The Criterion Group when it was established in 1964 by Wally and Brian Smaill, was a ready-to-assemble furniture company. It transitioned to primarily suppling cabinets to major electronic companies when it expanded it 's business outside of New Zealand and into the international realm. The relative success of the company has changed with different economic circumstances and management strategies. Although it is improving from it 's lowest level of demand in 1998, this level is still relatively low. Thus the course of this essay will critically analyse how effectively or ineffectively different management theories have been applied to the disciplines of; globalisation, communication, working in teams, leadership and motivation …show more content…
The Criterion group has relatively good style of leadership according to House’s (1971) path-goal theory, as the Smaill brothers are participative leaders. Participative leaders involve group members in decision making, promoting a more even distribution of power (Schermerhorn et al., 2014). This is evident as they took key personnel with them overseas (mainly to Northern America) to show them how the new manufacturing methods worked in practice, and involved in them in the development of their supply cabinets. They also took into account the feedback given by the cell leaders. Cell leaders noted that there was a need for an up skilling of there workforce and as a result the Smalli brothers took an estimated half of Tamaki factory workforce to attend Manukau Institute of Technology for one two-hour evening session each week. Continuation of the participative form of leadership would be the best strategy for the Criterion group as it showed a positive improvement such as high levels of job …show more content…
A highly motivated workforce is indispensable to the achievement of sustained high-performance results. The criterion group effectively employed Abraham Maslow 's hierarchy of needs to motivate there workers. This theory lies on the basic principle that lower needs need to be satisfied before higher needs (McLeod, 2014). The Criterion group satisfied the majority of the needs in the pyramid. They satisfied not only the physical needs such as access to food and water, but security needs, ensured their original workers jobs even in difficult economic circumstance. They satisfied social needs by establishing a social club were there employers got a sense of belonging, and ego needs, as employees got a sense of recognition and prestige when rewarded for performance improvements. They only ceased to reach the highest level on the pyramid; self actualisation. In order to reach this stage, the Criterion case needs to stop heavily focusing on manly collectivist approaches of motivation and rewards such as company profit-sharing scheme, but more recognising the successes of the individual. A more autonomous approach will help motivate the Criterion groups employers to develop and be more creative in there roles, increasing output and creativity in the