Chapter 15 - Building Commitments

Buster was hired to revamp the processing center for the Federal Education Institute. They are an education facility that provides undergraduate and graduate degrees. Traditionally, their student population has come from International students wanting an education in the United States. Recently, competition within the education industry has increased dramatically. Federal Education Institute needs to change their marketing approach in order to expand their student population. While the company has known for several years that they needed to change several internal processes, they just could not break out of their usual ways of thinking and doing business. Buster was hired from a large competitor for his expertise and is expected to bring about these changes.

While Buster knew that he needed to make several changes from the start, he took some time during the first few months on the job really getting to know key people in other departments. He soon determined that his strongest allies could be the IT, Financial Aid, and Business Development departments. He took time to establish communication with the head of each department.

After two more months, Buster was ready to start implementing his changes. He called upon things that he had found to be important to the IT department and referenced them during several cross-department meetings. He also researched and had specific examples of how the Financial Aid department assisted students during their most difficult period - admissions. When it came to the Business Development department, Buster included information in his presentations regarding how they want to expand the business based upon the needs of students. Ultimately, he believed that by expressing his desire for the same changes that these other three departments wanted to make, he showed support for their own initiatives. Buster is hoping that they, in turn, will support his change initiatives and back him up in meetings.

Answer the following questions by applying the concepts learned in Chapter 15. Also, conduct literature reviews on the subject of discussion and use to support your case study answers:

1. Describe which type of decision making you think Buster engages in most often.

2. Explain how Buster's behaviors show various commitments: to the customer, organization, co-workers, and the task.