations.

The aim of team building is to achieve improvement in the way your staff view and do their work, to inspire them to action so that your organization runs more smoothly and your staff interactions (say department to department, or hierarchically) improve.

2. Before an effective team can be developed, the organizational environment itself must foster teamwork. Accordingly an effective organization must meet certain requirements: 1) Share a certain vision or sense of purpose that all its employees can articulate. 2) Develop a structure appropriate for the organizational environment (e.g., a structure that works for a bank may not work for a fire department). 3) Strike a balance between reason and intuition so that its employees are neither too oriented towards nor too disregarding of “hard” facts. A leader should examine all pros and cons in such plights, align employees so that everyone is going in the same direction, improve the way team members interact, thus improving their ability to solve problems. Better problem–solving means better efficiency in general. Increased efficiency tends to boost or increase morale and productivity. It also helps to decrease stress, turnover and operating costs and bolster your organization’s public image. There are four key variables in the team development process. They are:

· Goals - individuals must understand and accept goals.

· Roles - team members must know what others want and expect from them.

· Procedures - All members must know how to get work done together e.g. making decisions, solving problems, managing time, communicating, resolving problems).

· Relationship - People who like and or respect one another usually work more effectively.

Ambiguity in these variables produces stress and hampers performance. To make the team development process more effective, team building exercises and activities can be used. They are designed to be stimulating, informative and challenging.

3. Workshops

Workshops are an extremely flexible and effective method for training, learning, development, change management, team building and problem solving. Workshops are effective in managing change and achieving improvement, and particularly the creation of initiatives, plans, process and actions to achieve particular business and organizational aims. They are also effective for breaking down barriers, improving communications inside and outside departments, and integrating staff after acquisition or merger. Besides, workshops are particularly effective for (CRM) customer relationship management development.

4. Team building games

Team building games, exercises and activities help build teams, develop employee motivation, improve communications and are a sort of fun. Quizzes also warm up meetings and improve training, and liven up conferences.

5. Role Playing

During the preparation stage for the team building workshop, relevant special interest groups or (SIGs) are identified. The key during role playing, is role reversal, for instance rank and file employees role play senior management, then explain the art of give - and - take in handling the situation. Output from the team building process, such as problems, challenges, opportunities, weaknesses etc. are evaluated by SIGs.

6. Buzz sessions

Buzz sessions can be inter-spaced through out the team building process to stimulate thought, discussion and add interest. These short sessions entail a guest-speaker delivering a short presentation on a relevant subject. Such speakers can be experts in their field; they can be internal employees or external guests from suppliers or customers.

7. Site visits

Site visits can be arranged and conducted prior to the workshop, during the workshop or post the workshop. They are used to develop organizational awareness to compare how the organization perceives itself internally and how it is perceived externally by suppliers and customers. Site visits also develop better working relationships and improved problem solving capability.

8. Risks and dangers of corporate events and social responsibility

Corporate events in terms of effects on employees' families and people's broader life needs should be carefully considered in team building process. Nowadays organizations have a deep and wide responsibility, which is progressively reflected in law. Alcohol and discrimination where wining and dining is concerned are big issues in modern organizations. Encouraging healthy work and home life balance tends to make organizations run smoother and less problematically, notably in areas of grievance and counseling, stress and conflict, disputes and litigation, recruitment and staff retention, succession planning, company reputation and image.

Today's well-led and ethically-managed corporations understand that divisive treatment of employees' partners and families undermines loyalty and motivation of employees. Modern ethical socially responsible organizations strive for the moral code of the team and do their best to minimize negative effects of corporate events.