COMM 2820 Take-Home Exam Summer 2017 Read the following scenarios and related questions. Type your answers and submit your answers on Blackboard. You do not need to repeat the questions, simple list the # of the question along with your answer. Use the textbook, notes posted on Blackboard, and anything you want to look up on the Internet to inform your answers. 1. Watch the movie trailer of the NASA example of Groupthink: (Do NOT buy the video.) http://study.com/academy/lesson/group-think-definition-examples.html The trailer shows staff from the Aerospace Engineering company and NASA working together to make a decision to launch the shuttle or not. 1 a) Describe the group dynamics that are playing out in this situation. 1 b) Imagine that you are a consultant who has been assigned to work with this team, what decision making process would you recommend the group use? 2. Read the scenario below. Describe the types of “power” Kerry has as the team leader and explain why he has these powers. Keary is a project manager for a virtual team in a six-state area. Since 90% of the team work is done via phone, email, fax, and web-conferencing, Keary finds it essential to meet early in the project in a face-to-face setting in order to establish interpersonal trust. Keary explains, “My degree in mechanical engineering provides me with my expert knowledge, but I have to make my expertise user-friendly especially for team members who are not trained in engineering. My group communication skills are central to getting the job done. I have little formal leadership authority -- everyone on the team reports to a different boss. I try not to micromanage the project. I try to be the friendly devil’s advocate to test the thinking process of the team.” 3. Read the scenario below. What are the powers Faith demonstrates? Faith works for a Fortune 500 company that employs approximately 90,000 people globally in 43 countries. She has worked for the company for nine years and has held five different positions. According to Faith, “I believe that one key to being an effective team member is self-awareness. A team member should have a reflective understanding of how he or she is likely to be perceived by others. For example, in almost every team setting I walk into, as a result of being a woman, blond, and young, I expect to be stereotyped by some team members before the meeting even starts. To counter potential misperceptions, I jump into the conversation early and offer well thought-out ideas. 4. Read the scenario below. Imagine that you are the sophomore on the committee. Describe what you would do to move the committee towards achieving its goal, and explain why. The Dean of Student Affairs at your college has become sensitive about reports from students that the activities scheduled for orientation week each year are silly. Specifically, student have been reacting to two of the Dean’s favorite activities: pass-the-orange under your chin relay race and the find-your-own-shoes –in-the-middle-of-theroom relay race. Students think the games are childish. To solve the problem, the Dean has created a student committee to recommend new activities for orientation week. The committee is composed mostly of juniors and seniors. As president-elect of next year’s sophomore class, you are the youngest of the six committee members. The chairperson is a graduating senior. You arrive at the first meeting ready to work. You are excited about being part of a decision-making process that will enact real change. To your dismay, the other members of the group seem to disregard their task and spend the meeting discussing the basketball team’s performance. You leave the meeting confused, but hope the next meeting will be better. At the second meeting, you suggest that the committee discuss next year’s orientation week. Members agree and then start making jokes about the past orientation activities. When the chairperson makes no effort to keep the group on task, you feel frustrated. You know the Dean expects a report in a week. 5. Read the scenario below. If you were Dr. Chelsea McGuire, what would you do? Explain why. Chelsea McGuire is the Chairperson of a Communication Department at a university in the southeastern United States. She has been Chair for more than five years and has built a very successful department. But Chelsea has been worried for some time that the department is too successful. Over the last few years, the number of Communication majors has been increasing steadily. When Chelsea took over as Chair, there were 500 Communication majors; now there are more than 800 majors, and there is no indication that the trend will reverse itself. Unfortunately, the university’s financial support for the department has not been increasing at the same pace. With a faculty of only 15 professors, Chelsea known that some kind of action needs to be taken soon. A month ago, Chelsea appointed two separate groups to study the problem and formulate enrollment management plans. First she formed an ad hoc enrollment management committee to look into the problem. Second, she asked the standing undergraduate curriculum committee to consider possible avenues for dealing with the preponderance of Communication majors. Chelsea now has a memo from each of the committees on her desk, and she has scheduled a meeting of the full faculty to discuss options and come to a decision about enrollment management. Let’s first take a look at the memos from the two committees. To: Dr. Chelsea McGuire, Chairperson, Dept. of Communication From: Dr. Walter Staniszewski, Chairperson, Ad Hoc Enrollment Management Committee Date: March 23, 2005 Subject: Enrollment Management Plan The Ad Hoc Committee on Enrollment Management has met on three occasions in the last month and conducted extensive research into enrollment management systems around the campus. Our goal was to determine the optimal system for stemming the flow of majors into the Communication Dept. In order to reach our goal, we conducted a systematic survey of all other campus departments to determine if they too, had experienced problems with over-enrollment in the past ten years. If they had experienced the problem, we inquired about plans that had been instituted to deal with the problem and established how well these plans were working. We also carefully compared the characteristics of other campus departments with relevant attributes of the Communication Department in considering option for dealing with our own enrollment management problems. After committee evaluation of possible solutions, we have determined that three options are worthy of further departmental consideration: • Many departments have instituted additional course requirements for majors. This has served to make the major less attractive to many students. Specifically, we might want to consider instituting a requirement of two years of foreign language or a requirement of math and computer competency courses. • Some departments have instituted strict grade point requirements for entry into the major. Although the university does not encourage this type of plan, the departments believe it to have been highly successful. Specifically, we might want to consider instituting a 2.5 GPA requirement for entry into the major and continuation in the major. • A few departments have instituted an “application process” for admitting students to the major. Although this system would require additional paperwork on the part of the department, it would discourage students who were not truly interested in becoming majors. To: Professor Chelsea McGuire From: Professor Jerry Gluesing, Chair, Undergraduate Curriculum Committee Date: March 25, 2005 Subject: Enrollment Management Issue At its biweekly meeting, the Undergraduate Curriculum Committee took up the issue of enrollment management. We had a lively discussion on the issue, and it quickly became clear that a number of perspectives were possible. The committee was particularly persuaded by the position of Dr. Tanaka, who, as you know, has been with the department for more than 30 years. Dr. Tanaka pointed out that we have had these “crises” of too many majors (or too few majors) many times in the past, and have often spent an inordinate amount of time looking for the proper “solution” to the problem. Dr. Tanaka argued convincingly that enrollment ups and downs are part of the natural life cycle of an academic department and that we would be rash to institute major curricular or policy changes at this point. Indeed, as Dr. Tanaka pointed out, we have made few major changes to the program in the past 25 years, and over the long haul, enrollment has remained at a healthy but manageable level. Thus, although we would certainly enjoy discussing alternative ideas, our committee would suggest that no action be taken at this point. If necessary, we can revisit the issue next year at this time. With these two memos in hand, Chelsea McGuire is now getting set to lead a faculty meeting where the sole agenda item is discussion of an enrollment management system. Her leadership in the past has always been highly participative. She has generally gone along with the “will of the faculty” in making departmental decisions, and she has been pleased with the effect of this decision-making style on both the quality of decisions made and on faculty morale. However, she is now concerned that this style might not work for the enrollment management decision, and she is going into this meeting with a bit of trepidation.
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