Identify several problems/challenges in order to better position ABC Company in the expansion of its operation globally. Who are the key people in making decisions and what are their roles? Why are they important? Explain.

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Module Five Case Study

Scenario
ABC Company, Inc., has been in existence for 10 years. It has 50 employees and currently only one location. ABC Company manufactures one product: widgets. It has managed to stay in business by holding onto a small portion of the widget market, but it is far from the market leader. Over the last five years, ABC Company’s market share has stayed more or less stagnant. The president of the company is an older gentleman who mostly works from home. He makes decisions through meetings with his managers over the phone and is rarely seen at the company. Mid–level managers don’t have much contact with each other and basically focus exclusively on their individual departments. The rest of the staff members are very distrustful of management, and there has recently been a lot of turnover. Outside of interoffice griping, there is rarely any company wide communication. Recent economic developments and technological advances in the widget industry have resulted in a greater demand for widgets in emerging markets, as well as in the United States. In order to stay competitive, ABC Company is considering expanding its operation globally. ABC has come to you, an expert on organizational change, for consulting advice.

Prompt
First, read and examine the ABC Company information provided to you in a thorough manner. Take notes, highlight relevant facts, and, if needed, underline key problems. Focus your analysis on identifying a minimum of 2 to 4 key problems/challenges. Use your critical thinking skills to uncover possible solutions. Review course readings, discussions, possibly outside research, and your previous learning/own experiences to tie into your understanding of the case study scenario.

Next, using the scenario, address the following:
 Give a brief overview of the company
 Identify several problems/challenges in order to better position ABC Company in the expansion of its operation globally.
 Who are the key people in making decisions and what are their roles? Why are they important? Explain.
 What teams/staff will need to be involved in the day to day work of this initiative? Why are they important? Explain.
 What does the team collaboration communication plan need to incorporate in order for the effort to expand globally?
 What does the timeline leading up to completion of an operation expanding globally look like?
 Identify 2–4 solutions that ABC Company will need to successfully implement in order to expand its operations globally.
 What assumptions did you use in providing for the solution(s) to expanding globally?

Create a Narrated Presentation. In your Narrated Presentation you will present the key ideas and highlights of your capstone project.

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Narrated Presentation

In part 5 of your Capstone Project, you will create a Narrated Presentation. In your Narrated Presentation you will present the key ideas and highlights of your capstone project.

Assignment Instructions
For this assignment, assume that you are presenting to the leadership group of the business that you have chosen.
Include notes or a reference area that document your sources within your presentation.

Your Narrated Presentation should be 2 -3 minutes in length.
To ensure accessibility of your presentation, you will need to also include transcripts or closed captioning. A suggestion is to create your script prior to narrating or recording your presentation. You can then upload your script document as your transcript with your presentation file or URL.

You may use a variety of tools including the Canvas video tools, PowerPoint with narration, the free versions of Screen-Cast-O-Matic, Zoom, Adobe Spark, or another tool or your choice

How are your proposed solutions to practical management problems encountered in a complex global environment sustainable? What methods and strategies have you proposed to develop individuals and manage teams in multiple settings?

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Capstone Final Project

The Capstone Final Project is an opportunity for you to bring together concepts, skills, and practices you have learned within your MSM program and integrate them into your next steps as a professional.

You will construct a detailed and well-thought-out analysis of a real-world business that employs many of the business theories, concepts, and relevant strategic analysis tools studied in the MSM program.

Assignment Instructions
This final paper integrates the analysis, recommendations, revisions, instructor feedback into one cohesive document.

Your final paper will be a minimum of 10 pages in length, use APA formatting, and follow this structure

Cover Page
Executive Summary
Table of Contents
Introduction
Description of your project including the reasons why you chose it and what you hope to gain from the project.
Body
Conclusion
Reference Section
Include answers to the following questions in the body of your paper:

How are your proposed solutions to practical management problems encountered in a complex global environment sustainable?
What methods and strategies have you proposed to develop individuals and manage teams in multiple settings?
Analyze how different functional areas within a business organization affect its strategic direction.
How are project management tools and techniques used?
Create sustained and coherent arguments to summarize work for both internal (e.g. management, peers, subordinates) and external audiences.
Include ethical challenges presented in this issue or topic. Include your argument or position for resolution of the ethical challenge.
Describe how information technology is used to generate solutions for your chosen issue or topic.

Develop a 7-page process improvement plan for a provided scenario or a business and process of your choice, using data to support your recommendations.

