Whetten David A., Cameron Kim S. Developing management skills
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DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS CHAPTER 1 87
2. A consumer advocate organization conducted a survey to determine whether
Wendy’s hamburgers were really any more “hot and juicy” than any other ham-
burgers. After testing a Big Mac, a Whopper, a Teen Burger, and a Wendy’s Hot
and Juicy, each hamburger brand received approximately the same number of
votes for being the juiciest. The consumer group advocated that Wendy’s not
advertise its hamburgers to be the juiciest. The company indicated that its own
tests showed different results and that the image of the burger was the important
thing, not the test results. Should the advertisements cease or not?
_______ Cease to advertise
_______ Continue to advertise
3. After several profitable years, the Bob Cummings Organic Vitamin Company was
made available for sale. Bob’s movie and TV appearances precluded him from
keeping track of a large company, and it became apparent that, if present trends
continued, the company would either have to expand substantially or lose a large
share of the market. Several firms were interested in purchasing the company for
the asking price, but one firm was particularly aggressive. It sponsored several par-
ties and receptions in Bob’s honor; a 35-foot yacht was made available for his use
during the summer; and several gifts for family members arrived during the holi-
days. Bob’s wife questioned the propriety of these activities. Was it appropriate for
Bob to accept the gifts? Should he sell to that firm?
_______ Proper to accept
_______ Not proper
_______ Should not sell
_______ Should sell
4. John Waller was hired to coach football. After two seasons, he was so successful
that he was named coach of the year by UPI, Sporting News, and ESPN. He was
also very vocal about the need to clean up cheating in college athletics, especially
among competitor schools in his own conference. He heard rumors about inap-
propriate alumni gifts to some of his own athletes, but after confronting those
involved, he received assurances that the rumors weren’t true. At the beginning
of the next season, however, he received conclusive evidence that seven of the
starters on his team, including an All-American, had received financial benefits
from a wealthy booster. What should Waller do?
_______ Kick them off the team
_______ Suspend them for several games
_______ Warn them but do nothing
5. Roger’s company had been battered by competition from Asian firms. Not only
were Asian products selling for less money, but their quality was substantially
higher. By investing in some high-technology equipment and fostering better
union–management relations, Roger was relatively certain that the quality gap
could be overcome. But his overhead rate was more than 40 percent above that of
the competitor firms. He reasoned that the most efficient way to lower costs
would be to close one of his older plants, lay off the employees, and increase pro-
duction in the newer plants. He knew just which plant would be the one to close.
The trouble was, the community was dependent on that plant as its major
employer and had recently invested a great deal of money for highway repair and
88 CHAPTER 1 DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS
streetlight construction around the plant. Most of the workforce were older
people who had lived in the area most of their lives. It was improbable that they
could obtain alternative employment in the same area. Should Roger close the
plant or not?
_______ Close the plant
_______ Do not close
Discussion Questions
Form a small group and discuss the following questions regarding these five scenarios:
1. Why did you make the choices you did in each case? Justify each answer.
2. What principles or basic values for decision making did you use in each case?
3. What additional information would you need in order to be certain about your
choices?
4. What circumstances might arise to make you change your mind about your deci-
sion? Could there be a different answer to each case in a different circumstance?
5. What do your answers tell you about your own emotional intelligence, values,
cognitive style, attitude toward change, and core self-evaluation?
DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS CHAPTER 1 89
SKILL
PRACTICE
EXERCISES FOR IMPROVING
SELF-AWARENESS THROUGH
SELF-DISCLOSURE
Through the Looking Glass
In the nineteenth century, the concept of “looking-glass self” was developed to describe
the process used by people to develop self-awareness. It means that other people serve as
a looking glass for each of us. They mirror back our actions and behaviors. In turn, we
form our opinions of ourselves as a result of observing and interpreting this mirroring. The
best way to form accurate self-perceptions, therefore, is to share your thoughts, attitudes,
feelings, actions, and plans with others. This exercise helps you do that by asking you to
analyze your own styles and inclinations and then share and discuss them with others.
This sharing exercise will provide insights that you haven’t recognized before.
Assignment
In a group of three or four, share your scores on the Skill Assessment instruments.
Determine what similarities and differences exist among you. Do systematic ethnic or
gender differences exist? Now read aloud the 10 statements listed below. Each person
should complete each statement, but take turns going first. The purpose of your complet-
ing the statements aloud is to help you articulate aspects of your self-awareness and to
receive reactions to them from others.
