when an industry defines a state

My family moved to Michigan shortly before my junior year of high school. I didn't know much about the state, except that the U.S. automakers were there. Like horse racing is to Kentucky, automobiles are to Michigan. The decline of the auto industry has decimated the Michigan economy. So many jobs are directly linked to the auto manufacturers and every job is affected by the fate of the Big 3 automakers.

I was reading the Detroit Free Press this morning, the paper my brothers delivered when we lived in Mt. Pleasant, a small college town in the center of the state. The cover story on GM highlighted the key roles the company has played in Michigan as well as U.S. history. It's a fascinating article, particularly the insights into the power of GM to shape U.S. politics and policy. For example:

In 1953, Eisenhower named Charles Erwin Wilson, then-GM president, as secretary of defense. Asked during Senate hearings if the defense secretary could make a decision against the interests of General Motors, Wilson answered yes, but famously added he could not imagine such a case, "because for years, I thought what was good for the country was good for General Motors and vice versa."

But even in Michigan, some question whether the U.S. government should try to save the company. Should the taxpayers pay for executives' bad decisions? A recent poll suggests that taxpayers aren't too keen on this idea. Or is GM simply a victim of the country's recent economic near-collapse?

As an organizational communication scholar, I hope that Michigan's government officials learn their lesson and make a concerted effort to diversify the state's economy. For too long the U.S. automakers have held hostage the state's economy and for too long the politicians representing Michigan have listened to the automakers and ignored the pleas of other industries.

Whatever happens with GM, the case will provide important insight into how people should organize--or not--in the 21st century.

~ Professor Cyborg

organizations and the new economy

This morning I sent out the welcome message to the students enrolled in COMM 144 for the summer. Although the class doesn't officially start until Monday, getting an early start tends to reduce some of the ambiguity and anxiety students new to online classes often feel.

I'm in Michigan for the first 10 days of the summer session visiting my folks. The effects of the world-wide economic collapse are evident here with so many houses for sale, boarded up businesses, and less traffic on the roads. The headlines of the Detroit Free Press are all about GM's impending bankruptcy. For me, the saddest part is the impact on people's daily lives, especially those who retired from GM with promised benefits and pensions. That deferred compensation now may never reach the workers who depend on it, or at least the amount will be reduced. GM breaking its promise with retired employees provides support for Eisenberg et al.'s observation that there's a new social contract between employers and employees in which employers are not loyal to their employees, and employees are not loyal to their employers.

As I mentioned in an earlier blog, the turbulent economic climate will provide many examples of how organizations cope, change, survive--or don't.

~ Professor Cyborg

ending/begining

The department graduation is tomorrow evening and will mark the end of the semester for me. What began with about 40 graduates and 250 audience members is now 85 graduates and 750 audience members. It's become an important ritual for the department, although I'm wondering if we shouldn't scale it back next year. Go with the trend of living more simply and reducing our carbon footprint.

Graduation marks the beginning for the students as they leave the university and launch off on their career paths--which may involve additional time in school, traveling, or turning an internship into a full-time job. These are difficult economic times; I hope the university has given students what they need to succeed.

The end of the spring term also means I need to turn my attention to the summer session. So I'll start checking my class email regularly and post a few time to this blog before the session begins.

I didn't teach any classes at SJSU in the spring, so I'm looking forward to getting back in the classroom.

~ Professor Cyborg

144 Summer 2009

Summer registration started this past Monday, so I decided I better get my class launched over the weekend. The main website is up, although I may make a few changes between now and the start of the summer term.

With the current global financial crisis--which is really an organizational crisis--there will much for everyone in the class to blog about. No one has been immune from the impact of the economic crunch. Certainly students, faculty, and staff at SJSU are facing the reality of the California budget cuts. What can we learn about organizations from what has happened? That will be the important take away.