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Process Improvement Plan

Develop a 7-page process improvement plan for a provided scenario or a business and process of your choice, using data to support your recommendations.

Introduction
This portfolio work project, a process improvement plan, will help you demonstrate competencies in process documentation, process analysis, and process improvement.

Scenario
For this assessment, choose either Option 1 or Option 2. You do not need to do both. You will apply one of these scenarios in the Requirements below. Both options will be graded using the same scoring guide.

Option 1
Wild Dog Coffee Company, a locally owned company with a single coffee shop location, serves a wide selection of espresso products, small breakfast and lunch menu items, and a limited evening menu. The company is planning to expand the business by adding an additional location. While different menu items may be tested at the new location, the espresso beverage preparation process will remain exactly the same. The company wants to ensure that the espresso beverage preparation process is documented and refined before the move.

Option 2
Select a business and process of your choosing. Note: It is recommended that you use the same business for each assessment in this course. Before choosing a company, read all three of the assessments thoroughly to ensure the following:

The company fits the assessment requirements and you have access to the information needed to complete the assessment.
The business information is disclosed in the assessment for faculty's reference.
You can distribute the business data without disclosing confidential information.
Contact faculty with questions.

Your Role
Option 1
You are one of three owners of Wild Dog Coffee Company. Your background is primarily in operations. Your business partners' backgrounds are in marketing and sales. While they are working on the external aspects of the business that will bring customers in, you are focused on making the internal customer-facing processes as efficient as possible. You are preparing an analysis and recommendations that will help manage a core process improvement for the successful opening of a second location.

Option 2
Your boss, a director, has tasked you with a process improvement project. She is relying on you to prepare an analysis and recommendations that can be presented to the executive team of the company.

Requirements
Include the following in your process improvement plan:

Assess the steps for a selected process.

Develop a flowchart showing the process' steps. You may include as many steps as are relevant for your selected scenario.

If using Wild Dog Coffee Company, show the steps for preparing an espresso beverage (for example, latté, cappuccino); there are two steps that must be included: (1) order is submitted and (2) beverage is handed to the customer. Hint: You may want to visit a local coffee shop to observe the beverage preparation process.

Prepare a procedure documenting the selected process. At a minimum, the procedure must document the following for your selected process:
Metrics. Identify at least two metrics that will be useful in determining how well the new process is performing. Be sure to identify the target value of the metric and how you will measure it.

For Wild Dog Coffee Company, it could be how well the beverage preparation process is performing. A third metric is already identified for you: order delivery time. (This is the time between when the order is submitted and the time the beverage is handed to the customer.)

Procedure. This section describes each step of the process.
For Wild Dog Coffee Company, your procedure should be titled, “Espresso Beverage Preparation Process.” Be sure to include order submittal and handing the beverage to the customer as part of the procedure.
Purpose (of the procedure). This section describes what the procedure is intended to do.

Analyze data for process changes for a selected process. Respond to the following questions:

Is the process centered? Provide the results of your calculations and the rationale for your decision by thinking about the process capability.

Is the process capable at 3-sigma? Provide the results of your calculations and the rationale for your decision by thinking about the process capability index.

Is the process in statistical control? Provide the appropriate numbers and the rationale for your decision using a control chart for individuals.

For Wild Dog Coffee Company, analyze the Beverage Service Times [XLSX] data. This data is for 50 beverage preparation events and was collected using their order processing system. Each individual order gets a time-stamp when it is placed and again when the beverage is handed to the customer. The senior barista thinks the beverage delivery times should range between 2 and 3 minutes. The known process standard deviation, which has been calculated on an on-going basis, is 0.5903 minutes.

Analyze the cause and effect of process variances.
Brainstorm possible sources of variation to create a cause-and-effect diagram to help analyze potential sources of variation in the espresso beverage preparation process at Wild Dog Coffee Company or for your selected business' process. Your diagram must include at least four of the “6 Ms” (that is, management, manpower, method, measurement, machine, materials).

Recommend quality and customer service improvements for a selected process.
Detail the results of your analysis for Wild Dog Coffee Company or your selected business' process to substantiate your recommendations.
Deliverable Format

Requirements:

The process improvement plan is to be a minimum of 7 pages, not including the title, reference, and appendix pages.

Use a process improvement plan template of your choice.

Related company standards:
The process improvement plan is a professional document and should therefore follow the corresponding MBA Academic and Professional Document Guidelines (available in the MBA Program Resources), including single-spaced paragraphs.

