SEMINAR PAPER
Module Code: MP2003C & MP2003N
Module Title: Organisation & Management
Module Leader:
Summer Resit Assignment : August 2006
Resit Assignment: Assignment 2: Student Workbook
Assignment 2: 20% weighting
This assignment is based on the completion of the attached student workbook and you will need to refer to some of the materials that are provided in your module booklet (which was issued to you when you took this module during your first attempt) in order to complete the various exercises in this student workbook.
Deadline date for submission: Check with the undergraduate office
Please note that you must hand in your work to the assessment office by the deadline date in accordance with the university’s assessment regulations and ensure that you obtain a receipt when submitting your work to the assessment office. Please keep a copy of any work submitted to the assessment office.
Assessment criteria for the student workbook:
· Exercises are completed in depth.
· Evidence shown of analytical and critical thinking.
· Evidence provided to support arguments made.
Deadline Date: 20 August, 2006
Department of Management and Professional Development
Organisation & Management
MP2003N
Student Workbook
Year 2006
Semester 2
Student Name: ______________________________________
Student ID No: ______________________________________
Seminar Tutor: ______________________________________
Useful information and advice on completing this workbook
Ø This individually completed student workbook will be formally assessed and will count for 20% of your overall coursework grade for this module. Please refer to your module booklet for the assessment criteria.
Ø You are required to complete the appropriate seminar tasks before attending the relevant seminar in that week and the seminar tutor will sign your student booklet at each of the seminar sessions as long as you have completed the appropriate seminar tasks. Non-completion or partial completion of any of the appropriate tasks before the relevant seminar sessions will result in you losing marks.
Ø It is important to realise that the student workbook has been designed towards helping and supporting you in the completion of your coursework case study analysis to a high standard. Therefore non-completion or partial completion of the tasks in your student workbook will mean that you are likely to struggle to complete your case study analysis to a sufficient standard to pass.
Ø Please ensure that you complete the details at the front of this student workbook correctly (indicating your student ID number and the name of your seminar tutor). You are required to submit this workbook together with your coursework essay on week 14 (Thursday 25 May).
Ø Your essay must be securely attached at the end of your workbook.
Preparation for Seminar 1 in Week 2 : Bibliography & Case Study Analysis.
A. Initial thoughts and reflections about this module
1. What are your goals as far as working/being involved in Organisations is concerned?
To share my technical and behavioural skills to achieve organizational goals and part of personal goals.
2. How do you think you could achieve your goals specified in 1 above?
This can be achieved by collaboration with the decisions of the group and the leader. I have to be vigilant enough to evaluate the effectiveness of my suggestions or if working on my specific tasks would mean a positive effect at organizational level.
3. How would you go about achieving, in practical terms, your goals specified in 1 above?
I will give my best to do my assigned tasks and attend meetings with the group. Suggesting directly to the leader would also result to much abrupt attention.
4. Having completed the previous 3 questions, what do you think you could learn in this module to help you understand and get the most out of your involvement in Organisations?
This module can provide other ways to contribute to organizational success, that is, to reach specific goals.
5. What do you think are the important topics that should be covered in this module? Explain why?
Tools to know/ measure individual and leader motivation to contribute to organizational success. This is very important for me to realize the foundation of my motivation to contribute. This will also have implications on the direction of leadership and efficiency to realize success.
B. Survey of books in bibliography
1. Identify at least three books you have surveyed.:
2. Which book would you read first and why
The book in number 1 is read first because in-depth understanding and taking notes on the case study at hand will serve as a road map to consider key areas to analyze. This will also suggest if there is a need for thorough theoretical search to give rationale to the conditions at hand (if any).
3. Which book covers most of the syllabus – explain how.
Book number 2 because it addresses the one written in A-5 in voluminous manner. It is a great source about staff, leader and organizational motivations.
4. Of the three books you have surveyed, which do you find easiest to understand – explain why.
Book 2 because it has direct application to working conditions which is the case study problem. It has sub-headings that connotes easy access to the required topics. In addition, some of the browsed topics are already covered in the last exposure to other subjects and also personal readings.
