People and Technology

Session 6 workshop - Group 3

In this session our group played the role of Company U (UK based), that has been taken over by a large Company Q (India based)

Part A

Managing Emotions

During the merging process a lot of emotions are involved such as;

Positive:

• New opportunities & challenges
• New benefits for people who like change
• Employees will be happy and excited as the company is merging with a large company and is being transformed.

Negative:

• Employees will be nervous about their ability to work efficiently in the new environment, under the new rules.
• There will be a new disciplinary system in the new hierarchy which employees may feel put their jobs at risk. Fear of change
• New routines need to be adapted, which may become problematic for those who are resistant to change.
• Fear for both Companies of cultural differences
• Company U employees may lose their independence an/or the way of work.


In order to overcome the negative emotional aspects involved Company U will need to adapt a gradual transition approach which would mean that the employees will not face sudden changes that will affect their job. The companies will also need to define a clear purpose of merging and set common goals. An employee handbook or contract can be produced and distributed amongst all employees. Things such as video conferencing can be used to familiarize the employees to each other and to the common ground of the company. The employees will need to be patient, understanding, and be attentive to prevent repetitiveness and misunderstandings.


Managing Language

As both companies are based in different countries where different languages are spoken there will be problems occurring. To overcome these language problems, first of all we need to establish a common verbal language (English). The English language will also need to be standardized to professional so that it is understood by all.

Improving Communication

1) Informal social gatherings could be used for team members to build rapport if possible. They should take into consideration, the physical constraints.

2) An organisational structure chart would clearly illustrate the levels of authority ensuring the employees are aware of everyone's position in the hierarchy.

3) A report and presentation on both sites, clearly stating the reasons of the merger and it's benefits to company U employees, will decrease the sense of apprehension shared by the employees.

4) Information should be provided detailing the standardised procedures e.g. report writing, meeting rules and documentation.


Part B

Common Ground

The Common Ground Approach is a means of navigating through conflict and identifying possibilities that are not apparent from an adversarial mind set. It is a set of principles and practices that, when utilized, causes a fundamental shift in people's relationship with conflict - away from adversarial approaches toward cooperative solutions. By using the common ground approach the companies will build a shared understanding, come to common terms, negotiate, accept changes and ideas, compromise with each other, and become flexible. This will make the merging process smooth.


Affordance

Affordance is a quality of an object, or an environment, that allows an employee or company to perform an action. In 1988, Donald Norman appropriated the term affordances in the context of human–machine interaction to refer to just those action possibilities which are readily perceivable by an actor. Through his book The Design of Everyday Things, this interpretation was popularized within the fields of HCI and interaction design. It makes the concept dependent not only on the physical capabilities of the actor, but also their goals, plans, values, beliefs and past experience. If an actor steps into a room with an armchair and a softball, Gibson's original definition of affordances allows that the actor may throw the recliner and sit on the softball, because that is objectively possible. Norman's definition of (perceived) affordances captures the likelihood that the actor will sit on the recliner and throw the softball. Effectively, Norman's affordances "suggest" how an object may be interacted with. For example, the size and shape of a softball obviously fits nicely in the average human hand, and its density and texture make it perfect for throwing. The user may also bring past experience with similar objects (baseballs, perhaps) to bear when evaluating a new affordance. (Wikipedia)


Deictic references

Deixis is collectively the orientational features of human languages to have reference to points in time, space, and the speaking event between interlocutors. A word that depends on deictic clues is called a deictic or a deictic word. Deictic words are bound to a context — either a linguistic or extralinguistic context — for their interpretation.

Some English deictic words include, for example, the following:

now vs. then
here vs. there
this vs. that
me vs. you vs. him/her
go vs. come

The origo is the context from which the reference is made—in other words, the viewpoint that must be understood in order to interpret the utterance. (If Tom is speaking and he says "I", he refers to himself, but if he is listening to Betty and she says "I", then the origo is with Betty and the reference is to her.)