In addition to the title and reference pages, include the following in the appendix:
Flowchart.
Procedure.
Detailed results of order delivery time analysis.
Cause-and-effect diagram.
Use American Society for Quality (ASQ) data analysis tools and 2–3 additional scholarly or academic sources where applicable.
Use APA formatting for citations and references.

Write a well-developed essay introducing yourself to me. Include such things as your background, interests, and achievements.

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Introduction/Business Letter Assignment – The Story of You!

Prompt: Following the Sample Standard Letter Format (see file at the bottom of this assignment), write a well-developed essay introducing yourself to me. Include such things as your background, interests, and achievements. Answer these questions – Why are you majoring in business? Where do you see yourself in 5 years? What do you expect to learn in this class? Be sure you write well-developed paragraphs with one topic per paragraph, with supporting points and examples. Use a conversational but professional tone. This means that the language is clear and concise, not verbose (wordy jargon), and avoids slang or colloquialisms.

NOTE: While business letters should be short and to the point in most cases (no more than 1 page), for this assignment IT IS FINE TO DO MORE THAN ONE PAGE! JUST BE SURE THAT YOU KEEP UNITY (1 TOPIC/PARAGRAPH) AND THAT YOU DO NOT REPEAT YOURSELF THROUGHOUT THE NARRATIVE.

Do a research paper on the impact of leadership style on the achievement of organization productivity in banking industry in Ghana.

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Research Paper

Do a research paper on the impact of leadership style on the achievement of organization productivity in banking industry in Ghana.

What insights did you gain into working as a native vs. nonnative speaker? What insights did you gain into the challenges of global collaboration?

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Business question

What insights did you gain into working as a native vs. nonnative speaker?

What insights did you gain into the challenges of global collaboration?

What are some rules you might give for native speakers, non native speakers, and team leaders based on this experience?

 

Identify ways to study that includes study strategies, good study habits, and a good study place.

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Study Skills Activity

  • CHAPTER ONE – Making the Most of Your Time
  • CHAPTER TWO – Juggling: Stress, Money, Family, and Work
  • CHAPTER THREE – Taking Notes
  • CHAPTER FOUR – Taking Tests

To identify ways to study that includes study strategies, good study habits, and a good study place.

This assignment should be 2 pages in length and should be formatted professionally and free from spelling or grammatical errors. These key points will be weighted in the assignment as it is a key detail you need to be aware of when submitting work at the collegiate level

Write your plan of action for growing your skills in each of these areas. Your plans for development should include actions that are specific, measurable and help you build habits and practices for being successful as a team member and a team leader.

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Final Paper – Your Leadership Journey

In this assignment, you will write a 2-3 page paper reflecting on your learning in Communication & Collaboration II: Teamwork.

There will be two main sections:

Section One – Reflection and Analysis

In Section 1, your paper should analyze and address each of the topics listed below.

  • Teams and Teaming
  • Team Effectiveness and Dysfunctions of Teams
  • Conflict Resolution
  • Problem Solving in Teams
  • Bias and Decision Making In Team
  • Negotiations
  • Trust in Teams

In this section you will reflect on the course content and activities, your own person experience, any secondary research you have done on Teamwork and research from interviewing 2 people who have been on teams with you in the past. A guide for seeking honest feedback about you as a team member will be provided to you.

Your analysis will highlight your most important insights and learning from the course and your own research efforts.

 

Section 2

In Section 2, write your plan of action for growing your skills in each of these areas.

Your plans for development should include actions that are specific, measurable and help you build habits and practices for being successful as a team member and a team leader.

Strong papers will incorporate class content and preparation, your own experience, the insights you gained from your interviews and relevant references to secondary research.

Research one of the theory/topics below and provide a 2-page maximum essay(APA style 7th edition) of the most important aspects of that theory/topic (e.g., what it is, what are the components of it, what it says about leadership, why it is important, what research shows about the implementation of that theory, benefits, etc.).

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Contemporary Leadership

You are required to research one of the theory/topics below and provide a 2-page maximum essay(APA style 7th edition) of the most important aspects of that theory/topic (e.g., what it is, what are the components of it, what it says about leadership, why it is important, what research shows about the implementation of that theory, benefits, etc.).
When the reader finishes reading the essay, they should know the most important aspects of the theory/topic.
Incorporate a minimum(so include more than 5) of 5 sources from peer-reviewed journal articles, in text citation as well. These sources should account for most of your information. You may include other types of sources as well.

Topics to choose from:
Authentic Leadership
Transformational Leadership