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Developing Leaders within an Organization

Should Cliffside Holdings Establish and Fund a New Leadership Development Program

Felicia Thomas

University of Maryland University College

Graduate School of Business

AMBA 610 9043 The Manager in Organizations and Society (2152)

Assignment Due: Tuesday, April 14, 2014

Turnitin Score: 7%

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Introduction

In The Memo Mr. Anil Ravaswami, Vice-President (VP) of Human Resources (HR) addresses

the CEO, Cynthia Castle of Cliffside Holding Company of MASSAPEQUA (CHCM) regarding

the potential for implementing a leadership development Programs. (A. Ravaswami, personal

communication, October 10, 2012)

Body

The Issues and Conclusion: This memo presents a prescriptive issue regarding whether or not

CHCM should establish a fund for a new leadership development program within the

organization that would train junior financial executives for potential VP roles. Ravaswami

conclusion is that it should not.

The Reasons: Ravaswami’s provides 4-5 core reasons for his beliefs. One justification is that

none of the 12 senior executives attended a leadership seminar yet and the company has still

been prosperous. Ravaswami agrees with the notion that Leaders are born not made, they are

genetically programmed to lead. He uses tall stature as an association to true innate leadership.

The VP further argues that Florence Forsythe, who is advocating for the program, desires his

own VP position and therefore has an ulterior motive to promote the program. Ravaswami’s final

reasoning is that sending employees to this training will encourage other employees to request

trainings the company cannot afford.

Ambiguous Words/Phrases: This memo presents many ambiguous words or phrases that possess

multiple possible meanings. How the company determines an employee to be a Junior Financial

Executive is important because it could refer to entry level just as much as it can refer to one who

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possesses 3-5 years’ experience. Ravaswami is also unclear in defining off site in the train

location which could simply be across the street from the office or in a different city or state.

How the writer determines the company to be prosperous is important as well because the

company can have a lot of revenue but be unprofitable due to high expenses. Additional

ambiguity lies in the definition of tall because all of the examples of tall leaders were men. This

begs the question of what is considers a leader to be tall and are the measurements for being tall

the same for men as they are for women? Liberal and Free Nation are phrases with political,

fiscal, or corporate associations, providing additional ambiguity. The term Bleeding Heart

Liberal Intentions is full of ambiguity that the reader may not be able to decipher. According to

Merriam-Webster a Bleeding Heart is “feeling or showing excessive or extravagant sympathy

especially for an object of alleged persecution...” (Merriam Webster, 2015). However, this term

added with liberal intentions provides loaded language to the reader. How Ravaswami defines

expensive training is important because the dollar threshold for what is expensive varies from

one reader to another. For example, an information technology employee who may be

accustomed to higher dollar purchases may consider a $5,000 per person training to be

inexpensive unlike the employee who purchases small dollar office supplies. The term expensive

is also contingent on ones level of authority. For example, an executive who signs off on

multimillion dollar purchases may view this term different than a lower level employee with

limited purchasing authority. Leadership traits have been mildly defined by Ravaswami;

however these traits may be defined differently depending on the reader. Finally, the theories of

the Aspen Institute may be unknown to the reader, which provides ambiguity.

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Value and Descriptive Assumptions: the following chart provides an overview of assumptions

that are made based on the four categories outlined in the book “Asking the Right Questions.”

(Brown & Keeley, 2015) Although this is not all-encompassing, it provides enough examples to

indicate that throughout the memo the author assumed certain ideologies to convey to the reader

Chart of Assumptions

Hidden Or Unstated

• Liberal notion and liberal intentions are not supported by the reader.

• There is tension with Forsythe.

• Current Executives were bred within the organization.

Taken for Granted

• Leaders are born not created.

• Ravaswami’s position is common sense.

• The companies 50 years of existence, 12% growth, and successful leadership were possible without such training.

• CHCM cannot afford to offer the training. Influence Towards Conclusion

• Florence Forsyth covets Ravaswami’s position.

Potential Deception

• The content taught by the Aspen Institute will not benefit potential future leaders.

