Is it good to foster a culture that reinforces failure? (Chapter 8)

The fact that failure is something that most businesses have a difficult time accepting, does not mean it is not a blessing in disguise. In this reading selection, the reader can understand more thoroughly the importance of accepting failure in a product’s life cycle and its silver lining for companies. It takes a very skilled leader-manager to recognize the benefits of failure. Whether a failure costs a company almost everything it has, or it is done inexpensively, it is one of the most vital components of a company’s growth. To be innovative in a world where products become obsolete in almost the same moment they are invented, failure needs to be looked at through the perspective of, “How can we benefit from this not working?” Many companies take even more risk by presenting the fact that failure with new products is likely when presenting to potential investors. It is extremely important to do so because many will not take that concept into consideration when analyzing a new product, it may even be overlooked altogether. Some may take the viewpoint that speaking of failure before a new project is initiated would be detrimental to the product, and furthermore, the company’s success. However, failure needs to be recognized as part of the risk-taking, innovation process. It allows a company to understand its customers and their needs on a much greater scale. It also provides what needs to be reinvented, or tweaked, in order for the product to sustain a lengthy life cycle. Failure creates an organizational culture that allows everyone to think on a similar unbiased, open-minded level. To not accept failure and pick out the good pieces left behind is failure itself.

1. Is it good to foster a culture that reinforces failure? What are the pros and cons?
- It can be good but, not all of the time. I think the larger the company or the more innovative the product is, then yes, failure should be reinforced in the company’s culture. If not, failure becomes an oversight and if the worst is on the horizon to happen to a company or the product, the culture will not know to efficiently and effectively bounce back. The pros are: implementation of change, reinvented innovation, even level of expectations and rationale, greater sense of understanding the customer, stronger sense of responsibility one would have within the corporation, and an ambition to take risks. The cons would be the direct adverse of the pros which would be deflated attitudes, increased expectation to fail, little innovation, and lack of interest in the corporation or its stakeholders.
2. How can storytelling be used to embed an innovative culture?
- Storytelling often reminds and re-circulates the ups and downs of the past. In a corporation this would be beneficial for the most obvious reason-not to repeat past failures. In order to create an atmosphere in a corporation that allows innovation to be at its peak and create profitable risks, knowledge of what has worked and what hasn’t gives the mind more to work with. Instead of finding problems with a failure, by means of storytelling, a company can reflect on an incident within the company’s history and look for key items to avoid.
3. How can organizations use reward systems to embed the positive aspects of failure?
- By reviewing history of the company’s failures, it may be an incentive for employees to study the trends of the current moment to the failed products and redevelop them. Also, bits and pieces of ideas can be pulled out of failed products and projects and then pieced together to create a totally new innovative product. Rewarding employees to accept failure, allows them to take a less-stressful leap into risk-taking and possibly pushing the company ahead of its competition.
4. How is Jeff Immelt trying to embed a culture that fosters innovation?
- Leading the GE innovators with the historic notion that the company would normally rid themselves of failure (and those who caused it) can be difficult for Jeff Immelt. He wants to see his team taking risks and keeping striving to push past failure. Failure is a part of the process of success. Instead of history repeating itself, he wants to profit off of innovation, because a company like GE needs to be ahead of its competitors as much as possible. Therefore embedding innovation facilitates collective commitment.
5. Which of the eight types of organizational structures are most likely to promote innovation? Explain your rationale.
- A “Team-Based Structure” would promote innovation because this type of organizational structure eliminates functional barriers to solve problems. People with different knowledge skills and functional levels are brought together in teams and pull all kinds of input and ideas out of each other.

