Reflection 2 - Supervisor subordinate relationships The supervisor subordinate relationship is the most widely studied form of workplace communication.

As a supervisor I feel that it is important to exhibit charisma, intelligence and courage. These qualities are necessary to establish solid teams that exhibit in-group relationship behaviors such as high levels of mutual trust, respect and obligation. (LMX theory) The reality of the workplace, however, makes these types of relationships much more difficult than in the past. The reality is that managers at all levels of the company are stuck between a rock and a hard place as the socially constructed contract between organizations and employees is changing. This contract is moving from one of interdependence to one of independence. As this change occurs, managers are asked to generate results without the ability to impact policies that affect their employees. There are several reasons why this shift is occurring: 1. 2. 3. 4. The growth of mega corporations with many layers of management The change in economic times The increased size and control of government The greed of shareholders and corporate executives

As the economy has contracted, corporations have merged to become larger and competition has become fiercer companies are no longer seeing the large returns that a false economy created. Therefore, there is pressure to cut costs across the board in order to see an increased bottom line. A lot of times these cost savings measures are not viewed from the long term perspective. Therefore, the cost of training new employees or lost productivity due to lack of motivation is not figured into the overall opportunity cost. Social construction and critical theory are extremely important ways that we can review supervisor and subordinate contracts as the change in contract occurs. Employees are creating new social realities that don't involve staying with companies for long lengths of time. Instead of what can a company do for me and my family over the long haul employees are only interested in what the company can do for the employee right now. I know that I have felt that way. When I first started in my career I hoped that I would be able to stay with my company for a long time. They had recognition programs and incentives for long term employees. I wanted to be a part of that time of company. As the economy changed, the mortgage bubble burst and I moved to other companies I quickly learned that the main goal of a company was to get you in the door, get as much out of you as possible and not fulfill the promises that they made. I have negotiated several contracts that have been broken in one form or another after the fact. The company feels that they can get away with the breaches because of the ability to reference obscure language. One example is my most recent company. The contract states that my year end bonus can be as high as 16.5% of my salary with successful completion of all company goals. Despite a stellar review, I received 5%. I was told that I should never have expected a bonus in that range. For me, and a lot of other peers, these types of manipulation techniques are the very reason why we only have loyalty to ourselves and we try to obtain as much from a company upfront as we can.