The first approach in determining the values and descriptive assumptions within this memo is to

evaluate Mr. Raviswami’s background as the author and VP of Human Resources. What is

gathered through the memo about Ravaswami is that he believes that Florence Forsyth covets his

position. Ravaswami also uses negative terminology in referring to liberalism, therefore he may

have a more conservative background in his beliefs that include but are not limited to politics,

society, and or finance. The text also implies that there is some concern on the author’s part of

having to fund multiple employee training initiatives through his mentioning of “getting

numerous requests...that we simply can’t afford.” According to Payscale.com, one of the

functions of one in Raviswami’s position is to “Oversee operations in the managed departments;

planning, budgeting and measurement of results.” (Payscale, Inc., 2015) We can therefore infer

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that the writer may have a concern for the budgetary impacts of such business venture as it

relates to his department, making it very important to him.

One of the values that can be assumed in the text is that that author is a proponent of

finding seasoned talent instead of breeding raw talent into leadership.

The opposing position may argue that if it is true that the organization is prosperous they

are certainly able to fund such an initiative. As it relates to the breeding of leadership, the

opposing values may be that of Linda A. Hill of Harvard University, who writes that “what we

know for sure is that managers are mostly made, not born.” and who concluded through her own

research that “becoming a manager was largely a process of learning from experience.” (Hill,

2004) Should it be true that Florence Forsythe does in fact covet the role of the VP of Human

Resources; she may be promoting the program with hopes that future leaders can have the

opportunity to earn such a position that she herself was unable to attain. Finally, the opposing

position may be receptive to the idea of receiving numerous requests for expensive training as a

waste of funds because it could allow for appreciation in the value of employees. According to

Mark Sandborn, a public speaker for leadership, “The best answer to ‘What if we train them and

they leave?’ is ‘What if we don’t and they stay?’”

Fallacies in the Reasoning: This memo presents numerous fallacies including an ad hominem

where the writer attacks Florence Forsythe’s purpose in promoting the program as a distraction

for justifying not funding the program. A slippery slope presented in the memo is that if the

company sends some people to leadership training there will be numerous requests for expensive

trainings. Two searching for a perfect solution fallacies are presented when the writer argues that

there will be less HR dollars and if the wrong people are sent the entire program will be a waste

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of money. Two Ad Populum fallacies within the memo are the writer’s survey which provided a

general consensus of senior staff and the mentioning of the “Journal of Applied Psychology” and

“Leadership Quarterly” research studies which support the notion that personality traits predict

leadership. Dr. Irwin Corey, being an economist may not be the best person to provide expert

advice regarding the training of personnel because he is not an expert on the subject matter

necessary to decide on the issue. Furthermore, Wikipedia, which is not considered a reliable

source, should not be used to justify the writer’s beliefs. Both of these are fallacies that appeal to

questionable authority because the sources are not privy to the best practices relative to recruiting

and developing future leaders. There are two ways in which the writer appeals to ones emotions

as a fallacy. One is in the use of fear that Florence Forsythe’s motivation is for personal gain and

not the best interest of the organization. The other appeal is potentially through patriotism in the

use of language such as “a free nation” and “rights”. He further uses the fallacy of straw person

on the same subject of Florence Forsythe being motivated by bleeding-heart liberal intentions.

An Either-or/False dilemma that is used lies in the notion that tall stature is possessed by leaders.

The author also diverts attention away from the point by talking about Winston Churchill,

Mother Theresa, and Martin Luther King as comparable leaders. This is a glittering generality

because there is an overall emotional appeal to these examples. When the author states

“Leadership development programs are wasteful because the money is not well spent” he is

simply begging the question. A red herring that is presented is that Ms. Forsythe has a personal

agenda to push the theories of the Aspen Institute. The explaining by naming and planning

fallacies were not discovered in this text.

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How good is the Evidence? The issue of whether or not to implement a training program

certainly needs evidence in order to support not doing so. The author provides a plethora of

evidence to appeal to his cause however this evident must be evaluated for quality and relevancy

to the issue at hand. The writer himself does not use intuition to plead his case but does user his

personal experience of noticing tall statue being possessed by leaders. Additionally, he uses

hasty generalization while inserting personal executive polling to justify not implementing the

training program. Although the reasoning of these executives may be consensual, it is not a large

enough sample set of all executives’ in order to justify his overall conclusion. Furthermore the

case samples of the height of United States leaders do not take into account the overall average

heights of leaders or the fact that there have been short leaders such as John Adams and William

McKinley who were both 5’7” and Nancy Pelosi and Sarah Palin who are both 5’5”. The author

personal testimony relates to the tension that lies between him and Florence in that he believes

she has an ulterior motive. The final questioning of the evidence lays in that the author appeals to

the authority of the previously mentioned research studies.

