User talk:MSB/IMB-EU-2013/PS2-P3

=Discussion via internet= Which industries has this russian coacher as clients? According to your interview we update the initial question and complication from the agile management method in the main project page. During the following week we should work on the following tasks: =Report 1= (28.04.2013) 
 * Don't forget to leave your progress report here. This can be and should be simple—you pick the format and the level of detail. I'm looking for information on (1) What did you mean to do this week? (2) What did you actually do this week? (3) If there's a gap between 1 and 2, what're you going to do differently next week? --msb (discuss • contribs) 08:48, 23 April 2013 (UTC)
 * Yerzhan. 12:01 28.04.2013. So far contacted a person working in Russia. He is working for a leading international coaching company RNL. His clients are russian state owned oil companies. The coaching he does is for teams (performance coaching) to increase effectiveness and efficiency of the team. Not the same as executive coaching, but similar. They measure the effectiveness of coaching by ROI (return on investment), different measuring scales, depending on clients demands. e.g. in drilling, the time needed to reach the oil, drilling equipment, floating platforms, set-up times, etc. Hard to measure in $ terms but possible to approximate. The difficulties in Russia with coaching, is that people are not familiar with this concept, it's easier for coaches to call themselves as project managers (working on a project of efficiency improvement). Also, Russian business are skeptical of positive effects of coaching, therefore they tend to put coaches under scrutiny, requiring "numbers", scales, measurements of increased effectiveness or positive effects. The cultural aspect here is that russian employees once talked to coaches, and made conclusions for themselves on where to improve and what to do next, really stick to their words, because they know that in X time they will meet with coach again and it will be a shame if they didn't kept on a promise made to themselves ("A man of word" concept). To prove all this and to get more results, this coach is willing to do a 4 or 5 items questionnaire that he can send to 3 or 4 of his colleagues. What do you think guys?
 * Ana Maria and Ana Milena (28.04.2013 16:00): Yerzhan, that is a very interesting information and we can definetly design a questionare in order to design our final study case and understand how cultural differences and failure patterns in these countries could be worked by executive coaching.
 * 1) Identify main cultural factors from Russia and Latin America countries when making business.
 * 2) Choose 1 or 2 industries in order to apply our final study case.
 * 3) Research for effective executive coaching methods.
 * (1)This week we wanted to divide the tasks while keeping in head the "question" to answer (How can executive coaching and logic of failure be useful for decision makers (individuals) from developing countries?). Ana Milena: Research on cases for Latin America for executive coaching; Ana Maria: Research on cases for Latin America for logic of failure; Yerzhan: Research on what is executive coaching and methods; Waldorf: Research on what is logic of failure and methods. As we research we wanted to form and shape the "question".
 * (2)What we did is, first, still searching for cases of executive coaching in Latin America. Second, started reading on methods of executive coaching and logic of failure. Third, tried other developing countries such as Russia, where a possible case may appear.
 * (3)What we would do differently next week is meet at least once a week to 1) shape the "question" as right now the research field seems to be quite vast, so as to narrow it down maybe or change the focus 2) to agree on tasks to undertake for the next week to form the "answer" to our "question". As mentioned by Ana Milena and Ana Maria we will focus on the following tasks for next week:
 * 1) Identify main cultural factors from Russia and Latin America countries when making business.
 * 2) Choose 1 or 2 industries in order to apply our final study case.
 * 3) Research for effective executive coaching methods.

Scrum Master Comment 29.04.13
This is good stuff thank you! I get an idea of what you're doing. You don't consider the weekly report a bureaucratic exercise, good! Think of doing this project for a client so that you have to take client relationship seriously. This means that at any time you can point towards what you have done, what you haven't done yet and what you're going to do differently (as you did!).--msb (discuss • contribs) 15:23, 30 April 2013 (UTC)

