Yumm!

My hobby. I may be getting a year older each day, but still young at heart! Thanks to my buddy for the photography.

Management - A Little Haiku

Management; the essence of success
Leading within the grasp of your hands
Do not mess this up

Blogging for the future!

When Professor Kurpis first told us we were to create and manage our own blog throughout the semester I was skeptical on what this would prove for the course. After a couple blogs, I thoroughly enjoyed writing these little thoughts in my head about the various activities we accomplished and also aided me in remembering certain things we did in class for future exams. I felt that this blog allowed me to put a lot of my thoughts into words for the rest of the class to intake and possibly learn from me as much as i learned from them. Like in one of the activities, by interacting with my group and reading their blog posts on their DISC personalities, i was better able to understand the little things about them and provided key information that helped me better distinguish their character and how they fair in interacting with their peers as well as other people they might come into contact in the future. Along with the professors blog, I was also able to gain a better insight into what fascinates our professor, and the thoughts and information he enjoyed sharing with the community and especially our class throughout the semester. I really enjoyed skimming through his blog from time to time and see if any new updates were posted. As for the blog itself, i still plan on keeping it active even after the course is completed and done with. It is sort of relaxing to simply put my thoughts into words and sharing it with the community. After this course, i have started looking into many other blogs that directly interests me which include tattoo blogs, car modding blogs as well as other blogs similar to mine but instead they blogger speaks of his or her own life. I definitely believe the blog should remain for future classes. I suggest though, that professor Kurpis encourage students to write more blogs and incorporate a higher percentage of relevance for the blog assignments because it really IS such an easy way for students to take control of their own grade. I definitely enjoyed this semester!

McDonald's Expedition

When I first walked into the McDonald’s in attempt to process this order, I was really skeptical of the looks I would be receiving from both the employees as well as the many customers that would be immediately behind me as I make this order. However, seeing as this is extra credit, I decided it would be a fun little experiment not only for class but for myself as well so I gave it a shot. While waiting in line, I noticed most, if not all, orders were processed within one to three minutes depending on the size of the person’s order and how complicated they got with it. This is considered pretty efficient pace seeing as it is a fast food restaurant. People expect to get their order in, get their food and get out as soon as possible.
Eventually enough, it was my turn. As I walked up to the counter to place my order, the cashier was really nice like every other McDonald’s, they start off with the same greeting “Welcome to McDonald’s. How many I help you?”. I immediately go right into my order knowing there was no time to waste. First I would like a hamburger but instead of the regular hamburger I would like it made with five pickles. Pause. The cashier started looking at me oddly at this point. She starts asking why I needed five pickles when it already came with two. I stressed that it was necessary because I had OCD and needed that exact number in order to satisfy my order. At this time, the cashier didn’t know what to do or how to handle and called the manager over. I briefly explained to him the reasoning and that I needed it made exactly the way I explained otherwise I can’t order it. This took quite a bit of time just to order one hamburger might I add. The time it took them to place this one order, 5 people next in line to me had placed their orders. So the manager assists the cashier and tells her how to input my order into the register and walks away. She proceeds to ask if that will be all as I calmly tell her it was not. I can only imagine what she was thinking when I said those words. Next I placed a order of small French fries. I proceeded to note that I request a side of the big mac sauce on the side for dipping and wanted my fries to be well done. I guess this time it was easier to input as she got that out of the way pretty quick. I really had to stress I wanted the fries well done otherwise she would have to make me another one and she obliged. I paid and as I waited next to the counter for my order I watched the process.
I can see a man in the back looking at my order and got to work. He took out two buns and placed the burger on top. Took out five pickles and placed it in between and wrapped it up. He didn’t seem puzzled at all. Next I watched as a lady put in a new small batch of fries. This took about five minutes to complete. Finally I got my whole special order, a hamburger with five pickles and a small order of fries, well done with a side of big mac dipping sauce. I can honestly say, this was the longest order I have ever made in my life and never wish to go through this again. The total amount of time I spent placing this order, I could have placed a regular order and eaten my meal already. The whole process between making the order and actually getting my order took about 15 to 20 minutes which more or less isn’t an acceptable pace for a fast food restaurant to operate but I gave them the benefit of the doubt considering that I’m sure no one ever came into the store and ever placed an order like mine. The whole process actually got me a little hungry but I ended up not eating it and threw it out a couple minutes after walking out of the store.
Let’s now analyze everything that went down. First with the organization, I feel that although very rare, people now and then or once in a blue moon will come in requesting a special order that employees are not taught to handle. I think managers need to be aware of the situation and teach their employees how to exactly assess these situations in order to get the order out faster and maintain their efficient pace. Next with the communication, I think that employee-manager communication was pretty good. The manager was able to assess the situation and provided assistance to me and the cashier in order to place my order. In the process, he also taught the employee for that one day, how to handle such a special order and hopefully teach the rest of the staff after the day was over. At this specific location and time, I feel there was no need to improve in their communication but there will always be room for improvement in the future. As far as training is concerned, I feel the employee was well trained in what she was taught to do but not in the sense of handling “special” situations such as mine. The order itself took about 10 minutes alone but she was very calm which I thought was good and obliged with my request. Had she panicked, it probably would have lasted pretty long.
Leadership I believe was pretty important in situations such as this. To display leadership like the manger did by calmly assessing my order and teaching his employee how to handle and input my order was a great ordeal. He was calm in his own right, asked how I wanted my special order and obliged without confrontation on how they would not be able to process my order. I believe strong leadership is necessary wherever you work even at a McDonald’s because you never know when something strange or new will happen. If a person like this manager possessed adequate leadership ability, they would be able to handle all situations calmly which in turn shows their employees transformational leadership.

