Convenience

Chapter 2:
The Environments of Organizations and Managers
5 9
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BUILDING EFFECTIVE COMMUNICATION SKILLS
Exercise Overview
Communication skills consist of a manager’s ability to
effectively receive information and ideas from others
and to effectively convey information and ideas to
others. This exercise will help you develop your com-
munication skills while also helping you understand
the importance of knowing the customer segments in
an organization’s task environment.
Exercise Background
Assume that you are a newly hired middle manager in
the marketing department of a large food manufac-
turer. You have just completed your formal study of
management and are excited about the opportunity to
apply some of those theories to the real-life problems of
your firm. One problem in particular intrigues you.
Your boss, the marketing vice president, recently devel-
oped a consumer survey to solicit feedback about pro-
ducts from customers. The feedback the firm has
received varies considerably, ranging from 2 to 5 on a
scale from 1 to 5, which gives your firm no helpful
data. In addition, sales of your company’s products
have been slowly but steadily declining over time, and
the marketing department is under some pressure from
upper management to determine why.
You have an idea that the survey is not an accurate
reflection of consumer preferences, so you make a
suggestion to your boss: “Why don’t we gather some
information about our customers, in order to under-
stand their needs better? For example, our products
are purchased by individual consumers, schools, res-
taurants, and other organizations. Maybe each type of
consumer wants something different from our
product.” Your boss’s response is to stare at you, per-
plexed, and say, “No. We’re not changing anything
about the survey.” When you ask, “Why?” the boss
responds that the product has been a bestseller for
years, that “good quality is good quality,” and thus
that all customers must want the same thing. He
then says, “I’ll spare you the embarrassment of failure
by refusing your request.”