MGMT 202 Sample Essay Graded – 45/50
Starbucks, one of the biggest coffee chains, focuses on giving the same experience to each and
every customer in the world. Every time you walk into a Starbucks, you know you will be greeted
with a smile and a friendly attitude. Every Starbucks has a similar feel, and your drink order will
taste the same whether you are in Turkey or London. The training of the staff, being friendly with
customers and having the knowledge of the product provide a superior experience the Starbucks
customers expect. The company management argues that these are the main factors behind
Starbuck’s worldwide success.
Do you agree with Starbucks management that these factors positively affect the
company’s performance? Critically discuss through the elements of Mcdonaldization.
The concept of Mcdonaldization, created by Geroge Ritzer. This theory is like an improved version of
the breaucracy that emerged from fordism. Conceptually, the two are the same. Their aim is to achieve
maximum efficiency, with minimum movement and input. Mcdonalization, tooks his name from the
McDonalds fast food chain, which is very similar in structure of Starbucks. Both of them are well-known,
worldwide companies with numerous branches and follow a stereotyped system which is
Mcdonaldization. It has four important elements, efficiency, calculability, predictability and control, which
are form this concept. This management system is positively effective in line with its purpose, but it also
has negative aspects when we look from a different perspective. In this essay, I will analayze positive
affects as well as the negative ones.
Firstly, the fact that people entering Starbucks all over the world have the exact same experience and
taste is a very important factor in the company's growth as a chain. The biggest secret of them
being able to achieve this is the old systems we mentioned. People don't need any extra skills or
knowledge to work at Starbucks. Thus, the company chooses its employees according to their younger,
dynamic and smiling faces. Afterall, they give everything that needs to be done, the rules to be followed.
They prepare its employees by undergoing the necessary trainings, and creates a uniform employee
type all over the world. People know what to expect and they don't take risks. This connects with
predictability which supports companies success. Furthermore, when we examine the trainings of
employees, we see that eveyone specialize in certain area. If we pay attention in the shop, there is a
layout from the selection point of products to the taken point. Employees focus on a single job at a time,
thus productivity increase. They are avoiding long lines and don't keep people waiting. This structure
reminds the assembly line in fordism. In addition, generally system is so well-defined that company's
inputs and outputs are also clear. Everything is measurable and in a form of calculability. As a result,
the firm has discontinued some of the stimulating drinks and has begun to release later.
Secondly, besides all of the positive factors of management, there is also a negative side. As a result,
of these rules that lead the company to success, there is the decrease in human relations. Empployee
appreciation is hindered by these restrictions and job discipline, which are also not conductive to
creativity. It was designed to behave like a human robots and was not expecting anything else. I recently
read an article about Elon Musk, in which he stated his fault about using insufficient human force in their
assembly line and explained the value of human relations. The fact that, besides his developments in
AI, this explanation take my attention. To be clear, people are used as machines in the Mcdonaldization
framework eventhough human relations are critically important for efficiency. On the other hand, the
assembly line, which has been developed very systematically, can create stress for the employees after
a while. Because they have to keep up with that pace, and that creates presure. This situation in
Mcdonaldization called dihumanization.
To conclude,ı believe the system of Mcdonaldization is a well-established management system. When
ıt used correctly, ıt is an element that leads companies to success. Starbucks and their performance in
coffeshop industry is an example for this. Today, Mcdonaldization's effects still contine, but its negative
effects are also trying to be minimized.
FEEDBACK: This is really a very good essay XXX. Well done! You integrated what we discussed in
class about Mcdonaldization to the Starbucks' case.
MGMT 202 Sample Essay Graded – 30/50
At the beginning of this April, some Kinder Surprise chocolate eggs have been recalled over a link
to 63 UK cases of salmonella mostly in young children. The Food Standards Agency (FSA) said all
the eggs affected had been made in the same factory in Belgium. Belgium's food safety authority,
the AFSCA, said the factory was ordered to shut after Ferrero was unable to provide complete
information for its investigation.