1. In taking the assessment instruments, I was surprised by . . .
2. Some of my dominant characteristics captured by the instruments are . . .
3. Among my greatest strengths are . . .
4. Among my greatest weaknesses are . . .
5. The time I felt most successful was . . .
90 CHAPTER 1 DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS
6. The time I felt least competent was . . .
7. My three highest priorities in life are . . .
8. The way in which I differ most from other people is . . .
9. I get along best with people who . . .
10. From what the others in this group have shared, here is an impression I have
formed about each:
Diagnosing Managerial Characteristics
This exercise is designed to give you practice in diagnosing differences in others’ styles and
inclinations. Being aware of the styles, values, and attitudes of others will help you manage
them more effectively. Below are brief descriptions of four successful managers. They differ
in values, learning styles, orientations toward change, and interpersonal orientation. After
reading the scenarios, form small groups to discuss the questions that follow.
Michael Dell
Michael Dell is the kind of guy people either love or hate. He is worth more than $13 billion,
loves to go to work each day, and is as likely to tear a computer apart and put it back together
again as to read a financial report. More than 15 years after he started assembling computers
in his dorm room, Michael is still fascinated with the hardware. Despite his billionaire status,
“if anyone believes that he is not the chief technologist in this company, they are naive,” says
Robert McFarland, vice president of Dell’s federal sales group. Although Dell Computer is the
quintessential lean-and-mean company, Michael does not play the part of the whipcracker.
After recently receiving an award from the Austin, Texas, Chamber of Commerce, for
example, Michael and his wife stayed long after the program was over to chat with everyone
who wanted to meet him. He has been described as shy and quiet and not inclined toward
public hyperbole. “Michael has a genuine shyness . . . he is a genuinely mild-mannered, low-
key person who was very focused on reaching his objectives,” says Brian Fawkes, a former
Dell employee. Admittedly, Dell has experienced several missteps and losses, but Michael has
been unafraid to learn from missteps. “Michael makes mistakes. He just never makes the
same mistake twice,” says Mark Tebbe, president of a firm Dell recently acquired.
SOURCE: Adapted from Darrow, 1998.
DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS CHAPTER 1 91
Patrick M. Byrne
As president and chairman of Overstock.com in Salt Lake City, Utah, Byrne was a Marshall
Scholar who received his PhD in philosophy from Stanford University. His management
style, personality, and core values are illustrated in his interview with Fast Company:
“Learning philosophy has been useful in teaching me how to get to the heart of things—to
be able to deconstruct what the real issues are. People think we’re endless debaters, but
what we’re really doing is refining concepts in order to reach agreement. With negotiations,
instead of trying to fight someone on every one of the issues, most of the time it turns out he
cares about a whole bunch of things that you don’t care about. Make those trade-offs, and
he’ll think you’re being too generous when in fact you’re just giving him the sleeves off your
vest. Ultimately, philosophy is about values, and that definitely has its place in business. I
consider myself a far outsider to Wall Street. There’s a whole lot of obfuscation involved. In
August, I spoke out on how the Wall Street system was corrupt and how the financial press
was co-opted. Because of it I got called a buffoon and wacky; then a lot of lies came out
about my being gay, taking cocaine, and hiring a stripper. That’s sort of the fifth-grade level
we’re operating on. It doesn’t bother me. When you decide to stand for things, you have to
be prepared to face criticism, mockery, and derision.”
SOURCE: Adapted from Fast Company, 2005.
Maurice Blanks
When Maurice started architecture school, one of the professors said that only 25 percent
of the students would make it. Sure enough, Maurice dropped out in his forties after oper-
ating his own office in Chicago. He moved to Minneapolis to devote himself full time to
Blu Dot, a company he helped create. His discussion about architecture reveals a great
deal about his personal attributes. “Architecture is about keeping track of thousands of
pieces of information and making sure they’re all covered in the design. The implications
of failure are pretty high if you don’t—people could get hurt. Therefore, you learn that
you must be very efficient with information and organization, which naturally translates
to running the day-to-day operations of a company. It’s funny how the word ‘sell’ is never
used in architecture school, but to me the critiques were kind of informal lessons in sales.
For exams, you’d present your work to a jury—professors, peers, local architects, and so
on. Their job was to shell you; your job was to defend yourself. It’s pretty brutal. Tears are
not uncommon. But it taught me how to communicate ideas quickly and tailor informa-
tion to an audience.”
SOURCE: Adapted from Fast Company, 2005.
