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The case Leadership & Teamwork Problems being discussed concerns Ellen Moore’s observations on leadership and teamwork while being assigned on a project management assignment in South Korea. She was, in fact, a systems consultant and her assignment in South Korea was the result of collaboration amongst Western Systems Inc. (WSI) the USA, which was an important North American information technology company; and Korean Conglomerate Inc. (KSI) South Korea, which was also a significant Korean business giant.
The problems being observed in the Ellen Moore case (WSI / KSI) in South Korea in the main domains of leadership and teamwork are being identified and discussed in the chronological order in the succeeding paragraphs.
Issues of Lack of Requisite Expertise of the South Korean Consultants
The Systems Implementation Team (SIT) was comprised of three North American and five South Korean consultants and as mentioned earlier, the job of the North Americans was to impart requisite technical knowledge and relevant expertise to their relatively inexperienced South Korean counterparts in designing and implementing the system, within seven months. This was an important task as the collaborative project of WSI and KSI was one of the largest consultation projects in the history of South Korea and therefore required he requisite level of expertise for all the team members. However, the South Korean consultants were found having very little expertise in the area. This was contrary to the earlier assurances provided by the KSI according to which all of the company’s managers were amply qualified for the task. Furthermore, the senior most South Korean consultant Jack, was also found lacking in knowledge or experience about systems implementation project or consultancy. This situation had the potential to delay the complete project because of importance of the deliverable designated to the SIT (Nicholls & Ellement, 1997).
Language & Cultural Differences
The American English and the South Korean languages are totally different having distinct origins and nuances. The translation, whenever done, was therefore limited in terms of interpreting the abstract concepts. Though Ellen Moore did her best to learn the South Korean language, however even a rudimentary understanding was impossible within the brief preparatory period available to her. This led to awkwardness and various difficulties, especially once the team gathered in informal settings and the South Koreans insisted on communicating or addressing others in their own language, without paying any heed to the presence of the Americans (Nicholls & Ellement, 1997).
Similarly, the South Korean culture, is totally different to the North American one, also created a vast set of difficulties for the Americans. The most prominent difficulty in this context concerned Ellen Moore being a woman and her acceptance as a qualified team leader by the South Koreans. This ultimately translated in Mr Song blaming her for all the delays and other problems with the project (Nicholls & Ellement, 1997)…
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