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LS 100 ORGANIZATIONAL BEHAVIOR Mr. Manolet M. Siojo Second Individual Long Test 1. Case analysis should include the following: Your brief analysis of the personality profiles of the major characters in the case based on the OB individual-level variables Your brief analysis of the group profile of the statistics department in the case based on the OB group-level variables Determine the major problem and key issues Setting your objectives for problem solution Outlining alternative courses of action with the pros and cons of each course of action Coming to a conclusion your final choice of action 2. Maximum seven (7) pages; double-spaced 3. Keep your analysis brief and concise. 4. Submission: March 23, 2012 (Friday) by 12noon at JGSOM Faculty Office. Late submissions will merit appropriate deductions.

BLACK HAWK ENGINEERING COMPANY In 2001 the Black Hawk Company hired Don Wilson, age 34, as chief statistician and manager of the newly formed statistics department. Black Hawk was the Philippines largest civil engineering-construction firm, employing over 1,000 people and having annual gross billings in excess of P500 million. The company had grown rapidly since its founding in 1990 and over the years the firms growth rate and size had prompted many internal reorganizations. One of the changes occurred in late 1993 when the board of directors decided to organize a statistics department and hire a professional statistician. Black Hawk executives saw a need for improving the nature and availability of internal operations figures. Don Wilsons name was suggested to the Black Hawk directors by the American Mathematics Association which Black Hawk had asked to list competent men in the statistics field. Wilson, an American, held a Ph.D. in statistics from Stanford University in California. He had remained at Stanford after earning his graduate degree, and in 2001 was associate professor of Mathematics and a part-time research fellow. For Wilson, the position with Black Hawk was his first outside of the academic world and his first chance to travel and live abroad. He accepted the position in order to try his hand at line responsibility and to study the level of mathematical sophistication in a foreign country.

The men whom Wilson inherited for the new Black Hawk statistics department had been doing data-gathering and recording work for the company since 1990. Their tasks had been routine and clerical and they had never been organized formally as a department; nevertheless, this group of men tabulated all of the internal and sales figures that did exist in the Black Hawk files. Among the 16-man statistics group, only two had had any high-level training in the use or application of mathematics. These were Mr. I.U. Nueva, the assistant manager, and Mr. Carlo Barrera, a newly hired departmental research assistant. The rest of the men had been with the statistics operation and were classed as clerks by the company human resource department. Most of these men were middle-aged and old-timers in the company and only finished high school. With the aid of his assistant manager, Mr. Wilson organized the department along the lines shown in Exhibit 1. The two staff sections were each headed by a chief clerk who directly supervised the activities in his section and assigned new work projects. These men, in turn, reported to Mr. Nueva, whose main responsibility was the smooth and efficient work flow through the department. Wilsons plan was that Nueva would handle personnel matters so that his own and Barreras time would be free for high-level project studies. Nueva, 46, had joined Black Hawk in 1991 as chief clerk and had risen to the rank of assistant supervisor by 1997. He was a graduate of a local evening college where he had majored in accounting and economics. Before the reorganization of the departments, Mr. Nueva had been in charge of the gathering and recording of company figures. Carlo Barrera, age 26, was the first Filipino hired by Black Hawk who possessed a graduate school degree from an American university. He had had graduated cum laude from the University of the Philippines and then spent four years in at Stanford University working for a Ph.D. in applied mathematics. Many of his classes had been taught by Mr. Wilson, and when the latter was hired by Black Hawk, he had asked Barrera to join him as a research aide. Barrera saw in his appointment an excellent opportunity to gain recognition as a statistician in his own country and continue to work under a man he greatly respected. He had been told, too, by a company vice president that if his work in this capacity proved to be highly satisfactory to top management, he might well expect a bright future with Black Hawk Engineering. During the first week on the job, Mr. Wilson suggested to his research assistant that the latter spend some time watching the work of the staff men, chatting with them during coffee breaks, and examining the companys operating papers. In this way, suggested Wilson, he would begin to feel more at home in his new position and be better prepared to begin his own projects. During these get-acquainted days, Carlo felt that the staff men did not especially welcome him to the company, nor did they show any interest in his assignment with their department. Although nothing had ever been said to give him the impression, Barrera wondered if anything he had said had prompted this cold shoulder or perhaps he was just too oversensitive to the others reactions. About two months after Wilson had joined Black Hawk, the occasion arose for him to take a two-week trip to Cebu on company business. By this time the department was

functioning smoothly, and Mr. Wilson decided to let his research assistant taste his first bit of line responsibility. Accordingly, having first explained this rationale for his plan to Mr. Nueva, he announced to other members of the statistics department that in his absence all reports and matters needing authorization should be presented to Mr. Barrera. In this manner he though he would give Carlo a chance to look good to his supervisors while simultaneously leaving the department in good hands. During the two-week period, it occurred to Barrera that the method used by one of the staff men, Mr. Singson, to record company sales figures was relatively inefficient. He reasoned that an entirely different and more systematic method would speed up the process and Singsons work much easier. Carlo spent a number of hours thinking about a better system and then actually went through the motions of the job to test his own method. Satisfied that he could help both the department and Singson with his new idea, Barrera approached the staff man with his plan: Mr. Singson, Ive noticed how you have been handling and recording the sales figures, and I think theres a faster and easier way to do it. Mind if I show you? Go right ahead. Well, I think this new way will cut your recording time in half therefore providing you with plenty of time to get other jobs done and impress the bosses. You should probably get a raise out of this Now, if you would sort the daily account cards alphabetically before you start and then (detailed explanation and demonstration followed) see, thats all there is to it. Look, Barrera, you may have figured out another way of handling these cards, but I have been doing this same work for years than youve been wearing long pants, and I know how to get it done. Surely, Mr. Singson, you dont mean that you know four hundred account cards? Maybe you can memorize thirty or forty accounts and that was okay years ago but were a big company now and growing, and we cant leave everything up to memory now Look, dont you see how this can help you get your work done in half the time Are you telling me that I have to use your method? No, Im just. Well, then, if you dont mind, I think Ill just stick to the way thats been good enough for eleven years. When Don Wilson returned from his trip to Cebu, he called in his research for an account of the departments operations. From the minute young Barrera uttered his first words, Wilson could tell he was in for some trouble:

 Everyones way behind in his work, but I cant figure out why. The workload is the same as alwaysNo ones sick.I asked Nueva why and he didnt know

Exhibit 1 Black Hawk Engineering Company Organization Chart of the Statistics Department

Mr. Don Wilson Manager Carlo Barrera Research Assistant Mr. Nueva Assistant Manager

Section Chief

Section Chief

Sales Figures Recording Section Seven Men

Internal Operations Recording Section Four Men