Organizational Change and Opportunism
For the past 2 years, I have been involved with an organization on campus called Illinois Sports Business Conference (ISBC). The organization was founded by a group of students who saw an opportunity to fill a gap on campus between the sports industry and the business world. The initial conference took place in February of 2015 and the fourth Illinois Sports Business Conference will take place in February of 2018. The conference brings together students at the University of Illinois and prestigious speakers from the sports business industry. The organization has a completely different organizational structure than it did 3 years ago, and has even changed quite a bit since I have been a part of the organization.
When I entered the organization, there was a President and an executive board of 7 different Vice Presidents. Each VP was in charge of his or her committee, which contained several general members working on tasks related to that committee. As a new member, I had no idea what the goals of each committee were, and it seemed like the President and VPs were the only ones doing any work for the organization. In fact, as time passed I noticed quite a bit of opportunism present in the organization. I became aware that, while the VPs were doing things building towards a greater goal, there was so much more that the organization could be doing if tasks were delegated effectively. The opportunism of the VPs was that they were choosing not to establish or work towards larger goals because they knew it would be more work on them. Despite the fact that there were about 30 new members willing and ready to go to work, it would be more work for the VP of each committee to establish these new goals and create roles that enabled effective delegation. I think that the complexity in not knowing where each of the new members fit into the organization led to satisficing by the President and the executive board.
As it turned out, the 2017 conference was not as successful as previous years, and I believe that was due to the poor organizational structure and opportunism from the executive board. I saw this as an opportunity to make a positive change in the organization and applied for the position of Vice President, Operations. After securing this role, I went to work implementing an organizational change. Within each committee, I wanted to establish specific roles for each major goal or task of that committee. These "Director" positions would help the VPs delegate tasks and avoid satsficing in their goals and work. We created 4-6 positions within each committee, each reporting to the Vice President of that committee. For example, under my authority of Vice President Operations, I have the Director of Alumni Relations, Director of Internal Relations, and Director of Communications. The other major change I implemented in the organization was a new "New Member On-boarding process." With our class of new members, we are going to go through a 6 week process of meetings and introductions designed to ensure that every new member has a firm understanding of how the organization works and what each committees goals are, before they are put in a specific position.
I will reflect on how these changes have effected the organization over the next few weeks, as a lot of this is happening right now. However, I know that the creation of positions within each committee has already improved task significance for members that aren't a part of the executive board, while also decreasing opportunism of the Vice Presidents. With people designated to specific roles, it is much easier to delegate tasks for those roles and ultimately set more ambitious goals for each committee and the organization as a whole. No longer do VPs have to avoid complicated tasks because they don't want to take the time to figure them out or delegate them.
I think this topic is relevant to topics we have been discussing in class such as the University as an organization and the organizational structure of the University and segments of it. The idea of opportunism was prevalent in my RSO and is something we are working to eradicate. Also, the idea of satisficing brought about in Herb Simon's Nobel address was a common problem in the organization when I first entered but hopefully will not be moving forward.
When I entered the organization, there was a President and an executive board of 7 different Vice Presidents. Each VP was in charge of his or her committee, which contained several general members working on tasks related to that committee. As a new member, I had no idea what the goals of each committee were, and it seemed like the President and VPs were the only ones doing any work for the organization. In fact, as time passed I noticed quite a bit of opportunism present in the organization. I became aware that, while the VPs were doing things building towards a greater goal, there was so much more that the organization could be doing if tasks were delegated effectively. The opportunism of the VPs was that they were choosing not to establish or work towards larger goals because they knew it would be more work on them. Despite the fact that there were about 30 new members willing and ready to go to work, it would be more work for the VP of each committee to establish these new goals and create roles that enabled effective delegation. I think that the complexity in not knowing where each of the new members fit into the organization led to satisficing by the President and the executive board.