On the other hand, chocolate-maker Ferrero said none of its Kinder products released for sale had
tested positive for salmonella. The firm representatives stated: "We take matters of food safety
extremely seriously. We want to sincerely apologize to all our consumers and business partners
and thank the food safety authorities for their valuable guidance." The FSA said Ferrero was
voluntarily recalling the products as a precautionary measure and added it had received no
complaints. It said the firm was working closely with food safety authorities to identify the exact
cause of the outbreak.
Critically assess Ferrero's approach according to your knowledge of business ethics and
stakeholder management.
In this particular case of Ferrero and its sub-brand Kinder, a immense incident took place. The
organization; "The Food Standards Agency(FSA)" and Belgium's food safety authority(AFSCA) created
an argument that criticised the company and its operational failure inside the its production line-factory.
The salmonella disease that had been seen especially in young children resulted in a communication
and movement failure for the large multinational company Ferrero. The company tried to emphasize on
its precise production system and health-care that it regulates around its factory lines and around the
company. Continously, Ferrero had tried to not cover its mistake but carefully fix the mistake with
recalling its products with safety check as well as creating a almost-balanced communication line wth
food safety authorities which are the main actors in this problem.
Ferrero is a huge company that is European-based but functions and sells its products all around the
world. Its products are delivered and used in lots of households' homes and larger spaces. It has a
history of knowledge, people advantage and workforce that makes the company a singular and particular
one. In most occasions and times, company is pretty successful with dealing along its health
measurements, worker conditions and product quality as seen from the business reports and economic
data of the companies quarterly and yearly reports. In the beginning of 2020, the world was disrupted
with the COVID-19 disease and its spread all around the world in a short span of time. Everyone's lives,
how they looked and took care of themselves, their purchasing and consuming habits shifted from one
case to another. Some where immense changes as some people didn't made much of a jump as their
psychological and economic positions were better advantaged. Governments tried to took care of their
countries, their governance systems and their corporate firms in order to balance the economic and
social routes for their countries. The corporate side got a lot of hurdle as the economic balances and
future projections were fully disrupted with this virus and its fast spread. They had to reoragnize their
economic teams, their R&D departments and most importantly their production lines, along with HR and
Marketing functions of particular companies. The multinational companies such as Ferrero had got a big
hurt from this as they have thousands of employees and stakeholders all around the world. They tried
to create a smooth shift to a new working system and mentality to get their work done and keep their
employees satisfied at the same time. But this was a challenge for most of them, as their mission
statement's and status quo's were challenged with a unexpected, once in a hundred years occuring
crisis. In 2022, as the pandemic started to slow its effects and spread especially with the lowering death
and case rates all around the world started to make people more comfortable and adapt their working
styles towards a combination of their old habits and the new ones for sure. In this April, the Kinder
Surpise Salmonella Case was spread and talked all around the world as a failure business case. The
company was trying to keep its stakeholders and understanding of ethics in a smooth and well-operated
dimension, but things didn't occur as much as they wanted. Ferrero tried to keep all its stakeholder in a
safe and economically well position with its doings and statements; both with its communication line as
well as its actions with agencies and authorities dealing. The factory of the company tried to work
efficiently with authorities in order to effectively provide its systematic success both for its end products
and stakeholders at the same time. On the other hand, company did tried to effectivly deal the stress
management and the human behavior inside the company with giving directives and messagges to its
workers and the global press(media). The ethical means of human safety, the needs and wants of people
were kept in mind in order to not disrupt the company culture and the years of experience of the
company, just for a singular case happening along the way. The workers were given better financial
deals and a messaagge that they would be kept safe inside the working zone within thieir humanitarian
needs.
Ferrero had a false inside this particular case, in which, it should have been much more clearer and
easier to catch-up and fix its mistake. The Salmonella is a crticial disease that is seen especially in
young children, in which should be taken care of. Company may not be directly the only responsible
actor for the cases but its products surely were a affective tool in this case. However, its global effort to
communicate, keep all its stakeholder safe and working, give importance to their ethical standards and
working styles, personalities inside the company were a key when trying to solve such a huge problem.