Gordon Bethune
Gordon Bethune has been described as the other earthy, exuberant, hard-drinking Texas
CEO who turned around an airline that is now famous for good service, happy employ-
ees, and admirable profitability. Herb Kelleher at Southwest Airlines is the best known,
but Gordon Bethune at Continental Airlines is the most successful. A high school drop-
out mechanic who spent years in the Navy, Gordon took over a twice-bankrupt airline in
1994 and led it from a $960 million loss to more than $600 million profit in five years.
Even from his early years as a Navy mechanic, Gordon was known as superb motivator of
people and a network builder. “He had a web of relationships that enabled him to get
whatever he needed,” said a former commanding officer. At Continental, Gordon turned
around a culture where morale was in the pits, on-time performance was abysmal, and
everything from the planes to the meals were a mess. Part of the turnaround was due to
Gordon’s personal attention to employees—for example, he attends the graduation cere-
monies of every new class of flight attendants, hands out candy canes to employees dur-
ing the Christmas season, shows up regularly at employee birthday parties, and holds a
92 CHAPTER 1 DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS
monthly open house in his office to encourage employee communication. “Anybody
who’s worked here longer than two months can recognize Gordon,” says a baggage
handler in Newark. When he walks through an airport, employees wave and call out his
name. Whereas Gordon is known as an irreverent and wild guy, he demands precision
and standardized levels of service in every place in the company. When he discovered
slightly larger white coffee cups in a Houston airport lounge, for example, he was told
that they were needed to fit the new coffee maker. He demanded that the coffee maker be
changed so that the standard blue cups could be used. No exceptions.”
SOURCE: Adapted from O’Reilly, 1999.
Discussion Questions
1. Rank these individuals from highest to lowest in terms of:
■ Emotional intelligence
■ Values maturity
■ Tolerance of ambiguity
■ Core self-evaluation
Justify your evaluations in a discussion with your colleagues and compare your
scores.
2. What is your prediction about the dominant learning styles of each of these indi-
viduals? What data do you use as evidence?
3. If you were assigned to hire a senior manager for your organization and this was
your candidate pool, what questions would you ask to identify these individuals’:
■ Cognitive styles
■ Values orientations
■ Orientation toward change
■ Core self-evaluation
Which one of these people would you hire if you wanted a CEO for your com-
pany? Why?
4. Assume that each of these individuals were members of your team. What would be
the greatest strengths and weaknesses of your team? What kinds of attributes would
you want to add to your team to ensure that it was optimally heterogeneous?
An Exercise for Identifying Aspects of Personal Culture:
A Learning Plan and Autobiography
The purpose of this exercise is to assist you in articulating your key goals and aspirations
as well as identifying a personal learning plan to facilitate your success. Because continu-
ous learning is so important for you to succeed throughout your life, we want to help you
identify some specific ambitions and to develop a set of procedures to help you reach your
potential.
This exercise is accomplished in three steps:
Step 1: (Aspirations): Write an autobiographical story that might appear in Fortune
Magazine, Fast Company, or the Wall Street Journal on this date 15 years from now. This
story should identify your notable accomplishments and your newsworthy successes.
What will you have achieved that will fulfill your dreams? What outcomes would make
you ecstatically happy? What legacy do you want to be known for?
Step 2: (Characteristics): Review your scores on the Pre-assessment instruments. Using
Figure 1.5, identify the extent to which you are satisfied with your scores on these various
DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS CHAPTER 1 93
instruments. The vertical axis in the figure ranges from Very Satisfied to Very Dissatisfied.
The horizontal axis identifies the five areas of self-awareness being assessed in this chapter.
For each of the seven instruments, plot your satisfaction level with how you scored. By
joining those points together, you will have created a Self-Awareness Satisfaction Profile.
This will help you highlight areas in which you will want to improve.
Based on that plot, identify your distinctive competencies, your strengths, and your
unique attributes. What are the values, styles, and attitudes that will assist you in achiev-
ing the aspirations you have identified in Step 1?
Step 3: (Feedback): Interview a member of your family or someone who knows you
very well. Ask that person to describe what they see as your unique strengths and capa-
bilities. What does he or she see for you in your future? Include the following questions
in your interview:
■ Who do you know that you admire a great deal because of their success in life?
What capabilities and attributes do they possess?
■ Who do you know that has failed to achieve their potential? What do you see
as the most significant causes of their failure?
■ What do you see as the distinctive and notable capabilities that I possess?