=Report 2= (02.05.2013) Objectives: Tasks for this (next) week: 1) Follow up on how dividing the task went on 2) Meet on Tuesday 5pm 7.05.2013 
 * If you like, take a look at a couple of Scrum Sprint review report samples for inspiration, here and here (alas, in German).
 * (1) We were supposed to meet and decide the parts and shape the questions
 * (2) We had a discussion and changed the question and answer to the question
 * (3) No gap
 * 1) Research on challenges come from Big Challenges (what parts e.g. HR, Logistics, Corporate Culture, Decisions Making) - Ana Maria
 * 2) Research on Logic Failure (e.g. types, actions, ) - Waldorf
 * 3) Research on Executive coaching methods (e.g. process, actions, etc) - Yerzhan
 * 4) Research on companies that used executive coaching (e.g. types of companies, industries best SMEs local, challenges) - Ana Milena

Scrum Master Comment 07.05.13
=Report 3= (07.05.2013) Now we will focus to start a collaborative document with google doc or a new tool. A. Intro -Challanges for local companies when facing global competition. background and document framework. (Ana Maria) B. Main Body 1. Application of executive coaching for HR Management in employee relationship, tools,method and examples{ research} (Yerzahm and Ana Milena) 2. Application of logic of failure for general management in decision making, tools,method and examples { research} (Waldorf) C. Summary (All team)  =Report 4= (12.05.2013) =Mid Sprint Review= (15.05.2013) Executive Coaching and Logic of Failure —show wiki —all members in front —changed research questions, really contains two questions —focus on competitive advantage and on a recommendation —HOW DO YOU KNOW YOU ARE DONE W/RESEARCH? —WHAT IS THE LINK BETWEEN YOUR TWO TOPICS (complex situation patterns) decision making only one issue. meaning making, team leadership issues; surprises: growth aspects of executive coaching. —explain complexity issue, transparency, —could use team coaching through me as an example? —HOW ARE YOU GOING BEYOND THE BOOK? —audience questions: did you split up? BIGGEST PROBLEM FOR YOUR GROUP SO FAR? —Titanpad, use of color codes
 * Given that you haven't laid down a lot of words yet, I think you need to be more specific with regard to your goals—or perhaps that is not the problem. If you must meet with the whole group to make the next step, you will not make the deadline(s), the first of which approaches next week on May 15 (first sprint review) where you are already supposed to show first results not just structure! So I think perhaps you need to give yourself much more challenging (and specific) targets for the next week!--msb (discuss • contribs) 10:07, 7 May 2013 (UTC)
 * We reviewed our tasks defined last week and shared our individual research.
 * Our structure:
 * Next steps:
 * Sunday - written work on Titan pad
 * Wednesday - present the collaborative document with our findings and document developments.
 * We have met and discussed the current stage of our paper, who is where and at what stage. So far, we have the main body of our paper, but linking to our research question and elaborating more is needed.
 * Ana Maria and Waldorf will work together on LF part, Waldorf concentrating on theory and Ana Maria - on practical side of LF, difference in decision making between Big multinationals and local SMEs, pro's & con's
 * Yerzhan will write the practical case of coaching linking it to HR management & talent management (management coaching lower level employees), employee retention through coaching (trust building, challenging, growing)
 * Ana Milena will write now on pro's & con's of executive coaching, effectiveness, and difference of EC & consulting, a practical case.
 * So far have been working on titan pad, found it useful
 * The meeting outside school is good once in a while
 * Next steps: Have this steps done before monday night.
 * Looking forward to your review tomorrow!--msb (discuss • contribs) 17:30, 14 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Recommendation from Professor:1)______ 2)_______3) Concentrate on problems with decision making -> LF and then talk about EC as a solution 4) Narrow down the question: How can executive coaching can help decision makers (here use decision making process & pattern identification?) in SME companies facing competition from multinationals? (waldor ->
 * Recommendation from A.Fiedler: go to identification of problems using LF & provide solutions through EC
 * Strengths: Presenting well done, showing the wiki, discussing challenges and problems
 * Weakness: Not to get lost in the content & details, more discussing the main idea and linking the parts in a group
 * Opportunities: Looking at coaching a team, the team at hand in particular
 * Last sprint review: presenting it to a customer by mentioning the processes but concentrating on result
 * Excellent review! Here is another resource recommended to me by a client, I son't know it vut it looks good, Whitmore, J. "Coaching for Performance". I really will have to write my own book...working on it and when I am ready you might like to be Beta-readers perhaps?
 * My notes from the review for you:

