MGT8033 - Site Security And Secure Escorts SSE Case Study - MIS - Leading Organizational Change - Management Assessment Answer

MGT8033 - Site Security And Secure Escorts SSE Case Study - MIS - Leading Organizational Change - Management Assessment Answer

Assessment Task:

Case study: Site Security and Secure Escorts- SSSE

Site Security and Secure Escorts (SSSE) is a company wholly owned by what will be referred to here as CP Security Services. The parent company is registered in the UK but provides a wide range of security services across Europe, including risk assessment and management, site security and secure escort services, cash transit (armoured vehicles) and high-value courier services, detention centres and prison escorts, and technical security systems. SSSE is based in the Netherlands and provides manned guard and secure escort services across a range of sectors, including pharmaceuticals, financial services, telecommunications, defence and utilities, to provide protection from theft, vandalism, industrial espionage, terrorism and attacks from radical activists motivated by issues such as animal rights.

A new CEO was appointed to SSSE and tasked to grow the business and improve profitability. His first task was to familiarize himself with the current state of affairs and identify what could be done to improve the situation. He spent a lot of time out of his office meeting people. He had almost daily conversations with most managers at head office and, with his director of operations, visited clients and met SSSE staff working on clients’ premises. His aim, using conversations, observations and management reports, was to identify key issues and begin to formulate an agenda for change. He did not embark on this process with a ‘clean sheet’. When he joined SSSE, he brought with him, based on his previous experience of managing similar businesses, his own subjective model of how organizations work and the key cause-and-effect relationships that determine effectiveness, and used this to direct his attention and interpret what he saw, heard and read about the organization.

He quickly realized that a number of clients were unhappy with the quality of service provided by SSSE. This not only threatened to undermine his plan to grow the business and increase margins but also raised the possibility that SSSE would lose existing business as and when contracts came up for renewal. His initial diagnosis pointed to several factors that appeared to be contributing to this state of affairs:

•    Staff shortages: Following 9/11 and the aggressive tactics employed by some animal rights activists, there had been a sharp increase in the demand for site security. This was accompanied by a related demand for new recruits to be more thoroughly vetted, a time- consuming process that reduced supply just when the demand for new staff was growing.
•    Management style: The Company’s management style was top-down command and control. While this had been effective in the past when management could easily impose sanctions for poor performance, it was proving less effective in the tight labour market. There was evidence that it was having a negative impact on motivation, and some employees were paying less attention to performance standards and were ignoring operating procedures because they were confident, given the rising demand for staff, they would not be dismissed.
•    Management structure: The number of supervisors had not increased in line with the number of new contracts, and so supervisors were overstretched. This was exacerbated by the fact that, in order to fulfil immediate contractual requirements for guards and escorts, supervisors had to stand in and personally cover for staff shortages.
•    Ineffective management information systems: Decision making was highly centralized but inadequately supported by the quality of available management information. For example, managers located at Case study 7.1 Site Security and Secure Escorts- SSSE  (Hayes, 2018 p.120)

Site Security and Secure Escorts (SSSE) is a company wholly owned by what will be referred to here as CP Security Services. The parent company is registered in the UK but provides a wide range of security services across Europe, including risk assessment and management, site security and secure escort services, cash transit (armoured vehicles) and high-value courier services, detention centres and prison escorts, and technical security systems. SSSE is based in the Netherlands and provides manned guard and secure escort services across a range of sectors, including pharmaceuticals, financial services, telecommunications, defence and utilities, to provide protection from theft, vandalism, industrial espionage, terrorism and attacks from radical activists motivated by issues such as animal rights.

A new CEO was appointed to SSSE and tasked to grow the business and improve profitability. His first task was to familiarize himself with the current state of affairs and identify what could be done to improve the situation. He spent a lot of time out of his office meeting people. He had almost daily conversations with most managers at head office and, with his director of operations, visited clients and met SSSE staff working on clients’ premises. His aim, using conversations, observations and management reports, was to identify key issues and begin to formulate an agenda for change. He did not embark on this process with a ‘clean sheet’. When he joined SSSE, he brought with him, based on his previous experience of managing similar businesses, his own subjective model of how organizations work and the key cause-and-effect relationships that determine effectiveness, and used this to direct his attention and interpret what he saw, heard and read about the organization.

