Managing in a different culture

As I get more and more involved in the daily management activities of a foreign IT firm, I feel the constant need to change my plans. At my first meeting with the staff, I made it very clear that things will have to change and our current operation is not even at 20% of what we could achieve.

Everyone at the meeting agreed about the need for a change and the need to move ahead with a new plan and a new attitude. The major issues we discussed in the meeting were:

• Absence of general management: there was no general manager in charge of day to day operation of the company, couple of staff members were acting as part time managers which created good deal of confusion for both the staff and the clients.
• The compensation system was not adequate: the staff members had no clear idea of the compensation system, the pay worked on standards that would change frequently.
• No tracking system: there was no adequate tracking system of the work done by the employees or the type of service delivered to the clients
• No follow ups: clients would wait extended periods of time waiting to hear back from the staff regarding technical help or a service that was not delivered on time.
• No follow ups on completed work orders: there was an excessive build up of fixed systems that needed to be returned to the clients.
• No company policy: there was no policy regarding (hiring, firing, compensation, vacation, sick leave, tardiness, etc.)
• No accounting system: the company had no accounting system, only an excel sheet with expenses and income.

For a moment, you would think “how in the world a company could run with all the above mentioned deficiencies”, will surprisingly enough, the company is doing well business wise, but thing can not run like this if the company want to really stand in the market.

In my next blog, I will go into more details about how to fix the above mentioned points. I will try to incorporate readers’ feedback into my solution