As it turned out, the 2017 conference was not as successful as previous years, and I believe that was due to the poor organizational structure and opportunism from the executive board. I saw this as an opportunity to make a positive change in the organization and applied for the position of Vice President, Operations. After securing this role, I went to work implementing an organizational change. Within each committee, I wanted to establish specific roles for each major goal or task of that committee. These "Director" positions would help the VPs delegate tasks and avoid satsficing in their goals and work. We created 4-6 positions within each committee, each reporting to the Vice President of that committee. For example, under my authority of Vice President Operations, I have the Director of Alumni Relations, Director of Internal Relations, and Director of Communications. The other major change I implemented in the organization was a new "New Member On-boarding process." With our class of new members, we are going to go through a 6 week process of meetings and introductions designed to ensure that every new member has a firm understanding of how the organization works and what each committees goals are, before they are put in a specific position.
I will reflect on how these changes have effected the organization over the next few weeks, as a lot of this is happening right now. However, I know that the creation of positions within each committee has already improved task significance for members that aren't a part of the executive board, while also decreasing opportunism of the Vice Presidents. With people designated to specific roles, it is much easier to delegate tasks for those roles and ultimately set more ambitious goals for each committee and the organization as a whole. No longer do VPs have to avoid complicated tasks because they don't want to take the time to figure them out or delegate them.
I think this topic is relevant to topics we have been discussing in class such as the University as an organization and the organizational structure of the University and segments of it. The idea of opportunism was prevalent in my RSO and is something we are working to eradicate. Also, the idea of satisficing brought about in Herb Simon's Nobel address was a common problem in the organization when I first entered but hopefully will not be moving forward.
I am going to begin by asking some clarifying questions. There is a formal program in Sport Management on campus. Is there any relationship between that program and the conference you describe in your post? You say there is a gap between the sports industry and the business world. But then you just left that there, so I as reader don't know what you are referring to. It seems to me that pro sports is quite heavily entangled with business and major college sports is as well. Can you clarify what the scope of this conference is?
ReplyDeleteThe next thing that would be helpful is why people joint the group. What are they expecting to get out of it. You said you didn't know much about it at the beginning. Why did you join then? It wasn't clear at all.
Ultimately you became a vice president. How did that happen? Who approved this? Was there competition for the position? Those fact might matter.
As a general rule on groups run by students, where there clearly will be turnover of the officers of the group because some of them will graduate, they have some obligation to train their successors to maintain business continuity of the organization. Did any of that happen in your group? If not, is there a reason for that.
Let me close by making the following observation. If you join a group, but are unsure why, and you are then given a position of responsibility, but don't know that you really want that, putting in lackluster effort is perhaps to be expected. So one might ask whether the group is doing a good job of explaining its function to the new members and motivating them well to continue to participate.
To be more clear about the "gap" between the sports industry and the business world, the organization was founded on the idea that there wasn't a formal means on campus for students to meet and network with professionals in the industry. So, by hosting a conference on campus, we are able to bring dozens of professionals from the sports business industry to the University of Illinois on the same day to bring students and professionals in the industry together like no other program or event had before.
DeleteWe do have a strong relationship with the Sport Management program on campus, although ISBC is a Council of Presidents organization within the College of Business. Since Sport Management is a huge market for the type of people we are trying to sell tickets to the conference to, we work with the Sport Management department to spread word of the organization's goal and market the conference itself.
While I said that I didn't know much about it at the beginning, that might have been misleading. I attended the Conference in February of 2016 and after speaking with some of the then-exec board members, I was intrigued to apply to the organization the following fall. By attending the conference, I was able to see the organization's major project and work come to fruition. However, when I joined the organization, what took me a while to learn was the process and inner workings of how this group of people worked together to put on such a great event (the 2016 conference in mind). That lack of internal training was the pitfall of the previous executive board, in my opinion.
When I decided I wanted a shot at the executive board, it was during the open re-application period for the exec board during the spring. It was a formal process, where each candidate gave a 20-30 minute presentation to the outgoing and incumbent board members, speaking to ways to improve the organization as a whole and the conference itself. I was ultimately selected for VP of Operations due to my organization skills and ideas for improving internal communication and training of new members, I believe.