Question

When paul o’neill joined alcoa as ceo, he set a , that there would be zero workplace accidents. a lot of people in the organization thought this was impossible given how dangerous some aluminum-manufacturing jobs are, but alcoa’s safety record improved tremendously. as the board of governors of the american red cross considers planning, one option is to make strategic plans and then direct managers to align tactical and operational plans accordingly. another option is to have planning specialists managers across the organization make their own plans. why might this organization’s executives opt for the latter approach? check all that apply. (a) the environment is a dynamic one, and department and frontline managers can come up with more responsive plans than can central leadership. (b)resources will be better coordinated across the organization in support of the overall strategy.(c) senior leadership will have more control over the organization’s direction. (d)when managers come up with their own plans, they are likely to be more committed to following through on them.

Answer 1

1) stretch goal

2) (a) the environment is a dynamic one, and department and frontline managers can come up with more responsive plans than can central leadership.

(d) when managers come up with their own plans, they are likely to be more committed to following through on them.

Step-by-step explanation:

1) A stretch goal is a radical, ambitious goal that aims to drastically change (improve) certain KPIs and outcomes in the organization. Usually these goals are deemed as impossible. However, their ultimate cause is not to actually be reachable, but to provide great motivation for employees. Since Alcoa has had substantial accidents in the past, a genuine stretch goal is to have zero workplace accidents.

2) This example demonstrated the debate and choice between centralizing decision power on the one hand, or distributing it across the organization on the other hand. Doing the latter has some benefits. The first one is related to responsiveness, as front-line managers would lose a lot of time when communicating a certain problem to senior managers. They would tackle problems more quickly if they had the decision power. Additionally, when they do have the power to make decisions, they are more likely to stick to created plans and strategies.