How good is the Evidence (continued): The evidence in this case must be evaluated because of

the variety of factors involved. The writer’s personal observations have not presented much

strength, yet his position is important as he is a stakeholder in the issue. It would not hurt the

case to present research studies as additional evidence to support or weaken the author’s

argument. However, such studies should be relevant to the cause, using qualified sources.

Unfortunately the Journal of Applied Psychology and the Leadership Quarterly are not a viable

source as it relates to recruiting and training up leadership within an organization because they

are not specific to Human Resources and the overall issue at hand.

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The analogy used in the article was the comparison of tall people having innate gifts to

leadership. As previously mentioned, a way to refute this is by examining the plethora of leaders

who are not necessarily tall in stature but are well regarded in the business world. This would be

a good fit for statistics by providing the average and standard deviation of the stature of leaders.

Rival Causes: Although one cannot attribute the writer’s entire reasons for the potential

interpersonal dispute with Florence Forsythe, there is certainly an underlying element to their

interaction that is affecting how Ravaswami justifies his position regarding the training. Another

potential cause, as previously mentioned may relate to Ravaswami’s obligation to manage the

Human Resources budget and allowing such a program can limit his options in spending on other

necessities within the organizations department.

Deceptive Statistics: One statistic presented within the memo is that the organization grows an

average of 12% per annum. There may be deception in this statistic because this growth is not

specific to revenue, number of personnel, amount of offices, etc.; it is merely a generality to the

company’s size without a unit of measurement specified. Additional deception is that the amount

that a company would spend in sending 20 employees to leadership training would equate to the

same about in lost time on the job. This is deceptive because 1) the organization should be able

to use those dollars spent as a tax write off. 2) If those numbers were true, each junior financial

executive would make approximately (((100,000 total /20 people)/3 weeks)*52)) $86,666

annually. If that salary is true why would the company spend time hiring one or such an amount

while having doubts that they are a waste of money? 3) The writer arbitrarily cherry picked the

heights of leaders and did not use any statistics about the averages.

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Omitted Information: There is a plethora of information that could be useful toward this issue.

This information includes the financial statements of the organization or at least the budget of the

Human Resources department. This is important to know if such training is truly affordable to

the company. It would also be useful to know the average tenure of executive leaders within the

organization because if the company truly developed the same employees from the start of their

career, there may be attributes to the corporate culture which would nullify or at least raise

question about the need for outside leadership training. Since the writer mentions the stature of

the leaders, one might want to investigate the process of hiring and promoting executives to find

out if there are any biases in the processes. The role and title/position of Florence Forsythe is

also important as it would provide more information regarding how much influence she actually

has in the decision making of the training program. The final piece of information that is missing

that may be relevant to a decision is the actual training program of Aspen Leadership Institute

and any example organizations it’s helped in the past.

Conclusion: Ravaswami does not provide strong sufficient evidence to justify his position

regarding the issue at hand. The use of the omitted information as well as removal of any

interpersonal issues may assist in bringing more clarity to his argument.

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Bibliography Brown, M. N., & Keeley, S. M. (2015). Asking the Right Questions. Upper Saddle River: Pearson.

Hill, L. A. (2004). New Manager Development for the 21st Century. Academy of Management Executives,

121-126.

Merriam Webster. (2015). Retrieved April 20, 2015, from Merriam Webster's Disctionary:

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/bleeding-heart

Payscale, Inc. (2015). www.payscale.com. Retrieved April 22, 2015, from

http://www.payscale.com/research/US/Job=Vice_President_%28VP%29,_Human_Resources_%

28HR%29/Salary

The New York Times. (2008, October 07). The Measure of a President. Retrieved April 20, 2015, from

Opinion: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2008/10/06/opinion/06opchart.html?_r=0