He quickly realized that a number of clients were unhappy with the quality of service provided by SSSE. This not only threatened to undermine his plan to grow the business and increase margins but also raised the possibility that SSSE would lose existing business as and when contracts came up for renewal. His initial diagnosis pointed to several factors that appeared to be contributing to this state of affairs:

•    Staff shortages: Following 9/11 and the aggressive tactics employed by some animal rights activists, there had been a sharp increase in the demand for site security. This was accompanied by a related demand for new recruits to be more thoroughly vetted, a time- consuming process that reduced supply just when the demand for new staff was growing.
•    Management style: The Company’s management style was top-down command and control. While this had been effective in the past when management could easily impose sanctions for poor performance, it was proving less effective in the tight labour market. There was evidence that it was having a negative impact on motivation, and some employees were paying less attention to performance standards and were ignoring operating procedures because they were confident, given the rising demand for staff, they would not be dismissed.
•    Management structure: The number of supervisors had not increased in line with the number of new contracts, and so supervisors were overstretched. This was exacerbated by the fact that, in order to fulfil immediate contractual requirements for guards and escorts, supervisors had to stand in and personally cover for staff shortages.
•    Ineffective management information systems: Decision making was highly centralized but inadequately supported by the quality of available management information. For example, managers located at headquarters did not have access to up-to-date information on operations, making it difficult for them to schedule work effectively.

The CEO shared and debated this assessment with senior colleagues. This debate produced some additional data and one minor reinterpretation and provided the basis for a searching discussion of what could be done to improve the situation. One suggestion was to explore ways of improving the performance of existing staff, but it was recognized that before this possibility could be pursued there was a need for more information. The operations director agreed to co-opt a site supervisor and conduct two focus groups with guards and escorts drawn from several sites. Their report indicated that while the guards and escorts raised different points specific to their roles, a number of common themes emerged. For example, both groups indicated that they often felt bored on the job, which lacked any meaningful challenge, and some remarks hinted that when not directly supervised, they read newspapers or did puzzles rather than give their full attention to their duties. They also felt undervalued. They realized there was a growing demand for personnel who had the level of security clearance required by SSSE’s clients, but they felt that this ‘scarcity factor’ was not reflected in their rates of pay. These findings prompted the management team to initiate a more detailed diagnosis of the roles people were required to perform, with a view to redesigning their jobs in ways that would improve their motivation and the quality of their work. A consultant was employed to facilitate this step in the process. He introduced managers to Hackman and Oldham’s (1980) job characteristics theory and helped them to use the job diagnostic survey to gather more information.  

Another suggestion for improvement was to take a detailed look at the way the organization was structured and the prevailing management style and to consider alternatives that might address some of the issues uncovered by the initial diagnosis. The consultant who had been brought in to help with the redesign of the jobs performed by guards and escorts was asked to facilitate a workshop on organization design. This led to the senior management team exploring the possible benefit of introducing team working on client sites, with self-managed teams being delegated responsibility for monitoring their own performance as well as executing the task. Hackman’s book Leading Teams (2002) guided much of this work.

Task 1

Based on less than perfect information supplied about the SSSE case study, you are required to act as an External Change Consultant to assist SSSE to address the issues and challenges:

1.    Develop at least further five (5) realistic assumptions that you can add to the issues and problems expressed. These might typically be related to management, change processes, managerial information systems, technology, competitors, Customer’s and so on.  Use at least two (2) sentences to describe each assumption. Only reference this task if you can, otherwise, there no need to reference this task in your response. 

2.    Referring to Hayes (2018) Chapter 3 and Worley & Mohrman 2014 (Reading 5) critically analyse how SSSE anticipated the need for change? Which typology of change - using Figure 3.4 Types of Organisational Change (Hayes, 2018 p.55) might best describe the approach that SSSE should adopt and justify your answers? 

3.    With reference to the indicators of effectiveness (Hayes 2018, Chapter 4), explain and discuss how SSSE has or has not been effective and critically discuss the factors that will need to be taken into account when assessing their performance?

4.    In reference to Hayes (2018) Chapter 10 Power, politics and stakeholder management and Malhortra & Hinings (2015) Reading 9 discuss and critically analyse the importance of enlisting support from key stakeholders. What advice would you give to SSSE at this time?  

Task 2

Use the SSSE case information provided above. 

Based on less than perfect information supplied about the SSSE problem statement, you are now required to continue your external change advice to the Board. Assignment 2 requires you to apply change intervention ideas to solve the company’s range of change issues. Use the same list of issues and assumptions from Assignment 1. However, if needed, add additional relationship and behavioural assumptions based on less than perfect information as follows:

1.    Based on Readings McFillen et al. 2013 (Reading 11), Rafferty et al. 2013 (Reading 12) and Barratt-Pugh et al. 2013 (Reading 13) compare and contrast the relationship between change readiness and change agents? Please use examples from the SSSE case to support your answer.

2.    Using Kotter’s Integrative model of organisational dynamics Chapter 7, Figure 7.4 (Hayes, 2018 p.130), redraw and adapt this Figure to suit your analysis of SSSE. Now using facts from the problem statement plus your own assumptions from the case study, explain your analysis using the short, medium and long term as described in Chapter 7 (700 words)

3.    Based on Hayes (2018) Chapter 9 and Battilana et al (Reading 16) identify, discuss and explain appropriate leadership approaches and competencies when implementing planned organisational change at SSSE. 

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