Reference no: EM132309058

Project Overview and context

Case study

You receive an email from Sarah Voss, Customer Service Manager.

Hello,

Following on from last week's senior management meeting, it has been decided that BizOps Enterprises will take on an organisation-wide commitment to developing a process to improve emotional intelligence in the workplace. As a part of this processes all managers, team leaders and members are expected to complete a self-reflection survey to identify the impact of their emotions on others in the workplace.

On a different note, I have been made aware that one of your team members, Anton, is not happy and this is affecting the usually excellent standard of his work.

Anton is a new employee who has been working at BizOps for only three months and has been in Australia for six months. He is very competent in his job role, but has a lot of difficulty speaking with others in the organisation. His accent is very strong and he is easily embarrassed when others cannot understand him, even though his English is excellent. He is often teased in a good-natured way, but does not realise that this is the way his group members interact with each other, so he gets frustrated and raises his voice in response. He does not get angry, but he has difficulty understanding the jokes. His peers then avoid him and laugh about his ‘cranky moods'.

I would like to you to mentor Anton with the purpose of developing his emotional intelligence skills to build productive workplace relationships and maximise workplace outcomes.

Please analyse Anton's self-reflection survey (attached) and put together a mentoring plan that we can discuss with him next week. We do not want to lose good employees, so it is important that this is done well.

This situation with Anton is one we would like to avoid in future. Consequently, I would like you to work on developing an overall positive emotional climate within our customer service. Given that you are the Team Leader for Customer Service, you are expected to complete the self-reflection survey attached to this email. This will help you identify your emotional strength and weaknesses to effectively develop positive emotional climate in our organisation.

Please compile a report for me to use as the basis of a presentation to the management team. I expect the report to be ready for monthly board meeting which will be held in four weeks from now. The report will then be offered to other departments for them to work towards developing emotional intelligence at BizOps.

Regards,
Sarah Voss
Customer Service Manager

Assessment Tasks

This Project has been split into eight separate tasks. Please complete each task in the order they appear.

Task One

Complete the self-reflection survey for BizOps managers to analyse your own emotional intelligence competencies.

Task Two
a) Use the insights you have had about yourself during the previous activities to improve your emotional intelligence. Keep a daily journal for one week (5 working days), Complete the template below.

b) Explain how you can use this awareness to enable you to control and manage your emotional responses in the workplace.

c) Provide your completed Self-reflection survey and your journal to two colleagues, family members or trusted friends and ask them for their feedback on your level of emotional intelligence and any areas you could improve. Write down their feedback in the space below.

d) How can you use your self-reflection (Task One) and the feedback you have received to further develop your emotional intelligence?

Task Three

a) Keep a daily journal for one week (5 working days) of observing others in your workplace.

Ensure you do not compromise anyone's privacy by using pseudonyms such as Person 1, Person 2,etc.

b) How can you use this awareness to adapt your communication/behaviors style in the workplace to build positive relationships with your colleagues and others and how would you use this knowledge to understand and respond accordingly to the emotional states of others?

Task Four

Review Anton's completed Self-Assessment-Survey and the information provided in the email from Sarah Voss, and complete the following:

1. Explain how Anton is expressing his emotions in the workplace and how he could do this more appropriately.

2. Explain how Anton is responding to the emotions and behaviours of others in the workplace and how he could do this more appropriately.

3. Prepare a mentoring plan for Anton. The mentoring plan is required to explain how you would:

- assist Anton to respond to the emotional states of his co-workers and to assess emotional cues

- identify the variety of cultural expressions of emotions in the team to help Anton understand and respond to a variety of emotional cues

- select and offer flexible work practices to Anton to assist him in his work-life balance for overcoming stress related to language and cultural barriers he may encounter in the workplace

- provide opportunities for Anton to express his thoughts and feelings on a regular basis

- assist Anton to understand the effects of his behaviour and emotions on others in the workplace

- encourage Anton to self-manage his emotion

Your plan should be in the form of an action plan with timeframes, resources and outcomes, and should link to any relevant BizOps policies and procedures.

Task Five
Your assessor will be looking to see that you are able to understand issues raised by co-workers and how you are able to provide assistance and monitor the implementation of the action plan for Anton and whether this has improved the workplace as a whole.

Review the mentoring plan you developed for Anton in Task 4 and the following information:

Anton is often teased in a good-natured way, but does not realise that this is the way his team members interact with each other, so he gets frustrated and raises his voice in response. He does not get angry, but he has difficulty understanding the jokes. His peers then avoid him and laugh about his ‘cranky moods'.

This situation with Anton is one we would like to avoid in future. Consequently, I would like you to work on developing an overall positive emotional climate within our workplace.

Develop a coaching and training plan for your team members to develop and use emotional intelligence in the workplace that includes the following:
- Culturally sensitive communication
- Conflict resolution skills
- Emotional triggers
- Understanding and managing your emotions and those of coworkers
- How you can utilize the personal strengths of others to increase workplace outcomes.

Your plan should be in the form of an action plan with timeframes (ranging over a 3-month period), resources and outcomes that you discuss with your co-workers as part of the "Meeting" Part 2 role- play.

Task Six
You are required to answer in a report format that should comprise of no less than 2000 words and must follow the BizOps style guide.

Using the information from the relevant BizOps policies and procedures and the work you have done so far (in Tasks 1 to 5), prepare a report on preliminary/general ideas relating to emotionally intelligent management practices. Your report must contain the following:

Introduction
- Explain the relationship between emotionally effective staff and management and the achievement of business objectives, and why this is important for BizOps.

Body
Outline three key emotional intelligence principles that would be suitable for BizOps.
- Explain the use and importance of emotional intelligence strategies to build positive internal and external workplace relationships.
- Explain how to recognise and respond to culturally diverse emotional reactions of team members (provide examples).
- Explain how to adapt your own communication style to promote positive relationships.
- Explain why management should always consider the emotions of team members when making organisational decisions.
- Outline how to use the strengths of team members to achieve workplace outcomes.

Conclusion
Reiterate the importance of the practice of emotional intelligence in the workplace.
Encourage all staff to identify their own and others' emotional reactions and develop ways to respond to and work with each other more effectively.

The final documents you submit for assessment will be assessed using the project criteria provided.

All project criteria outlined must be covered satisfactorily for Part B to be completed satisfactorily.

You must complete the project unassisted by the assessor or other personnel, but may refer to reference material as needed.

Attachment:- Project Overview.rar