INSTRUCTIONS: Read Carefully
(Previous Outline Submission is attached at the end of these instructions)
Your Portfolio Project synthesizes information gathered from an interview you will conduct with
a manager of your choosing, the knowledge you’ve gained in this course, and your own
experience to create a research and reflection paper.
Be sure to thoroughly read the Portfolio Project description below before beginning to work on
the project.
Portfolio Milestone Deliverables
The following 2 deliverables have already been completed. The Week 5 outline is at the end of
these instructions.
Already Completed (Week 2: Interview Subject and Summary of Theories (20 points of the
Portfolio Project)
Select which of the two Portfolio Project options you will complete and submit. Before 11:59 PM
MST on Sunday, submit the name of the person who will be your interview subject, along with a
summary of the theories that you plan to cover. These theories can change as you progress
through your project, so the information you provide for this Week 2 deliverable is not set in
stone. Instead, this assignment provides an opportunity to begin thinking about your Portfolio
Project and record your preliminary ideas. Your submission should be 200-300 words in length.
Already Completed Week 5: Portfolio Project Outline (20 points of the Portfolio Project)
Submit an outline of your Portfolio Project. Your outline should include bullet points, in the form
of sentences or phrases describing each major argument you want to make, organized as the
final project will be organized. This should by no means be a complete or final document, but
should be sufficiently advanced to serve as a guide for a working draft of your project drafts to
ensure that your writing is clear, thoughtful, and precise.
Interview
Choose a manager to interview with whom you are familiar—ideally, someone whom you
admire and aspire to emulate. Ask her or him for some time—perhaps you can sit down for
coffee—during which you can describe your course learning objectives and discuss what you
have so far taken away from the class (in brief) Ask the manager what insights she or he has to
offer to you at this point in your career.
The goal of the interview is to gain insight into what makes a good manager from the perspective
of someone in a management position. Some topics to touch on in the interview could include
the following:• How did your interviewee come to be a manager (i.e., what career path she or he
followed)?
• Has your interviewee found that professional certifications, volunteering, and continued
education are important factors to career development?
• What has surprised your interviewee most about what it means to be an effective leader
(as opposed to the popular view of what a successful leader is and/or does)?
• What roles are played by managerial goals, objectives, decision-making, and
communication on the job?
• How does the interviewee handle change management at his/her organization and what
specific challenges has she or he encountered?
• What advice does your interviewee offer to someone in your position and with your
short- and long-term goals?
At the close of the interview, be sure to thank your interviewee for her or his time and assistance!
Note: Any documentation resulting from personal interviews by CSU-Global students are for the
sole purposes of fulfilling a course assignment and will not be used as part of a larger study,
published, or distributed outside of the course environment.
Research and Reflection Paper
In the next phase, ruminate on what you learned in your interview—especially anything that
helped you to gain a deeper insight into the topics you studied in the course—and write a
research and reflection paper in which you draw upon learning shared with your instructor and
colleagues, your individual learning, and knowledge you have gained from the interview to
demonstrate a more in-depth understanding of the foundational principles of management. In
your paper, go beyond recitation of memorized facts or regurgitation of information; strive to
synthesize the most important topics of management (i.e., leadership, personality, motivation,
decision-making, communication, and the importance of good management to yourself and to
society) into a hybrid research and reflection paper.
Your paper should integrate responses to each of the following questions in a well-organized and
coherent paper:
• What leadership precepts did your interviewee impart to you (or what can you glean on
the topic as a result of your interview), and how do those dovetail with one or more of the
modern theories of leadership?
• How do the personalities of workers, colleagues, managers, and subordinates impact your
performance in, and experience of, the workplace? How do they interact with one or
more leadership models to create the most effective work environment?
• In light of your interview, the leadership model(s) you’ve discussed, and your own
personality, what one or two tenets of motivation theory have you taken away from the
course?