STRENGTH presentation of actual wiki, explanation of source validity and problem character, good presentation handover! IMPROVEMENTS too much detail of content, do not get lost in the subject. --msb (discuss • contribs) 13:12, 15 May 2013 (UTC)
 * Don't forget your weekly report: most importantly, which steps will you take during the week (task list). --msb (discuss • contribs) 09:07, 21 May 2013 (UTC)

=Report 5= (31.05.2013)
 * We have met and discussed the relevant articles, as we are going to change the direction of the paper. Thus, we will have executive coaching but will leave out logic of failure.
 * Ana Milena will concentrate on HR side of challenges for SMEs, Waldorf will concentrate on factors that affect coaching SMEs, will see if coaching for SMEs is Business development or personal therapy, Ana Maria will look into cases in UK, Austria, Hong Kong of application EC on HR improvement - training, Yerzhan will look into effectiveness and measurement of executive coaching. The area is under question if EC is applied same to all industries SME operate in.
 * Next steps: Have this steps done before monday meeting.

=Report 6= (03.06.2013)
 * In this meeting we review our findings based on our research.
 * Based on our findings the final question to work on is: "How does Executive Coaching help SMEs Performance?
 * Our Final Structure includes some part of the already research on SMEs and executive coaching.

— 1. Methodology ->Yerzahn)       — 2. Introduction ( HR Challenges of SMEs and relation with organizational culture) -> Ana Milena       — 3. Executive Coaching -> Yerzahn       — 4. Findings (cases and limitations) -> Ana Maria       — 5. Recommendations (EC, Mentoring, and Business Coaching) -> Waldorf We are satisfied we our research findings and based on it we worked together on our paper conclusion and recommendations for SMEs. Based on it we will continue our writing in Titapad Work parallel on titapad Meeting on 14.06.2013 to review our writing and slides for the final presentation. = Final Comments =
 * Next Steps:
 * Don't forget sources, especially on your Wiki page. This is an area where it'll be tempting to just claim things...you need to either generate data or find them. Looking forward to discussing (and seeing) your progress next week!--msb (discuss • contribs) 21:06, 5 June 2013 (UTC)

Content
The authors are investigating how executive coaching and mentoring could help small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) overcome their HR challenges. In the introduction to the research question is analyzed using the pyramid principle and the specific challenges that SMEs face today are listed. this treatment is very brief and the sources are not entirely clear. the link to organizational culture is highlighted but the extensive literature does not seem to have been taken into account. the section on executive coaching suffers a little from being a one source pony. the authors devote some time to explaining the difference between consulting and coaching but it's not entirely clear why (in the context of their main question). The rest of the paper is much better covered by secondary references. The authors point out, accurately, that there are few studies on executive coaching in SMEs and also argue why this is so. Their treatment of executive coaching in SMEs is concise and to the point. The final section of the paper deals with mentoring as a method and with the comparison between coaching and mentoring. Here, as in the summary, the authors deliver as their main result that coaching and mentoring can be useful as complementary methods to deal with HR issues in SMEs. Though properly referenced, this last step suffers from, for such an in principle well-covered scientific ground, relatively few (and dated) sources.

Structure
The paper is fairly well structured, easy and interesting to read. The use of the pyramid principle was helpful to focus the authors' process. To prefix the introduction by section on methodology is a bold, unusual step. However, the main content of this methodological section is the authors' outline of their approach and the limitations of their investigation.

Form
Formally, the term paper was created in a wiki using agile methods and a separate paper version (not a printout of the Wiki) was also created and submitted. There are a few English mistakes, but not many and both the wiki and the paper version are well presented. Unfortunately, the references in the paper version are a number of cases inconsistent with regards to the way of citation.

Relevance
The paper is relevant because there's actually little written about the effects of consulting in SMEs because of the reasons identified and analyzed by the authors. It would be more relevant as a study if it had gone deeper and been better sourced.

Process
The team of authors struggled a little with the process throughout. Admittedly, this process, which included agile methods, such as scrum, and several IT platforms, was in itself difficult. Also, the authors were hampered by a lack of primary data.

Strengths
Good formal capture of several complex topics. The authors have succeeded in bringing together different aspects.

Weaknesses
Some aspects are not covered in sufficient scientific depth. References are unevenly cited and used.

--Birkenkrahe (discuss • contribs) 22:14, 22 September 2013 (UTC)