Reading Response Week Two
In response to the article about the CEO who sent out an "angry" email to all of his employees accusing them of not working to their full potential, I felt that this was a ludicrous method in trying to motivate his workers. First off, why would a man of his power send out an email of that nature to everyone in the company? I think it would be best to figure our areas that were not working to their full potential and then send the email to those few individuals. It is childish for him to cry to his company and then expect grown humans to just shape up because someone sent out and email whining about not working hard enough. I understand the fact that he wanted to motivate or create a little fear to get his workers to work harder, but this was not the right method to do so.
Comments
It's All About Being Professional About It
I agree with your blog about the CEo going about the E-mail in the wrong manner. As the CEO, he should have gone about the whole situation in a way other than an E-mail. If he had such a problem with his employees, he should have called a meeting to address the issues. It may have been easier for him to say such things to his employees in an E-mail than it would have been in person. I agree with you when you said that he should have figured out the areas that were not working to their full potential and sent an E-mail to them. I feel that writing an E-mail to the entire company was wrong. If he were to write an E-mail to just the targeted area, he could have been more direct and told them specifically what he'd like them to improve in a much more civil manner. It is the CEO's responsibility to be a role model and address problems with professionalism.
Calling a meeting would be better
I agree that calling a company meeting or a managers meeting would have been a better idea. I think that CEO's should possess the skills to verbally communicate his feelings. Being in a position of power, verbal skills should be an easy thing to do. Calling the meeting could have also allowed him to think about his ideas and organize them and think about how he could say it without obviously calling out people in the organization. I agree that the CEO has the responsiblitly to be a role model for the company. His position pretty much screams a position of professionalism. I think that the stockholders or board or anyone higher than him in the company organizational chart should reprimand him. I know that a stock price plummeting is pain enough but he should remember this incident for the rest of his career in order that he doesn't repeat this again.
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I completely agree that this was a really bad way to try and get your employees motivated. Also you have to have a more substantial reason than how crowded you parking lot is to say that your staff is not hard working. Sometimes being aggressive is the only choice you have left but there is a big difference between being aggressive and rude. This CEO was just rude to his managers.
If he had called a meeting and discussed his views that would have been much more appropriate
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It is true this CEO should not have sent out such a mass email and that it is never a good idea to send mass emails. The CEO needed to specify which groups or people needed to hear the message. It is a bit surprising to me that Patterson even made it to this position. The whole issue seems as though he was lazy. First he didn’t take the time to specify who needed the extra motivation, and he also didn’t pinpoint exactly which areas these people needed to improve on. In the end it is a very costly lesson to learn for Patterson.
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I totally agree with you. I too think that this was a childish act on the part of the manager. This sort of behaviour is not at all expected from person of his post. The better way was to call a meeting and discuss the various reasons that would have hindered the company's progress like is done in any other business. What goes in the company is highly confidential and should not be sent through email and if sent, there should be a clear written message saying, "confidential". Apart from that the boss should mind his words and try solve it in a sophisticated manner.