360-Degree Appraisals at GE Case Analysis Assignment Help Introduction:
170 GE Employees in Durham, North Carolina, work in nine teams to produce the GE90 jet engines that are used by Boeing in its long-range 777 aircraft. Each team “owns” the engines they build, starting at the beginning of the assembly to them being loaded on the trucks for delivery. Teams are not given instructions from managers except for the date when the engine is to be shipped from the plant.
Self-management is used by the employees of this plant. The decisions that are made include when to order tools and parts; training, scheduling vacations, overtime, adjustments to the production process to improve efficiency, monitoring product quality, and taking responsibility for diagnosing and resolving any issues that may arise among the members of the team. Decisions are made by a consensus by everyone on the team; this is a founding principle of the plant.
Any ideas and decisions are to be lived with even though all team members may not agree; however, no blame is allowed to be placed on any of the team members when things go wrong because the decision was made with all team members consent. The consensus process has become a way of “life” at the plant so much that the employees routinely talk about “consensus” on this or that. Paula Sims is the only boss at this plant and her main objective is to keep everyone’s attention focused on the common goal of “making perfect jet engines correctly, quickly, and cheaply.
” Her job is to make sure that all team members’ efforts are coordinated so that their decisions optimize the plant’s performance and to free up resources for growth and improvement. She has learned that what you intend to communicate isn’t always easy and she has also learned to listen carefully to monitor her effectiveness. The culture at this plant is that the manager is responsible for making the decision only about a dozen times a year and the decisions are either heavily relied on input from the employees or are made by the employees.
The manager is only responsible for making sure the plant employees know about the problems and for informing the GE managers whom they report to. The manager is expected to listen, not decide. The plant manager educates the task force and everyone else about the problem and explains why it is important. It is the task force’s responsibility to find the solutions. Once the plan has been formed, the task force takes it to the plant manager who then informs the GE managers how they will proceed and makes sure the GE managers agree with the plan.
Key Issues: The first is that the production team lacks direction, and instruction in terms of completion date goals. The team is able to receive a definitive shipping date for the completed product. However, the team does not have a definitive process in reach to complete the product by that given shipping date. As a result, an inconsistency in the efficiency of production would be seen by this particular GE plant. The second key issue is that there is a lack of allocation of responsibilities between the team members, and the plant manager. There should be a human resources manager that coordinates with this particular team. This human resources manager in turn would be responsible for overtime, scheduling, training, and vacation dates. The production team’s primary focus should be on efficiently completing the product.
The plant manager should be able to take on the responsibilities of ordering tools, and parts, monitoring efficiency, and product quality, and being an unbiased mediator for resolving issues that surface amongst the team members. The last issue is the plant manager should be able to effectively resume checks, and balances within the plant, if this is what she feels comfortable doing in order to be an effective and proficient manager. Following up with the team about their productivity appears to have become an issue amongst that particular plant production team. The plant manager’s actions have become offensive to the team members. However, this is not the plant manager’s intent at all to be offensive, or come off as judging the team. The plant manager at the time was not aware of the plant’s culture, or team norms.
Root Problem: The root problem in this case is to incorporate the least consistent decision-making styles into the current process used by Durham/GE.
Problem Component: The problem component in this case is to implement a 360-degree appraisal process into the current process without changing the structure that is currently in place at Durham/GE.
Generating Alternatives: Due to the root problem and the problem component noted above, some alternatives that might be used to address these problems include:
Alternative
1: Incorporate the least consistent decision-making styles into the current process used by Durham/GE. Alternative
2: Implement a 360-degree appraisal process into the current process without changing the structure that is currently.
Case study GE: 360-degree appraisals Final assessment order description 360-degree appraisals in Durham, North Carolina, 170 GE employees work in nine teams to produce the GE90 jet engines that Boeing installs in its long-range 777aircraft. Each TEAM OWNS the engines they build from the beginning of the assembly process to getting them loaded onto a truck for delivery. As they begin each engine, these teams generally receive no instructions except for the date on which the engine is to be shipped from the plant. Getting the engine produces is the team goal, but the goal can be reached only if the teams effectively manage themselves.
Besides producing and 8.5 – ton jet engine out of 10,000 individual parts, team members order tools and parts; schedule their vacations, training, and overtime; make adjustments to the production process to improve their efficiency ; monitor their product quality; and take responsibility for diagnosing and resolving problems that arise among members of a team. Decisions about these and all other issues that the teams face are made by consensus, which was a founding principle for the plant. Each employee understands that living with ideas that they don’t necessarily agree with is part of the job. They don’t blame others when things go wrong, because they make the decisions. The process of reaching agreement on decisions is so much a way of life here that people routinely talk about “consensus” on this or that.
The one boss in this plant – plant manager Paula Sims keeps everyone’s attention focused on the common goal: making perfect jet engines quickly, cheaply, and safely. Her job is to make sure that the efforts of all teams are coordinated so that together their decisions optimize the plants performance and then to free up resources for growth and improvement. In her four years as the plant manager responsible for GE’s jet engine production teams, Sims has learned that communicating your intentions properly isn’t always easy. She describes her plant manager’s job as the most rewarding. To do it well requires a different level of listening skills – significantly different. More and more of what I do involve listening to people, to teams, to councils, to ideas, trying to find common themes.
” In this culture of continuous feedback, one reason Sims has listened so carefully is to monitor her own effectiveness. She learned early that her actions can be easily misinterpreted. Recalling an accident from her early days, she explained. “An employee came to me and said; ‘Paula, you realize that you don’t need to follow up with us to make sure’ were doing what we agreed to do. If we say we will do something, we-we will do it for you. – You don’t need to micromanage us. ’ ” At most plants’, following up is just part of a manager’s job, but here it was sending the wrong message because she always followed up, people concluded that she didn’t trust them. The real problem was the she had not yet learned the plants norms about decision making.Sims also listens when the plant is trying to solve a problem. At other companies the title of managers almost means “decision maker”, at GE/Durham, however, the manager actually makes only about a dozen major decisions each year.
All other decisions either rely heavily on input from, or actually made by, the other plant employees. The plant manager is responsible for making sure plant employees know about problems, and for informing the GE 360 – Degree Appraisals 2 managers that she reports to about the solutions. But to get the solutions, the plant manager is expected to listen, not decide. For major issues, such as reducing cost of important moving safety, a task force is formed to decide how to address the problem. The plant manager educates the task force and everyone else about the problem and e explains why is important. Then the task force takes responsibility for finding solutions. When they have a plan for the future, the plant manager informs those above her about how the plant will proceed and makes sure the higher-ups are on board with the plan.
As the HR manager for the plant, Sims has approached you with a request: she wants you to help her install 360 degree appraisals for everyone in the plant, including her. The 360 degree appraisals will not replace the other performance measures that already are being used. They will be simply be added on as a new element in the performance management system. You have expressed some concerns about the idea, but she is determining to move ahead with the plan. Describe how you will precede case questions begin by analyzing the possible advantages and disadvantages of using 360 – degree appraisals in this plant. Then indicate the decisions you would make regarding each of the following
questions:
1. Will you use one set of performance dimensions for everyone, or will people in different jobs be evaluated on different dimensions? Explain your logic?
2. How will you determine the specific content of the 360 degree appraisal form?
3. What type of rating format will be used to make the appraisal rating?
4. For the members of the nine production teams, who will provide performance assessment: All members of the team? Members of other team? Will Sims evaluations for all employees.
5. How will the feedback be answered?
6. What plant is operation well right now? What steps will you take to ensure that this new activity doesn’t reduce the plants productivity?
7. Are there other advantages or disadvantages to this appraisal?
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