Figure 1.5 Satisfaction with Self-Awareness Scores
1
Very
Dissatisfied
1 – Self-Awareness Assessment (current level of self-awareness)
2 – Emotional Intelligence Assessment (level of emotional intelligence)
3 – The Defining Issues Test (level of values maturity)
4 – The Cognitive Style Indicator (information gathering and evaluation)
5 – Locus of Control Scale (internal versus external locus of control)
6 – Tolerance of Ambiguity Scale (level of intolerance of ambiguity)
7 – Core Self-Evaluation Scale (level of positive self-regard)
Very
Satisfied
Neutral
234567
94 CHAPTER 1 DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS
■ In what areas do you think I should focus my improvement and development
efforts?
■ What do you see me doing in 15 years?
Step 4: (Planning): Now identify the developmental activities in which you will engage if
you are to achieve your aspirations. With the insight you have gained from steps 2 and 3,
identify the things you must do to help you achieve what you hope to accomplish.
Consider the following activities.
■ What courses will you take?
■ What people will you get to know?
■ In what extracurricular or life-balance activities will you engage?
■ What will you read?
■ What spiritual activities will be most meaningful?
This written product should be handed in to your instructor, or it should be given to a
family member for safekeeping. Open and reread this document in five years to deter-
mine the extent to which you are on track.
DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS CHAPTER 1 95
SKILL
APPLICATION
ACTIVITIES FOR DEVELOPING
SELF-AWARENESS
Suggested Assignments
1. Keep a journal for at least the remainder of this course. Record significant discov-
eries, insights, learnings, and personal recollections, not daily activities. Write in
your journal at least twice a week. Give yourself some feedback.
2. Ask someone you know well to complete the assessment instruments wherein
that person rates you on each item. Compare your scores and those of this other
person. Discuss differences, strengths, and areas of confusion. The goal is to help
you increase your self-awareness by getting a picture of yourself from the stand-
point of someone else.
3. Write down the comprehensive, consistent, and universal principles that guide your
behavior under all circumstances. What core principles will you rarely violate?
4. After completing the personal assessment instruments and discussing their impli-
cations with someone else, write an essay responding to the following four ques-
tions: (1) Who am I? (2) What are my main strengths and weaknesses? (3) What
do I want to achieve in my life? (4) What legacy do I want to leave?
5. Spend an evening with a close friend or relative discussing your emotional intelli-
gence, values, cognitive style, attitude toward change, and core self-evaluation.
You may want to have that person complete the instruments, giving his or her
impressions of you, so you can compare and contrast your scores. Discuss impli-
cations for your future and for your relationship.
6. Teach someone else the value of self-awareness in managerial success and explain
the relevance of emotional intelligence, values maturity, cognitive style, attitudes
toward change, and core self-evaluation. Describe the experience in your journal.
Application Plan and Evaluation
The intent of this exercise is to help you apply this cluster of skills in a real-life, out-of-class
setting. Now that you have become familiar with the behavioral guidelines that form the
96 CHAPTER 1 DEVELOPING SELF-AWARENESS
basis of effective skill performance, you will improve most by trying out those guidelines in
an everyday context. Unlike a classroom activity, in which feedback is immediate and
others can assist you with their evaluations, this skill application activity is one you must
accomplish and evaluate on your own. There are two parts to this activity. Part 1 helps pre-
pare you to apply the skill. Part 2 helps you evaluate and improve on your experience. Be
sure to write down answers to each item. Don’t short-circuit the process by skipping steps.
Part 1. Planning
1. Write down the two or three aspects of this skill that are most important to you.
These may be areas of weakness, areas you most want to improve, or areas that
are most salient to a problem you face right now. Identify the specific aspects of
this skill that you want to apply.
2. Now identify the setting or the situation in which you will apply this skill.
Establish a plan for performance by actually writing down a description of the sit-
uation. Who else will be involved? When will you do it? Where will it be done?
Circumstances:
Who else?
When?
Where?
3. Identify the specific behaviors in which you will engage to apply this skill.
Operationalize your skill performance.
4. What are the indicators of successful performance? How will you know you have
been effective? What will indicate you have performed competently?
Part 2. Evaluation
5. After you have completed your implementation, record the results. What hap-
pened? How successful were you? What was the effect on others?
6. How can you improve? What modifications can you make next time? What will
you do differently in a similar situation in the future?
7. Looking back on your whole skill practice and application experience, what have
you learned? What has been surprising? In what ways might this experience help
you in the long term?