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Developing And Improving My Leadership Skills Term Paper

Organizational Change and Personal Development Plan Many organizations globally strive to achieve their desired growth and sustainability. Effective leadership and management promote the realization of the strategies by ensuring that organization's activities are executed in accordance with the development strategies. Therefore, this paper analyzes some of the strategies used by Judy Stockley in promoting the realization of the downsizing goals of the Advanced Medium Range Air-to-Air Missile Company in Eglin Air force Base, Florida. It also provides a personal leadership development plan for Judy Stockley.

Practices that successful project managers apply in exercising their leadership and management roles

The management strategies adopted in an organization influence the degree of success. Most project managers employ the effective use of their leadership and interpersonal skills to ensure success of their projects. This entails adopting strategies aiming at motivating their employees to work together effectively and work towards attaining a common goal. Project managers create organizational structures that facilitate the success of the designed project. This entails adopting effective leadership styles such as transactional and transformational leadership styles that are employee centered and foster their commitment. The success of a project also relies on effective use of the allocated resources.

Project managers achieve this by encouraging responsibility and accountability among the key stakeholders. This ensures their autonomy, thereby, the success of a project. Successful project managers recognize the importance of providing an environment supporting open communication between employees. Environment that supports open communication encourages employee commitment, empowerment, and teamwork that see success of a project. In addition, successful project managers develop anticipatory plans for managing unknown risks. This ensures elimination of factors that are likely to impede the success of a project (Richman, 2012).

Evaluate Judy Stockley's Level of Success in Developing a Culture of Trust While implementing her Plan

From the case study provided, it is apparently clear that, Judy's strategy of developing the desired culture and achieving the desired downsizing was successful. Firstly, her strategy of informing the employees of their expectations and the result of the effect of downsizing proved successful. She uses an open channel of communication between the government and the contractors that prove effective in promoting the realization of the desired organizational goal. Evidently, Judy's strategy of providing employees with a system of expressing their distress and dissatisfaction with some of the organizational activities facilitated the realization of the downsizing strategy and the establishment of the desired organizational culture (Richman, 2012).

For example, her decision to provide them with an option of diffusion their tension and frustration through monthly meetings helped her achieve her goal of downsizing them with minimal impact to the employees and the organization as a whole. Judy's decision to change the nature of the leadership style predominant in the organization helped in the creation of the desired culture. For example, "she eliminated the bureaucracy from her side to win the trust from the key stakeholders." Ultimately, this resulted in the organization performing according to the government and the customers' expectations. In addition, Judy succeeded in developing the ultimate long-term culture. She aligned the perception of the other management team by holding various meetings relating to their partnership status, weakness, and areas that needed improvement. For example, "she takes a copy of the spec tree governing the program during that time, which illustrated the problems facing the AMRAAM and the need for adoption of change strategies through collaboration." This helped her establish "heart and soul" relationship with the products among the key stakeholders. The decision of enhancing acceptance and understanding between the teams using the mirror exercise helped Judy to introduce the desired organizational culture into the teams. This sealed the relationship and promoted collaboration. For example, Dennis helps the collaborating teams understand the need for their collaboration by holding meetings and establishing open communication between the government and contractors to facilitate the change process. Therefore, this shows that, Judy's strategy of introducing the desired organizational culture was a success (Richman, 2012).

Key Learning and Behavior Modification Strategies Used by Judy Stockley to Address AMRAAM's Organizational Problems and Gain Trust from Project Team Members

Judy used a variety of behavioral modification strategies to address AMRAAM's organizational problems and gain trust from the project team members. Firstly, she took the responsibility of introducing the desired culture to show her commitment to the other project members. This enabled her to create a relationship of trust between the staff members, a mutual support, and teamwork...

In order to achieve this, she hosted a number of meetings with the key members of the Raytheon and Hughes to discuss with them the drawdown plan.
Judy used the spec tree to create understanding among the key members the weaknesses associated with their previous collaboration strategies and the need for an improvement. As such, this created a sense of mutual understanding between the project teams, which promoted the establishment of a trusting and mutual relationship between the teams. As stated in the case study, it led to the establishment of a "heart and soul relationship with their products," showing the success of the introduction of the desired change in the organization.

Secondly, Judy took the responsibility of changing the leadership style predominant with the aim of bolstering her efforts in addressing AMRAAM's problems. From the case study, "Judy eliminated the bureaucracy on their side" to facilitate the process. This eliminated the disruptive nature of operations management and facilitated commitment from the teams. As such, Judy's team came up with steps such as the "mirror exercise" to enhance understanding and acceptance of the new culture. Thirdly, Judy's team established an open communication system between the government and the contractor to facilitate the elimination of the problems facing the organization, achieve their downsizing goals, and introduce the desired organizational culture (Richman, 2012).

For example, Dennis says, "when some people working on other programs came by to ask for advice, they were stunned to learn how open my relationship was with Raytheon." This resulted in the establishment of the desired organizational culture and trust between the key stakeholders. It also facilitated the elimination of the problems facing the organization and realization of the downsizing goals. Other learning and behavioral strategies used by Judy and her team include introducing working site-by-site strategy, establishing long-term pricing strategy with the contractors, and holding meetings on a monthly basis for consultation purposes.

Analyze three actions that Judy Stockley undertook to change the project's team culture

One of the first actions taken by Judy Stockley in changing the culture of the team was leading by example. Judy took the initiative of taking a lead in the execution of the desired strategies bringing the desired organizational culture. For example, she had to change the bureaucratic leadership that characterized the organization in the past. In order to achieve this, Judy eliminated the bureaucracy on their side. This helped in reducing the disorganization experienced from the customer's side. Change in the bureaucratic leadership resulted in employee commitment. There was a shift in the organizational practice from customer care to building missiles. As stated in the case study, the change in leadership facilitated the acceptance of the new culture tested using the mirror exercise.

Secondly, Judy took the responsibility of changing the culture of the project. She took charge of selling the reform that could facilitate the creation of a trusting relationship, reciprocal support, and collaboration between the government and the contractors. As such, she announces the drawdown plan and hosts meetings with all stakeholders. She discusses the partnership, the weaknesses, and ways of improving the new plan. She uses a spec tree used to govern organizational programs to show them its weaknesses such as low-level specs, which contributed to poor performance of the organization. As stated in the case study, this contributed to the introduction of the new culture, aiming at cooperation, teamwork, and mutual trust. Besides, the teams embraced strategies like proper documentation of the needed parts by the contractors and full responsibility of the government in facilitating the provision of resources and the change process (Richman, 2012).

According to change theories, achieving the desired organizational change relies on the establishment of open communication to promote consultation and elimination of employee's doubts. To comply with this, Judy summoned all employees from all the teams and informed them on the planned downsizing. As stated in the case, "Judy called a meeting of all the 200 workers to explain the drawdown plan." This helped in creating consciousness among the employees and stimulated behavioral change that ultimately promoted the adoption of the organizational culture. In addition, Judy held monthly meetings with the workers where she would address and communicate their expectations on the need for change in the organization. She also uses her senior staff such as Dennis to facilitate change through the establishment of an open communication system between the government and contractors to enhance their understanding, teamwork, and mutual relationship.

Personal Leadership Development Plan for Judy Stockley

Personal vision and mission

As an experienced leader and manager, I have discovered that, experts and consultants provide ideas that are too many to enumerate. I believe the…

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Richman, L.L. (2012). Improving your project management skills. New York: American Management Association
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