Introduction
The concept of changing mindset transcends to both the personal perspective of every individuals to shift from career to entrepreneurship and the organizational perspective of shifting into a learning organization. Furthermore, the concept of changing mindset will be elaborated by analyzing a case study and the article by Seddon and O’Donnovan (2010). In he first part, the changing mindset was demonstrated by the case of Andy who successfully established a small business instead of staying in his career. It is apparent from the case that changing from career into a small business entrepreneur can be a challenge, but is easily overcome by means of ensuring that best practices in startups were achieved such as good planning on which products and services to offer. Marketing was also found to be an integral part of any business model, which provides a greater focus on future direction of the business. On the other hand, the article by Seddon and O’Donnovan demonstrates the need for organizations to change its system of management by adopting learning concepts to meet customer demands instead of focusing on quantifying the workers’ organizational function.
Leaving a Career for a Small Business
Most of the people would plan their future with the goal of acquiring a college degree given the common notion that having sufficient education would lead to a better future. At the end of day, education is still considered as a stepping-stone for the comfortable future on the anticipation of having a good career. However, a lot of people are still looking into other possibilities of securing their future by venturing into a small business even if they have no significant capital, existing model to follow or experience. According to Omar and Noordin (2013), one of the reasons that people choose to venture into putting up a small business regardless of the uncertainties is because of career adaptability. This means that people tend to seek for opportunities where they can develop and apply their expert knowledge, but still able to do so within their own time. Career adaptability is about having the abilities and skills needed in order to respond to the environment.
However, in a corporate setting, rules in which the freedom to create and implement a person’s adaptability standards can be limited. On the other hand, owning a small business that relates to the interest of the career person would enable him to not only create and develop new ideas, but also gain from it at the same time. In addition, the level of job satisfaction is also a factor that made individuals to leave their career in exchange for an opportunity of having their own business. According to Alam and Mohammad (2009), being satisfied in the work environment is a motivational factor that improves a company’s retention rate. However, if an employee lacks the motivation because of unfavorable work conditions, the level of satisfaction declines and the intent to leave becomes a more preferable option even for career professionals.
Reasons Why Andy’s Party Achieved Success
In the case of Andy, he finished both Bachelor’s and Master’s degree, which landed him a high profile position in a well-known firm. Given that Andy is receiving a good pay and impressive benefits, his discontent grew and after a while made his decide to put a business, which is Andy’s Party. The question here is that how Andy was able to achieve success. For starters, Andy has good background in business given his high profile position in his former employer. Being in such an important position in a firm encompasses responsibilities related to the firm’s decision-making. Experience is also an important factor Andy’s success as a small business entrepreneur, which was presumably acquired during his time with the previous company. The assumption of experience in business was based on the fact that Andy was able to plan the business from products and services to marketing and conceptualization, which are paramount to any business startup. In addition, Andy was able to have a clear vision of his business concept judging from the reasons he articulated why people should choose his business. More importantly, Andy was not alone in the process because having his wife to help him out with the business operations is a valuable aspect of the business success. This is because having another person to oversee the business and sharing responsibility encompasses a greater probability of success.
Future Plans
Andy is subcontracting third-party providers such as high-end caterers, entertainers, and bounce house rentals. Given that the business is growing since the last four years, the future direction of the business could be an expansion to other areas that they are lacking such as the three services that they are subcontracting. It is apparent that subcontracting will also cost the business expenses to pay for rentals. However, adding capital to the business will enable it to establish an in-house supply of services that they are formerly subcontracting. For example, purchasing bounce house is an investment that will cost them additional capital. However, having an in-house bounce house will save them the cost of renting from third-party providers. Furthermore, the availability of their own bounce house will also generate additional income for the business because they can also offer rentals of the equipment. If the conditions are right for Andy’s business, the succeeding years will allow him to expand to other segments of the business such as organizing events beyond children’s party, provide catering services by having a catering segment of his own for high-end service requirements.
Synopsis
In order to escape this system referred to by Denning as a prison, it was advocated that the management should focus on overseeing the flow of work in he broader organizational system rather than measuring the functional activities. Furthermore, the counter intuitive truth observed from Denning’s argument suggests that the consequence of the management’s focus on cost is that they inadvertently drive the costs up (Seddon and O’Donnovan). In this sense, the authors presented the concept of double-loop learning, which was defined as the reshaping of behavior and thinking that determines why actions were taken. Furthermore, the double-loop learning encompasses generative learning, which is essential in the process of shifting into a learning organization (Seddon and O’Donnovan). After studying the role of value demand in enabling service design from the users’ perspective, the users are able to get what they want while the service provider improves and drive the cost down at the same time. Through a customer-oriented system design, managements should be able to focus on their responsibility of providing as much value to the customer’s demands as possible.
Achieving organizational learning encompasses understanding of demand that the organization receives from the customers and at the same time ensures the possibility of training workers in order to meet the predictable value demand. This is because when organization receives demand and the workers are not trained to address the demand, necessary expertise will be pulled into the system, which will add up to the cost. In order to integrate the described concept of learning organization through workers’ training, a system archetype was introduced for transactional service organizations. This archetype encompasses the key measures of capacity and capability, which aims the workers to achieve single piece flow that will enable a process where the demand will be addressed as soon as it enters the system instead of pooling all demands and address them as one.
Summary
The discussion is divided into two parts where the first half encompasses an analysis of case of Andy who left his career despite having a high profile position in the firm in exchange for a possible success as a small business entrepreneur. Several factors were identified that explains why a person who trade his career for a small business despite uncertainties. These factors are low job satisfaction and lack of freedom from for creativity and the need for career adaptability. On the other hand, Andy was able to achieve success in his party needs services business because of having a clear direction in terms of what products and services will fit the client’s demand and capitalizing that demand to create value. The same idea about the role of value and customer demand to an organization was perceived from the article by Seddon and O’Donnovan where the concept of learning organization was articulated at the second half of the discussion. It was found that the current system of management in most organizations today was based on the context of command and control characterized by obsession of the management of quantifying the worker’s activities. Instead, organizations should incorporate learning as a core aspect of management. Through learning that the organization would be able to address customer demand where the workers should be given trained to meet those demands and ensure that it will be addressed as soon as it enters the system.
Works Cited
Alam, Muhammad Masroor and Jamilha Fakir Mohammad. "Level Of Job Satisfaction And Intent To Leave Among Malaysian Nurses". Business Intelligence Journal 3.1 (2009): 123-137. Web. 1 Sept. 2016.
Omar, Safiah and Fauziah Noordin. "Career Adaptability And Intention To Leave Among ICT Professionals: An Exploratory Study". The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology 12.4 (2013): 11-18. Web. 1 Sept. 2016.
Seddon, John and Brendan O’Donovan. "Why Aren’T We All Working For Learning Organisations?".Organizations and People 17.2 (2010): 1-15. Web. 1 Sept. 2016.