5. Which book(s) take a critical view of the subject – explain how
Book 2 because it has some basic motivational issues and theories being presented applicable not only to module goal but also to the case study. For the latter, Book 2 directly identifies the motivations of organizational actors regarding the new adopted structure of spaghetti organization.
C. Analysis of case studies
1. What should be done when analysing a case study?
There are several steps to consider according to (2006):
a. History, development and growth of the company over time.
b. Identification of SWOT, PESTEL and other factors
c. The corporate strategy and other tactics
d. Analysis of control and structure systems
e. Preparation of recommendations
2. What should be avoided when analysing a case study?
First, the analysis should avoid repeating large amount of data from the case. There should also be a logical order of change throughout the analysis for easy reading. Further, grammatical and spelling errors can lead to a sloppy paper ( 2006).
3. Give a brief overview about your coursework case study – what is the case study you will be analysing for your coursework about?
The case is about the benefits or otherwise of the newly adopted organizational structure of Oticon. The new structure referred as spaghetti was considered for the firm to achieve adaptive culture. In its history, the firm lacks operational flexibility. It lost market share due to its incompetence to produce the “in the ear” hearing aids due to its EU prominence, tradition and widely known products of “behind the ear” types. Because of this, at the end of the 1980s, it adjusted its organizational to adopt this project-based approach of people interaction and doing tasks ( 1994). The new structure seemed to be very flexible and effective indeed for the organization. But where the flexibility comes from and what factors affected the success of this untraditional structure?
Preparation for Seminar 2 in Week 4: Writing Essays & Referencing.
A. Writing and Structuring an Essay
1. What should be done in order to write and structure an essay correctly?
According to (2006), in writing essays, there is a need to make an outline to plan the essay. Second, there should be rough draft and editing to come up with correct format, logical order and others. The essay should also submit to what it intendeds, if analysis, description or persuasive tone.
2. What should be avoided?
According to (2006), avoid too many quotations especially on case studies.
B. Referencing
1. What is the difference between Referencing and providing a Bibliography?
A Bibliography is:
An alphabetical list of in-text citations written at the end of the paper. It includes the most basic information about the writer and his book/ article or in the case of electronic source, the sponsor and the website.
2. Reference is:
On the other hand, reference is merely an in-text citation noting the author, the year of publication and page number in which the ideas from the sentences or paragraphs are derived. They are also guides for easy access of the reader to the whole material (not merely the specific page numbers being included) whose publication information is located in the bibliography.
3. What details must you provide in your references?
Author, year of publication, title of book/ article, publisher, place of publication and page numbers being used in the text.
4. Provide two specific examples of bibliographic citations using the Harvard style.
5. Provide two specific examples of Harvard style referencing below (one of a Journal citation & the other of a citation of a text):
1. In the study of (2003) on the population politics in Kazakhstan, he founded that population estimates to measure the status of the attempt of President Nazarbayev to establish an ethnic homeland inhabited by Kazakhs was supported by vague data (p. 103+)
2. In Kazakhstan, the oil industry is heavily operated by foreign investors due to the sale of large resource extraction opportunities back in 1994 to 1997 ( 2004 p. 2).
6. Why is Referencing important?
Cited in 1998:
· It provides the evidence in the level/ extent of knowledge of the writer in the existing related literature.
· It discusses the writings of other authors in the related or specific field
· It gives scholarly background to the essay
· It serve as a benchmark or framework to agree or refute cases or events at hand
7. What is Plagiarism & how do you avoid it?
Plagiarism is a form of cheating in which the writer do not use generally accepted format to cite other author work’s involved in his work. It is a bottleneck in professional writing that is committable by knowing and unknowing writers on an event when parts of their works are derived from others.
It can be avoided by paraphrasing the main ideas of a published paper and using generally accepted format of citation and bibliography. In addition, lively using it in a sentence partially introduces authentication attributable to the writer using different author ideas.
Bibliography
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