Ethical Case: Should Drug Salespeople Be Allowed to Give Doctors Free Drug Samples & Gifts? (Chapter 10)

Unfortunately, a major piece of this snippet of reading was whether or not the charged salespeople indicated that the free gifts were given under the condition the doctors would promise to prescribe a certain kind of drug. I am assuming that these salespeople make a commission based on the fact the doctors prescribe the drugs the salespeople brought to them. If not, do the drug companies have these salespeople pushing their prescription drugs onto the doctors simply for them to earn a profit? Personally, I do not see anything wrong with giving gifts and free drug samples with doctors. If I was a salesperson, I would not solicit someone’s business and show up empty handed. Gifts sway anyone’s impression of you and if you are a salesperson that could make all of difference. However, if I went to a doctor with the intention of giving free samples and gifts as an indicator that the doctor’s best interest was to use my product over anyone else’s, then yes, this is unethical. In this scenario, I am not a doctor or a chemist, basically I am out to make quick money for myself. I cannot prove whether or not the prescription drug is any better than prescriptions a doctor may already feel comfortable using with his or her patients. For me to represent a pharmaceutical company and then say whatever comes to mind so I have that doctor prescribing my product could be costly to all stakeholders. If I was doing my job correctly and honestly, leaving a small gift or free samples with a doctor is just a way of doing business and marketing a product.

My answer selection: There is nothing wrong with this practice. Giving drug samples and gifts is simply another form of advertising.

Management in Action: How Should Managers Fire Good Workers Who Don’t Fit? (Chapter 9)

The larger the corporation, the harder it is to have a group of people working in sync in a corporate culture. Although as an employer, one may find suitable and very well qualified employees, personalities often are the cause of the employees’ difficulty of “fitting in”. This then becomes troublesome for management to achieve results from said employees because they are too busy being overly stressed by their work environment. Not only does the company lose a good person, they will lose a great worker. If the employer and potential employee from the beginning have clear expectations and goals, and both sides are honest about personality traits, the hiring process should eliminate the difficulty of fitting in. However, this is a relatively rare case in which everything orchestrates so smoothly and managers essentially have to fire phenomenal people. I think there are ways to readjust people rather than just giving up on them and letting them go. For a human resources manager to make every effort to offer assistance in securing the fired employee a new job is all well and good, but it is not effective. I believe that during the interview process, the interviewers can sense what drives the potential new hire and subsequently that person is hired based on the sense perceptions of the interviewers. To turn around shortly thereafter and say that person “cannot fit in” or “his or her maladjustment into the corporation is causing stress among other employees” is taking a cheap way out of molding the new hire. People simply need to be placed in the appropriate position, with similar types of people in order to flourish. By firing someone and shuffling him or her out the door without working with what that person brought to the company initially will make both sides ultimately fail.

1. How might companies inadvertently discriminate when firing good employees who don’t fit? Explain. - Without a clear explanation of what stipulations the company is firing upon, the employee can easily spin the termination in his or her favor and sue the company on grounds of discrimination. For example, if it is a woman being fired and her counterparts were mostly men, it could look like the company didn’t want a woman in that particular position because of her gender. 2. How can an employer use its recruitment and selection process to minimize the problem of hiring people who don’t fit in? Provide specific recommendations. - During the interview process, the selection committee can screen the interviewee’s personality traits by way of body language, gestures, and verbal communication. From that point the committee could provide certain scenarios that may occur on a daily basis at the company and see how the interviewee acts when responding and listen to everything the interviewee is NOT saying. I feel this provides huge insight as to whether a person will work well with other different types of people in the workplace. 3. How can companies revise their performance appraisal procedures and processes to reduce the problem of employing people who don’t fit? Discuss your recommendation. - As I had stated in my summary analysis, I do not believe an employer should give up molding a great employee to the corporation’s culture and environment. That person came to the company with great traits to offer the company’s future success. Albeit you can’t change people, you can change the process in which they think. If I were a manager providing feedback in the performance appraisal, I would list the major issues that were affecting the work performance of the employee and the company in general. Then, I would tie in what is good about the person, on a personal level, and then as a professional. From there, I would try to redevelop a strategy to have this person working at his or her peak. 4. Why is it hard for managers to fire employees who don’t fit in? What can be done to overcome these causes? Explain. - It is difficult because a manager may find him or herself in that employee’s shoes. Situations become over-analyzed and then taken to a personal level. Part of the responsibility of being a manager is to know when it is most appropriate to let someone go because the long-term outlook for the company will be obstructed by trying to acculturate that employee. To overcome these difficult moments, managers should develop certain guidelines that all employees should “fit” before being evaluated for long term employment.