SIGNATURE ASSIGNMENT

Hlin Rahlan

BUS 137 - Principles of Management

1. Interviewee First and Last Name

Andrew Highfill

1. Interviewee Job Title or Team Leadership Role

Process Assistant

1. Interviewee's Employer or Business (if owner)

Amazon

D. Interview Date: April 1st, 2023

E. Interview Time: 11 PM

F. Interview Modality (i.e., phone, in person, WebEx, email, etc.)

Email

G. Interview Questions and Responses:

MANAGEMENT AND LEADERSHIP BASED INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

1. Please describe the navigation of your career path that led to your current management or team leadership role.

-I have worked for Huckaby Jewelers, First Union and Home Depot

1. What are the qualifications (e.g., education, certification, special skills, training, and experience) necessary to perform in your current management or team leadership role and how do you keep your skills current?

-I have a degree in English Literature and a minor in Economics. In no way has that helped me perform well in my position.

-Training for this job was mostly learned through having worked most of the lower positions available.

-I received no actual training from anyone other than select fellow Process Assistants.

-My skills are kept current by adhering to the needs management requires of me.

1. Briefly share three or four main strengths regarding your hard/soft skills or experience that will allow me to gain a healthy perspective of what makes you successful in your management or team leadership role.

-My main strengths are interpersonal skills, a highly developed sense of work ethic and responsibility. Plus being physically fit doesnt hurt in this job.

1. How do you incorporate the four functions of managementplanning, leading, organizing, and controllinginto your work routine and which of these functions do you tend to practice or focus on the most?

-I plan each day based on the workload our section is expected to process in the amount of time given.

-I lead by example and by listening to the needs of those I am supervising.

-I also plan out where each employee is going to work based on their own strengths, abilities, training, work ethic and interpersonal skills. *This is the what I tend to focus on the most*

1. Please describe a typical workday or work week and the decisions you must make on a frequent basis regarding management or team leadership issues.

-Refer to question 4.

1. What do you enjoy the most and what do you enjoy the least about your management or team leadership role and why?

- I enjoy when people are working effectively together to achieve a goal.

-I dislike when I am put in situations where I must remove associates because they are being disruptive or do not perform well enough.

-I also do not like it when my managers step in and make arbitrary decisions.

1. What are your upward mobility aspirations with regard to a promotion, greater responsibility, or a possible career change?

-Currently I aspire to achieve a role in operations management.

-However before doing so I would prefer to learn all of the other Process Assistant roles.

TEAM COHESION AND DYNAMICS BASED INTERVIEW QUESTIONS

1. With a focus on strengthening cohesion within the teams that you lead, what do you look for (in terms of criteria) when assigning or selecting new team members?

-Work ethic. The ability to see that other areas need help and the willingness to move there without having to be asked.

1. To what extent is compensation based upon individual accomplishment and to what extent is it based upon achieving team or department goals?

-Sadly accomplishment has little or nothing to do with compensation in an environment like this. Those doing a great job and those just scraping by will reap the same rewards financially.

-Achieving department goals will likely help one when interviewing for different positions within the company as a demonstration of your ability.

1. How are the team members or employees in your group evaluated and what reward criteria is offered to motivate them beyond just compensation?

-Team members are evaluated based on ability to perform jobs at a high level of proficiency. There is little that Amazon offers to motivate regular employees past occasional praise and food. I do not consider cheerleading, buttons, stars or even the limited amount of swag they offer to be an effective means to motivate people.

-I try to respond to my team members' needs when I can but ultimately I am only able to offer them my sincere appreciation and admiration for a job well done.

-Praise from someone you respect is often a reward in itself.

-They must find pride in simply doing a job well.

1. With regard to conflict resolution, please discuss an example of conflict that occurred within your team or department and describe how you effectively resolved this conflict.

-I stress to team members that have problems to bring their complaints to me so that I can evaluate the issues and provide a solution.

-Typically when a tangible problem arises I will try to accommodate that person's need by fixing the issue myself. When problems arise between individuals the best solution is to separate the individuals and to coach them individually as to how they should comporte themselves in the future.

SA: REFLECTIVE INQUIRY (Part IV)

(need help with the part IV)

1. Discuss three specific highlights from the Informational Interview that you found significant or that resonated with you, and explain why.
2. Provide a reflective self-analysis to ascertain your fitness for management or leadership.

• Give thought to how your own personal style or approach to leadership fits in line with the roles and functions of the manager or team leader you chose to interview.
• Consider the hard and soft skills you possess, your personality type, your learning style, and how effectively or ineffectively you interact and work with others.
• Consider the way you interact with team members (whether at work or as part of a group project through school/college).
• Give thought to the interviewee responses to help assess those areas in which you would thrive or struggle in if you were in a similar leadership role.

1. Provide a synthesized discussion of what you learned about one of the four functions of management (i.e., planning, organizing, leading, and controlling) from the course material as well as from the interviewee. Discuss the importance of the function to effective management and leadership. With regard to what you learned from the interviewee regarding the function, reference your own interview notes. With regard to what you learned from the course material, reference the following chapters within the course text.

• Planning is covered in Chapters 5 and 6
• Organizing is covered in Chapter 10
• Leading is covered in Chapters 12, 13, and 15
• Controlling is covered in Chapter 16

1. UseHandshake,Indeed,Career Builder, or any other job search board to search for two management or team leadership related employment opportunities that are of interest to you. Provide information regarding each position to include job title, employer, salary structure, education and professional certification requirements, and job requirements (i.e., skills, knowledge, years of experience, etc.). Next, discuss your fitness for each position based on the requirements and preferences listed within each job description. Identify what more you can do to make yourself a more viable candidate for each position, beyond your current qualifications.