Lee Bolman

Organization Simulation: Private Sector

THE ORGANIZATION SIMULATION

(Developed and © by Lee Bolman and Terry Deal)

The organization simulation is a temporary system established to promote learning, particularly about topics of structure, people and power in organizations.

Each participant will be a member of either:

(a) one of the three levels in an management consulting firm, Management Resources Corporation (MRC)

or

(b) National Managers' Benevolent League (NMBL)

You will receive a briefing sheet appropriate to your organizational membership.

The Faculty

The faculty member will be a traveling anthropologist. He is free to move about the system to study the process. He will not intervene or participate in the simulation until its conclusion.

THE SIMULATION WILL LAST FOR ONE HOUR. THE END WILL BE ANNOUNCED BY THE FACULTY.

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Briefing Sheet

MANAGEMENT RESOURCES CORPORATION (MRC)

Top Group

1. Members of the top group are viewed as having overall responsibility for MRC'S business success and for promoting the welfare and learning of all participants.

2. In keeping with their responsibilities, the top group is also entrusted with control of the corporate treasury.

3. The Top Group is responsible for negotiating with Customers for sale of MRC's service. MRC's only current service is developing management slogans. In order to provide a fair return to MRC and its employees, you want to sell at a price no less than $6/slogan. You have no current customers, but you hope to negotiate a contract with the National Managers' Benevolent League. You know that they are looking for a vendor to provide slogans that will help build public support for the management profession.

4. Top management negotiates the slogan specifications with the Customers, and communicates those specifications to the Middle Group. The Middles are responsible for organizing the production workers to create the slogans.

5. It is a policy that the members of the top group are considered invited guests who are always welcome in the spaces of each of the other two groups. Members of the top group may communicate with members of the other groups at any time.

6. It is also a tradition that members of the top group are the guardians and interpreters of MRC's traditions, rules and policies, including wage and salary policies. In that capacity, they may change or re-interpret any customs or rules at any time.

Middle Group

1. Historically, the role of the middle group is to work with the top group to set performance goals and specifications, and to organize and manage the workers in production of slogans.

2. It is an MRC policy that members of the middle group never enter the space of the top group, nor communicate with the top group, unless they have received the invitation or permission of the top group. It is viewed as permissible for members of the middle group to knock on the door of the top group, and request an audience.

3. Members of the middle group have always been free to enter the space of the bottom group and to communicate with members of the bottom group at any time.

4. Each member of the middle group has been assigned to one of the work teams in the bottom group.

Bottom Group

1. Members of the bottom group are expected to perform the basic work of the organization: producing management slogans, and learning about structure, people, and power in organizations.

2. Members of the bottom group remain in their own designated space unless they receive permission from member of the Middle or Top groups to go elsewhere. Bottom group members may knock on the door of the middle group, and request an audience with that group. It would be considered a serious violation of custom for any member of the bottom group to attempt to communicate with the top group, unless first invited to do so by the Top Group.

3. Each member of the bottom group is assigned to a work team. Members of a team work together in the production of management slogans, under the direction of their middle group supervisor(s).

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Briefing Sheet

NATIONAL MANAGERS' BENEVOLENT LEAGUE (NMBL)

You are the professional staff of the National Managers' Benevolent League. NMBL is a voluntary association of professional managers formed to promote the management profession and to build support for managers.

Responding to widespread evidence of a decline in public support for the profession of management and respect for managers, NMBL wishes to develop a public education program to enhance such support. Central to the campaign will be slogans that will catch public attention and remind citizens of the importance of management.

Your group's task is to purchase management slogans that meet the specifications outlined below, using funds from a grant awarded to NMBL by the Management Power Foundation (MPF). You are not permitted to produce slogans yourselves, but you may purchase from any qualified vendor. Currently, the only known vendor is Management Resources Corporation (MRC). For each slogan that you successfully purchase, you will be paid a commission that can be used as salaries for your staff. Your commission varies with the price you pay for slogans, as shown in the following table:

Price per slogan	Commission
$1.00 - $3.00	$1.00
$3.00 - $6.00	$0.50
$6.00 - $8.00	$0.25
over $8.00	$0.00

Your compensation is paid separately, not from the grant that you receive at the beginning of the simulation.
Be sure to keep a record of your purchases. Any money from the grant that you don't spend to buy slogans will revert to the professor.

Slogans must meet three criteria:

1. They must be consistent with NMBL's basic themes: management is central and vital to our nation's survival and quality of life; managers shape our nation's future; money spent on management development is not an expense but an investment that will be returned many times over; managers are dedicated and creative professionals who deserve to be compensated accordingly.

2. Slogans should be simple and brief, yet powerful. (NMBL is concerned that jargon and wordiness might turn off the public.)

3. They should be original, creative and well-written. (In all due probability public supporters for management at this point in time is likely to not very much be facilitated by slogans that are old fashions, dull and/or boring, mispelled and/or not good grammarwise.)

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ROSTER FOR ORGANIZATION SIMULATION

MANAGEMENT RESOURCES CORPORATION

TOP GROUP:

ALDREDO FETTUCINI

PUTTANESCA PASTA

ETC.

Middle Group:

O. Veal (Team A)

W. Boeuf (Team B)

Bottom Group:

Team A: Bacon, Lettuce, Tomato

etc.

National Managers' Benevolent League

Suzette Crepes, Melba Peche, etc.

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m.r.c.

Executive Offices

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M. R. C.

Middle Management Offices

M. R. C.

Production Unit # 1

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Team A

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Team B

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Team C

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Team D

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National

Managers'

Benevolent

League