~ Professor Cyborg

mindfulness and metaphors

Chapter 11 is sort of a catch all for the topics the authors haven't addressed earlier in the text, a chance to revisit some concepts, and a look to the future of organizational communication. The authors again discuss dialogue, linking it with mindfulness when they note that thinking is the essence of authentic dialogue. Communication research suggests that organization members interact mindlessly most of the time. Mindless communication can be useful because the brain reserves energy for more challenging interactions. But being mindful is nonetheless an important aspect of competent organizational communication, requiring communicators to adapt messages to their listeners.

The most interesting part of this chapter for me is the section on new logics of organizing. While the dominant metaphor is organizations as machines, it's often not the best way to organize. Viewing management as poetry suggests that managerial tasks are motivated by story and metaphor. For example, I've learned a lot about how to chair a department from the stories that others have told. In addition, viewing management as poetry recognizes that organizational behavior is seldom rational; people do the things they do and say the things they say for all sorts of reasons and motivations.

New metaphors for organizing include organizational communication as discourse, which focuses attention on organizations as texts. Organizational communication as voice highlights who is allowed to speak in an organization and who isn't. For example, reflect on how much say CSU students get in fee increases, courses offered, and graduation requirements. Organizational communication as performance suggests that organizational life is best understood as a drama--some aspects are fairly scripted, but others are more like improv.

~ Professor Cyborg

organizing and technology

The most interesting aspects of Chapter 10 for me are those focusing on organizations and new communication technologies. I don't think the authors fully grasp the degree to which the internet, cell phones, the like have impacted organizational communication, organizations, and organizing. For example, internet communication researchers have rejected media richness theory and embraced notion of a communication imperative, which I discuss in the Technology & Teams web lecture.

This imperative is related to Mouritsen and Bjorn-Andersen's argument that one concern in analyzing communication technology is humans are agents, which means that humans are able to work around the prescribed system. Consider the kinds of strategies employees will use to avoid surveillance technology. In identifying concerns in analyzing communication technology, Mouritsen and Bjorn-Andersen argue that technology is politically ambiguous, which means that technology can be used to both promote and constrain dialogue. Another concern in analyzing communication technology according to Mouritsen and Bjorn-Andersen is understanding is partial, which means that organization members' behaviors may lead to unintended consequences.

Eisenberg et al. observe that many social relationships within and between organizations involve mediated interpersonal communication, or the use of email, fax, telephones, and other forms of new communication technologies. I find this terminology rather quaint. What work relationships doesn't involve some sort of mediated communication? The telephone is a mediated form of communication and organization members have used phones to communication for over 100 years. As I discuss in the Technology & Teams web lecture, there's no virtual vs. real world--it's all real. Organization members use whatever forms of communication are available to meet their communicative goals.

~ Professor Cyborg

leading and organizing

Leadership has never been one of my interests as an organizational communication scholar. I've always felt it should be, but I tend to be more interested in the view from the bottom of the hierarchy. Nonetheless, leadership does function at all levels in an organization. Rather than looking to "a" leader, organizations generally work better when leadership and leading are more distributed.

In Chapter 9, the authors of your text discuss various approaches to leadership. The trait approach to leadership provides the insight that physical attractiveness is a key component of effective leadership. An early version of the leadership approach to leadership posited autocratic, democratic, and laissez-faire leaders. From the situational approach to leadership, leaders’ behaviors can be categorized as delegating, participating, selling, or telling. The transformational approach to leadership stresses the importance of leaders communicating a vision that resonates with followers.

After serving as acting chair of the department for six months last year, I could relate to the section in the chapter on effective leadership habits. Habits of mind essential for effective leaders include sensing, presencing and realizing. Habits of character include accessibility, decisiveness, and valuing individuals. Habits of authentic and compelling communicative performance include creating a vision for the future and developing a credible life story. In leading the department, I found the habits of character to be the most important in securing faculty enthusiasm and productivity. For example, faculty could easily contact me via email, phone, or in person. There are some decisions I made myself, such as setting up a faculty wiki. And I made sure to thank and acknowledge faculty members for their efforts in completing essential departmental tasks.

~ Professor Cyborg