DISC

When we had a self test on what kind of personal profile we possessed last week I was instantly skeptical about what my result was going to be. I did however possess and idea of which one I was. At the end of it all, I was correct and i ended being the influencial personality of the four. I believe this is the correct interpretation of me because I tend to listen to all sides but I also have my own input. I never try to negate what other's have to say but I also don't try to dive in too deep into a problem or situation just to waste a huge amount of time in order to try something out. I tend to try to persuade others in my favor most of the time because I, like most if not all "I's", believe that we produce the best idea. Even if we don't, we tend to try to incorporate our idea into what the final decision ends up being anyway. If i had another choice i probably wouldn't change my profile because that's who I am but if I had to, I would become an "S" and I believe it is very possible to switch profiles. I chose "S" because they are the most similar and like Professor Kurpis mentioned, we have the best leader capabilities. I think this is a good test because before this, we noticed a lot of personalities within our groups and this test confirms what we have experienced with our groupmates and gives us a greater insight as to how we should expect them to interact in the future. This test would be helpful on many occasions and I think it would be a good test to give interviewees for jobs as opposed to employers judging by appearance. This provides them with quick information about the applicant right off the bat.

A dream, a vision, a reality

I have many personal and business goals for my future self. The first goal is to hopefully soon, graduate from Baruch College with a degree I can use in the real world and obtain a full time position where I can pursue even further goals. Basically, this can be seen as a two pronged goal where one goal influences the other. I hope with this goal in mind I can motivate myself to do more to be as successful as I can be.
My second goal in life like many is to get married and have children. I have always loved kids and having kids of my own would be a step above that. Before that, I hope to find the right person to share the rest of my life with. A companion that shows unconditional love through good and bad times.
To further elaborate on my first goal, my third goal in life is to be successful and make money and one day invest and save money to eventually be categorized in America's top 100 richest people. With the money, I would be able to support my blood and my own family and ensure the best life for everyone especially my kids.

The steps to obtaining these goals will never be easy however. In order to graduate from Baruch, I must excel in all my classes which includes this management class. I must not slack because in the real world, there is no place for slackers and people with no motivation. Basically, I will take all necessary steps to make sure my vision becomes a reality. In order to be successful in the real world once I obtain that dream position however is another step towards the working life. In order to catch the attention of companies and top level executives, one must show leadership skills. This means taking initiative at every opportunity, be creative, and just showing interest and enjoy what you do. The last aspect of my goal in life is a companion. This aspect should be rather easy. Life is about what you make it. In order to attract the right person, you must do what you love. So for me, I will do what I have been doing all my life and not change a thing. The right person will come along. Simple and easy. Life doesn't need to be complicated as long as you don't make it complicated.

decisions decisions decisions!

During our decisions making process, there was a lot of conflict as to which model was the best. Everyone in the group had opinions and it was really difficult to come to a compromise. When one structure was decided on, someone else would reject it and have their own input on how to modify it better. This was followed by back and forth arguments that ultimately lead no where. As for me, i used the collaborating method of decisions making. I chose this method because i believe that the best decisions a GROUP as a whole can make is to have the input of everyone. Everyone thinks differently and by having many creative options, the best way to achieve our goal was to go that route. Other methods i observed from our group members include the "compromise" method and "compete to win" method. Peter in our group was always listening to others opinions and would agree but would also consider other options once in a while. Others in the group constantly believed that their idea was the best and that ultimately lead to a lot of wasted time and effort in argument that could have ultimately have been spent thinking up a better model. A different way I would have thought up to see a more desirable result with less conflict was to be a mediator between all argument and try to piece together little bits of everyone's ideas or even look online and find proven structures of the experiment to guarantee success because as we all know, facts cannot be argued!