1. Do you think there is a trade-off between the positive (higher performance) and negative (increased stress) effects of stretch goals? 2. Do you think a manager should consider stress when setting stretch goals for employees? If you answered no, what should a manager do if a valued employee complains of too much stress? If you answered yes, how might you consider stress in setting goals? 3. How do you think you would respond to stretch goals? Would they increase your performance? Would they stress you?
question: Critically analyse the below case and answer the questions at the end. Some of the most admired business leaders argue that the only way to get the most out of people is to stretch them. Both business anecdotes and research evidence seem to back this view. “If you do know how to get there, it’s not a stretch target,” former GE CEO Jack Welch has said. “We have found that by reaching for what appears to
be the impossible, we often actually do the impossible; and even when we don’t quite make it, we inevitably wind up doing much better than we would have done.” As for the research evidence, we have studied in goal-setting theory—whereby
managers set the most difficult goals to which employees will commit—is perhaps
the best-supported theory of motivation. The implication is that to be the most
effective manager you need to push, push, and push more.
But does this pose an ethical dilemma for managers? What if you learned that
pushing employees to the brink came at the expense of their health or their family
life? While it seems true that managers get the performance they expect, it also
seems likely that some people push themselves too hard. When Roshan Gupta, who
travels 4 days each week to different countries, read an e-mail at an airport telling
him that he and his wife had been blessed with twin children, born premature, he
was both happy and anxious. He looked around and could only see strangers around
him. He felt sad that there was no one around him with whom he could immediately
share his intense feelings.
On the one hand, you may argue that employees should be responsible for their own
welfare, and that it would be paternalistic, and encourage mediocrity, for
organizations to “care for” employees. On the other hand, if your stretch goals mean
your best employees are those who give it all for the organization—even putting
aside their own personal or family interests—is that what you wish your results as
a manager to be?
Questions
1. Do you think there is a trade-off between the positive (higher performance)
and negative (increased stress) effects of stretch goals?
2. Do you think a manager should consider stress when setting stretch goals for employees? If you answered no, what should a manager do if a valued employee complains of too much stress? If you answered yes, how might you consider stress in setting goals?
3. How do you think you would respond to stretch goals? Would they increase your performance? Would they stress you?
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