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MGTU 301 SA Paper #2

Sandra Atchison

Brandman University

MGTU 301: Principles of Management

Melissa Stec 10/18/2020

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Introduction

A large change is currently occurring at my place of employment, Walmart. The current

management hierarchy in the store is: Store Manager, Store Lead, Coach, Department Manager,

Associate. Starting next week there will no longer be a Department Manager (DM) position

(which is my current position). The position of Team Lead (TL) will now replace the DM

position.

We currently have about 40 Department Managers, and there will be 17 Team Lead

positions. The current DM’s names will be put into a pool to fill the new positions. The upper

management of each store will discuss and evaluate who will be placed in each new position.

If you are not chosen for a new position, you will have the option to find a lateral

position, step down to associate, or take a severance package. If you take the step down option,

your pay will be guaranteed for one year. After that it will adjust the pay scale for that position.

Application

Systems Thinking

1. Inputs – Walmart’s mission statement is “saving people money so they can live better.”

The vision statement is “Be THE destination for customers to save money, no matter how

they want to shop.”

The strategic plan is Save Money, Live Better, Win, Play, Show, and Fast, Friendly,

Clean. These categories will reduce the number of products, and perhaps reduce the
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number of overall suppliers, as well as make merchandise flow more efficient, having

zero waste facilities, and improve efficiencies in the supply chain and transportation.

The analysis of change for Walmart is that the company thinks that this change is needed.

The top managers support the change, the majority of employees will be able to adapt to

the change, but the majority of employees are also very pessimistic about the

consequences of the results of the change.

2. Target Elements of Change – The employees have the knowledge and ability for the

change, but they do not seem to have the attitude or the motivation for the change.

3. Outputs – The results that are expected from the change are that more associates will

start to take ownership for the entire store, instead of for single departments. The new

Team Lead will be over the associates, instead of the department, and each TL will be

over multiple departments.

The company believes that this will help to streamline the processes of moving

freight from the back of the store to the floor, which will in turn reduce the amount of

backstock.

4. Feedback – “Not all changes work out well, of course, and organizations need to moni-

tor their success. This is done by comparing the status of an output such as employee or

customer satisfaction before the change to the same measurable output sometime after the

change has been implemented” (Kinicki & Williams, 2020). 

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Since these changes are just now beginning to be implemented, feedback will

become available at a later date.

Prediciton

I think that the change will be successful, but because of the pessimism of the employees,

I think that it will take some time and adjustment before we see the successful results.

Because there have been so many changes over the years that have not been as

successful as the company had hoped, the majority of employees hear that there will be new

changes, and automatically assume that they will turn out badly.

This change to the structure was implemented in just one area of the store last year, and it

is working, to some extent, the way the company envisioned it. However, there are areas of the

change that are not woking very well. They tend to put “new” people into the new roles, that do

not have the experience needed to lead effectively.

With the new changes, they are putting experienced people into the positions. This is why

I think that it will ultimately be successful, and have a better outcome than last years changes.

Reflection Analysis

I think that the company is more ready for the changes than the employees are. They have

had this in the works for some time, but wait until the last minute to make the employees aware

of changes coming. This causes a lot of fear in the employees, because they start worrying about

their income, and the ability to support their families.

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Recommendations

My recommendation is that the company should prepare the employees at an earlier point

in time. If they would start a few months out (instead of a few weeks), having discussions about

the new system, I think that the employees would be better able to adjust when the time comes

for the change.

As it is now, there were no discussions until three weeks before the changes were

to take place. Having meetings for questions and answers might have alleviated some of the

concerns that the employees have.

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References

Kinicki, A., & Williams, B. K. (2020). Principles of Management (8th ed.). New York, NY:
McGraw-Hill Education.