Reflection OBHR
Reflection Statement
Business Acumen for Technical Leaders :
Organizational Behavior & Human Resource Management
Vinod Kotiya
I would like to start with some important things which I learned in the class which is not only about Organizational Behavior but also Psychological Safety from Dr. Wayne Rawcliffe. I especially liked the comment that we understand the reality of the breakdown of the world. We only see a piece as a construct and think pieces as whole. Reality is complex so we make abstract models. Another thing is don't teach everyone to speak but create leaders to make an environment for others to be heard.
We started with learning a high performance team which includes diversity, EQ, motivations and conflict. Teams are a social system and there are no rules to govern the outcome. Here we learned the concept of 5 conditions:
Real Team: Groups are not teams. Teams are responsible for goals & stable over time.
Compelling Direction: Objectives and demonstration from leaders to achieve the goals.
Enabling structure: Job clarity, motivation, authority and feedback is required.
Supportive context: Reward and recognition. Not always monetary.
Coaching: Motivation at start but consultative and reflective towards end.
The new thing I learned was a topic: Psychology Safety and understood its importance. Normally all institutions and policies have stabilization factors and are very difficult to change. That's why change management comes into effect. Also Rules are for fools and not for high performing teams. Equality in conversation is required along with good listening. There are many interdisciplinary issues which we learned with the case study of Children's Hospital and Clinic.
I have reflected my own experience in this case study about the time in my career when I was empowered to speak up with the few factors which contributed for openness. These were Authority, Team formation, Making roadmap and policy formulation. With all such responsibilities I was comfortable to speak up about all the good ideas and issues comfortably. The work environment when I was assigned the responsibilities out of my domain and expertise prevented me from speaking up. I realize that the task is not important and it will not be affected by my contribution or idea so it is worthless to put any impact. Therefore In my professional life I have to take utmost care to know what my colleagues are thinking and to improve the things within the team environment.
Later we did an amazing simulation where I got the role of a product manager for a newly launched device GlucoGauge of a company Matterhorn. This exercise helped me to understand the cognitive biases in decision making. Initially, I examined the background information and available evidence provided by SVP of Marketing, and determined that the problems associated with inaccurate readings using the monitor were due to consumers misusing the device in the field. Here I learned about confirmation bias which was polarization of views based on information.
I found the user manual not adequate and very generic in nature. Initial report shows that testers were educated and tech savvy therefore the user manual should not be a problem to them. This issue was confirmed with another report that says user confidence increases to use the device after verbal instruction. So this was the area I identified to work upon. So I decided to go with the management allocated budget for consumer training only and not for training the doctors. Since doctors are educated enough to use the device, there was no point in working in that area. When this exercise failed I gave up to use further funds in this so I have not failed in the trap of sunk cost effect.
I was informed the Problem originated from a new strip supplied by the device. Microprocessor component was failing with the new strip but working fine with our old strip..I took immediate action and informed users to switch the brand of test strips. This caused financial impact including 400 employees layoff and here I tried to avoid the framing bias with not much emotionally affected to job loss thing..
When I was asked about the percentage of users getting wrong readings because of mobile app syncing. I kept it way less to 30% compared to 65% data from one doctor which was provided to me without falling into the trap of anchoring bias.
I also learned about status quo traps and overconfidence traps. I learned about some decision making tests to avoid mistakes like the publicity test, reversibility test which is putting myself at the receiving end of a decision. Generalizability test which is how it feels when someone else makes this decision for me. Also ladder of inference which is taking data and adding meaning to existing assumptions is required. Left hand tool is good to know the things which only I know.
I also felt that using such techniques for decision making with a cost where time bound decisions can not be made for a project. Therefore I have to look for a proper balance based on the outcome in my professional life. I will work more upon cognitive bias traps and try to implement them in my decision making. I think this understanding will also be useful in my professional life. I am also working in a startup under e@UBC and I would like to apply these learnings on crucial decisions which I have to make for growth in a couple of months and setting up my team. Overall It was great learning in a short span of time.
References
AMY EDMONDSON, MICHAEL A. ROBERTO, & ANITA TUCKER. (2001, January). Children's Hospital and Clinics. Harvard Business School Publishing.
Duhigg, C. (2016, February 25). What Google Learned From Its Quest to Build the Perfect Team (Published 2016). The New York Times. Retrieved August 7, 2022, from https://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/28/magazine/what-google-learned-from-its-quest-to-build-the-perfect-team.html
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