• How do your understandings of motivation theories impact your conceptions of the best
practices when it comes to making decisions and communicating at work?• Based on your interview and on learning from this course, what does it take to
be an
effective employee, a successful manager, and an exemplary citizen of society?
Your well-written paper should meet the following requirements:
• 8-10 pages in length in addition to the title page and reference page
• Formatted according to the APA Requirements
• Cite at least three scholarly sources, at least one of which is not provided in, or linked
from, the course, to support your assertions and strengthen your arguments. The CSUGlobal Library is a great place to find these sources!
Prior Week 5 submission OUTLINE: Please build from this
Portfolio Milestone #2
Michael A. McCormick
Principles of Management– MGT300
Colorado State University – Global Campus
Bradly E. Roh
August 20, 2017Portfolio Milestone #2
1. Mr. Toles succeeded in his career journey by using social learning theory. Social learning
theory involves learning from other people by observing and imitation (Miner, 2011). Mr.
Toles became successful in his military career by having self-discipline, gaining
experience over the years, and personal goal setting. The most important experience that
steered the success Mr. Toles was the presence of role models and leaders who
influenced a positive growth in his character development and life journey.
2. Goal-setting theory involves the setting of goals with performance progress. Setting
difficult and challenging goals improves the performance of an individual far much better
than having easy and simple goals (Miner, 2011). Mr. Toles used principles of goalsetting like having challenging tasks, feedbacks, and commitment.
Setting goals is one of
the most effective ways of staying motivated.
3. According to Mr. Toles, certification, volunteering and continued education has been an
important factor in his career development. Volunteering gave him an opportunity to
learn from the role models who were highly experienced in military. He also gained
professional certifications to decorate his military career. Continuing with education
helped in learning about important theories like social learning theory and goal-setting
theory.
4. An effective leader should have qualities like self-assessment, honest communication,
responsive to the needs of the team, understanding the goals and the purpose, team
building skills, goal setting and motivation skills (Collins, 2014). The opposed popular
view of what makes a successful leader is gaining high level education, having a
commanding voice, and should solve all problems. It is a good thing to be learned, but aleader should have addition skills like motivation, decision
making, and goal setting skills
that will boost the growth of an organization as well as personal growth like Mr. Toles.
5. The roles played by managerial goals include motivating the employees, satisfying the
customers, and enlarge the profit margins. These are the core managerial goals because
they touch on three important aspect of an organization which are the employees,
customers and profits.
• The role of objectives includes: makes planning easy, improves coordination
within and organization, promotes commitment and motivation, and improves
organizational change (Horstman, 2016). Setting objectives makes planning and
coordination easy because employees are aware of what they need to achieve and
how to do it.
• Decision-making improves managerial function, evaluates performance, chooses
the best alternative, helps in planning and implementing polices, and helps in
succeeding in business (Horstman, 2016).
• Communication promotes individual motivation to work, helps employees to raise
concern and leaders address them, and builds strong teams within the organization
(Miner, 2011). Communication influences the effectiveness of decision making
process.
6. Mr. Toles handles change management by having a positive attitude even when things
look bad. He believes that controlling moods is a choice and one can choose to be happy
or not regardless of the current situation. Deciding to be positive and outgoing has helped
him deal with change management. The specific challenge he has encountered is that
there is a need to control emotions and remain positive throughout all occasions.7. The main advice Mr. Toles offers for both short and long-term goals
is to use the social
learning theory and goal setting theory. There is need to have a mentor to look up to and
to emulate in career and personal growth. Set goals that are challenging so as to improve
the personal capacity and learn new things. Also set goals that are specific, measurable,
achievable, realistic, and time limit (Horstman, 2016).References
Collins, J., 2014. Leadership qualities : qualities of a good leader. Leipzig: Amazon.
Horstman, M., 2016. The effective manager. Hoboken, New Jersey: Wiley.
Miner, J. B., 2011. Organizational behavior 6. Integrated theory development and the role of the
unconscious. Armonk, N.Y. : M.E. Sharpe.
