I spend a fair amount of time thinking and contemplating what it means to be a good leader. I came across Penelope Trunk’s blog post, “How to be a Good Manager: Be Generous” and have to say I agree with a majority of her points and have learned a lot of what it means to be a good leader.

One of her points that really stood out to me was that you should always prepare an agenda prior to a meeting. I found her reasoning behind it interesting as it was a perspective I’ve never thought about before. She stated that by preparing an agenda, it shows that you care and are respectful of their time. Prior to reading this, I had thought that the purpose of an agenda was to ensure the manager was organized in order to run a smooth meeting for their sake; I had never thought about it from an employee’s perspective.

Another point I found valuable is that as a manager, you should be popping up all the time to check in, not to micromanage or because you don’t trust those around you. You should be checking in because you genuinely care about how they’re doing. I thought that this was crucial as well due since I know that employees are much more likely to cooperate or feel a need to put effort forth if the management team makes it seem like they matter.

Lastly, I thought that her comparison with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs was a smart way to compare a job to. First you have to have the basics and then you try your best to help others. It was an interesting comparison as it’s something that you wouldn’t think to compare it to but it makes sense and it’s relateable as we know what we need to live. In order to help others, you’d have to satisfy your own needs, that goes for both your personal and work life.

After reading her blog, my mind regarding management has opened up and I see that there’s much more to being a good leader than doing what is assigned. You have to go above and beyond to make your team feel like they matter if you want them to truly care about their work.

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References:

How to be a good manager: Be generous

Samsung, one of the leading companies in the electronics industry has recently been undergoing negative publicity due to a lack of care in the production of the Samsung Galaxy Note 7. In Jiayu Cao’s blog, he talks about how consumers will lose trust in the brand and the effort needed from Samsung to win back it’s customers. Furthermore, as mentioned in Helen Liu’s blog, Samsung will struggle to continue to keep it’s customers trust. In addition, while I do believe that Samsung will need to put forth a tremendous amount of effort in order to regain it’s customer base and may succeed to an extent, I do not believe that Samsung will ever be able to regain the level of trust from it’s consumers it once had.

Samsung and Apple, while not interchangeable, definitely do have several similarities between the two. Those who are Samsung fans who have lost faith in the company would have very little struggle changing to Apple, Samsung’s strongest competitor. In addition, there are several substitute brands to those who intend to stay with an Android, such as HTC or Google phones. Furthermore, while the edge of the S7 is still seen as an advantage and a critical point of difference, Apple is starting to offer different options for their screen sizes (as seen in the 7 and 7Plus) therefore Samsung’s large screens are now a point of parity in this market. As Helen has mentioned, due to the decreasing number of points of difference between these rival brands, along with Samsung’s increased risk of danger, Samsung is now at a disadvantage in the market.

Currently, Samsung is working overtime, trying to bounce back with new projects, one of them rumored to be something along the lines of a bendable phone technology. While I do believe that this will definitely catch the attention of several consumers as it is a unique point of difference, I also believe that consumers would be less likely to trust such a new idea, especially with Samsung’s faulty Galaxy Note 7. Furthermore, as mentioned by Helen, Samsung’s value propositions is to provide a wide variety of features are a reasonable price. Some of their features, such as the battery life or large screen is appreciated by consumers but as of right now, due to their shaky reputation, consumers will be skeptical of a bendable phone.

In conclusion, Samsung has hit a large bump in the road and has to go back to the beginning in order to both regain the trust it once had and continue attracting consumers to their products without creating anything that would cause a large amount of skepticism.

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References:

http://thenextweb.com/mobile/2016/11/10/samsung-bendable-phone/

blogs.ubc.ca/jiayucaosauder

blogs.ubc.ca/helenl

Image:

https://www.extremetech.com/mobile/235017-everything-you-need-to-know-about-the-samsung-galaxy-note-7-recall