The stakeholder approach/management combined with the practical business ethics that the company
supported created a better dimension and a half-way opened door for the company to be able to solve
the problem in a shorter span of time.
FEEDBACK: XXX, you started your essay by desribing the existing situation but it would be nice
to see (in Intro) what you are going to discuss/defend in your essay as well.
Moreover, your essay did not touch upon any of the ethical perspectives we discussed in class.
In other words, you did not analyse the Ferrero's case by referring to any of the ethical
perspectives, which are utilitarianism, individual rights, and justice. For example, do you think
that the actions of Ferrero are ethical based on utilitarian perspective or justice perspective? (It
first closed the factory that the affected eggs were produced however later on, it recalled the
products as a precautionary measure in different parts of the world). The arguments about the
stakeholder management are well-constructed.
MGMT 202 Sample Essay Graded – 20/50
The culture of any organisation is shaped by the worst behaviour its management is willing to
tolerate. When negative behaviours are tolerated in toxic environments, it can negatively affect its
culture, decrease collaboration between teams and reduce overall motivation. People in
management positions will often look for quick fixes, but it’s not that simple. It’s easy to blame one
individual employee for toxic behaviours, but in fact, the responsibility lies on the organisation’s
management. Managers need to take full responsibility for the low morale/motivation of their
employees and urgently address the situation before all the good employees leave and the toxic
environment remains.
How can managers transform toxic work environments to manage their organisations
effectively? Critically discuss based on the motivation and groups/teamwork topics
discussed in MGMT 202.
Life is full of misbehaviors. In the workplace, things are no different. We all know that certain behaviors
are unacceptable- verbal oe psychological bullying, sexualharassment, racism, ableism, and preferential
treatment, to mention a few- but what is the best method to address them? This is the question where
a good leadership has an answer for. How should a leader react in the aftermath of an adverse event?
How can a toxic work enviroment and company culture be repaired? How can you ensure that your
principles are lived and breathed by everyone? Questioning all these can be easy but finding an answer
without creating new problems is a tougs business.
Bad behavior in the workplace is not limited to a few "bad apples." It occurs as a result of leaderhip
failing to recognize warning indicators that something was wrong or failing to express the gravity of the
offense.Leaderhip decides and sets the boundaries of acceptable behavior, so when people miss the
mark, it is usually because the boundaries have not been clearly established - or because they yhing
they can get away with it. Companies are more tolerant of harmful behavior, and issues like sexual
harrasment are becoming more common. when combined with the shamethat typically comes with
reporting harrasment or bllying, things only get worse if there is even nagging suspicion that the
perpetators eill 'get away with it.' People feel supported and protected by their job whwn the office culture
is obviously disapproving of such behavior.
Leaders can't begin to fix the problem of the toxic workplace until they look into how their behavior nay
have contributed to the problem. It's crucial to realize that the actions do not have to be planned or
conscious- stress, workplace politics, and a desire to avoid conflict can lead to leadersunintentionally
turning a blind eye and allowing poor behavior to exist. Leaders should try to overcome any natural
defensiveness they may feel. Compassion and humility are two characterisitcs of outstanding
leadership, and the ability to acknowledge, own, and correct personalshortcomings send a powerful
message to other team members. Kind words, however, are not enough; leaders must also take action.
Nothing deflates victims more than talking up about a traumatic experience only to discover that nothing
changes. So it is crucial to have a solid strategy to deal with all forms of behavior and that leaders's
response, rather than simply punishing, tackles the structural issues that lead to it. Understand the value
of leading by example; if a leader does nothing in the aftermath of a harmful event, employees will lose
faith in their capacity- or even desire- to safeguard them.
