Introduction
All organizations comprise of employees with different tasks trying to accomplish common organizational objectives. The fundamentals of the organization’s structure and design cause various individuals in the organization to behave differently with issues sometimes arising among the employees. To solve such issues among workers in an enterprise, it is imperative to learn how the employees interact with each other in the organization and find the best ways to manage them for the organization to have optimum performance.
Problem Statement
Marjorie Jacozki is a secretary in an organization, working for seven people including Ann Wheeler. Marjorie feels that Ann does not consider the fact that she works for six other people and leaves her with too much complicated work. She also complains that Ann only is never around to explain to her how she needs the work to be done and only leaves the instructions in notes. This has made Marjorie use too much time on Ann’s work that she has no time left to do the other people’s work.
Ann, on the other hand, feels that she has been too lenient on Marjorie and has given her less work compared to previous secretaries. Ann says that Marjorie does not spend as much time on her work as she does on other people’s work, she does not complete her work on time or sometimes keeps the job for some time and returns it saying she could not do it. Ann also does not feel the need to explain herself to Marjorie concerning how she does her work.
Analysis
The problems seem to occur due to both Ann’s and Marjorie’s lack of human and conceptual skills and also Marjorie’s lack of technical skill. Human skills are the basic skills required when working others such as communication, persuasion, and conflict resolution. Conceptual skills are used in the analysis of complex interrelated issues and require a good understanding of an organization’s operations. Finally, technical skills are required to complete specialized tasks (Schermerhorn, Hunt, and Osborn).
If both Ann and Marjorie had good conceptual skills, Ann would have understood that Marjorie works for six other and, therefore, is stretched thin for most of the time. Marjorie would also have understood that Ann travels a lot and could not deliver the jobs personally to Marjorie and explain to her what needs to be done. Marjorie also requires to have the technical knowledge to perform all secretarial duties.
Solutions to the Problems
The most important solution to the problem is efficient communication between Ann and Marjorie through another mode of communication with face-to-face being the most preferred method. Good communication would enable Ann to explain to Marjorie what she needs to be done; this would make Marjorie’s work easier allowing her to complete the jobs and beat the deadlines. Communicating their feelings and opinions to each other would also help solve the problem. This is because both of them feel that they are doing so much for the other, yet they both feel unappreciated. This is indeed true since Ann pays other typist to do her rush jobs and Marjorie sometimes goes home with Ann’s work in a bid to beat deadlines (Frantzve). Knowing such information would motivate both of them to be more flexible and accommodate each other.
Another solution would be to employ more qualified secretaries so as to increase the efficiency of how work is done in the organization. This would ensure that each secretary has ample time to finish their assigned jobs and employees would not need to outsource organizational work to another typist for it to be completed in time.
Conclusion
The best alternative would be to encourage communication between employees and secretaries. This would lead to them knowing each other not only on a professional level but also on a personal level. This will help build employee relationship and understand each other job description and capabilities preventing problems such as the one observed between Ann and Marjorie.
Works cited
Frantzve, J.L. “Marjorie Jacozki”. Behaving in Organizations: Tales from the Trenches. Newton, MA: Allyn and Bacon., 1983. Print.
Schermerhorn, John, James Hunt, and Richard Osborn. Core Concepts of Organizational Behavior. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 2004. Print.