Leadership, not employees, is responsible for ensuring that everyone respects and feels represented
by the company's basic principles. While a company's culture is something tahat everyone contributes
to, leaders must acceps responsibility for supporting and discouraging specific behaviors. Lead by
example, create the right enviroment, and constantly bacck up leaders' words with action. 'Keeping out
of things' in situations like these is not a neutral action; instead, it fosters a culture that tolerates
destructive behavior.
FEEDBACK: XXX, unfortunately, I cannot see any concrete discussion on "motivation" or "teamwork"
in your essay. Please reread the question.
In this question, students are expected to discuss alternative motivational tools based on the
theories and concepts discussed in class. For example, they can suggest that the managers need to
focus on enhancing the intrinsic motivation of employees by giving them more autonomy in their
work. In addition, they can improve the “expectancy” or “equity” conditions and/or work on
employees’ job characteristics. To increase the collaboration between teams, managers can ensure
“psychological safety” among team members.
While building their arguments, students are also expected to comply with the essay writing
guidelines. Basically, they should write an essay with an introduction paragraph, two body
paragraphs, and one conclusion with a minimum word limit of 500.
MGMT 202 Sample Essay Graded – 15/50
With ever-increasing demands at work, being able to get things done can be a key driver of
success. But, according to a recent Harvard Business Review article (2019), the irony is that it can
also deter success because a focus on tasks often comes at the expense of a focus on people.
Things like building relationships, inspiring a team, developing others, and showing empathy can
fall by the wayside. If the leaders sense that they may be overly task-focused, they are advised to
talk to their team about what they can do to focus more meaningfully on the people. They can seek
out the advice of others who are good at balancing task- and people-focus to gain some insight
into how they do it.
Do you agree that the leaders in organizations need to balance task- and people-focus?
What other factors they should take into consideration to lead their teams successfully?
Critically discuss based on the leadership perspectives we discussed in the class.
Employee Centered and Job Centered Leadership.
Initially i want to explain waht leadershipis. It is to determine a goal and to affect the
processes of people who determined their goals. There are 5 different leadership styles. These
are triat spotting, style counselling,context fitting, distributed leadership and transformational
leadership. For the firs 2 of them, it is imortant to assess the personal traits and behaviours and
attitudes. We can say historical perspecrives for these. The others are more contemporary
leadership styles.
Style counselling perspective focuses on the behaviours and attitudes of the leader.
Behaviour patterns are more emerging in this style. We can see 2 different behaviour styles in
this pattern First of these is the employee centralized behaviour. Leader focuses on the
neccessities and interactins of their employees. To develop their employees, to affor their
necessities, to divide them into informal groups, otonomy giving, collaboration and dedication
to the organisation, involvement of the employees into the decision processes are considered
via the leader. Prioritizes to approact their employees friendly and support them. Leader
exhibits a humistic approach. Because leader thinks that to approach humanistic, it contributes
better for a success.
Other kind of leaders believes that to approach employees task focused will benefit more
in terms of to achieve success in the work enviroment. They focuses on to finish the tasks in
their hands. As a result they approach as a task oriented method. We can also say this scientific
approach. It is important to provide performance and finishb task on time. It is a more autocratic
approach of leadership. Most of the employees wishes their leader to be sensitive even they are
autocratic.
There is no one and succesfull leadership style. Another important factor is the
accomplishment of the goals of the company and the satisfaction of the employees.In my
opinion, in order to be successfull in terms of achieving a task, it s important to consider both
of the leadership styles which are task focused and employee focused.
FEEDBACK: Very limited discussion.
In this question, students are expected to discuss whether or not they support the idea that “leaders
need to find a balance between being task-focus and people-focus”. They should also talk about the
contextual or situational factors that may shape the leaders’ behaviors. These factors may include
but are not limited to readiness and willingness of followers to perform a task, task structure,
leaders’ positional power, quality of leaders’ relationship with their followers, organizational norms,
nature of the problem, etc.
While building their arguments, students are also expected to comply with the essay writing
guidelines. Basically, they should write an essay with an introduction paragraph, two body
paragraphs, and one conclusion with a minimum word limit of 500.