The Department of Defense Educational Activity (DoDEA) is a hedgehog organization because it knows only one big thing that it pursues: education. The organization has simplified the complexities of education into one and simple concept of career readiness in education (Collins, 2001). Consequently, this concept is not only simple to understand but also easily to implement. Rather than pursuing the complexities of education as a whole, the organization has simplified its pursuit into a simple objective of the pursuit to prepare learners to be ready for college and career, which makes it a hedgehog organization.
DoDEA can be the best at education in the world because it set out essential imperatives that guide their strategic planning process. The first imperative for this organization is to develop an educational system with the potential to build college as well as career readiness among the learners. The second imperative is to develop an organizational model that is both efficient and effective as a unified school model (Anderson, Bracken, & Bracken, 2000). The two imperatives guide the overall strategic planning for the organization as it seeks to offer quality education
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The major driver of DoDEA’s economic engine is the revenue generated from offering educational services to learners related to military personnel. It was established to offer an educational framework to learners whose parents or guardians serve within the military service. It derives its main economic income from educational services. In offering these educational services, the organization is deeply passionate about preparing learners to be ready for their college education and subsequent careers (Anderson, Bracken & Bracken, 2000). It tailors its educational programs in a way that identifies learner strengths and builds on such strengths in a way that helps that benefits the learners during their college education and subsequent careers.
The council members that I would choose for DoDEA would include one teacher, one administrator and one instructional specialist. The three-member council will be effective in guiding the organization towards a hedgehog approach in its strategic planning and management. During the first meeting, I would give the following speech.
Ladies and gentlemen, you have been selected to join the DoDEA council. Your roles in this council will be to help it, and its management gains a deeper understanding of critical issues its faces (Collins, 2001). As members of this council, you will be required to engage each other in debates and arguments about specific positions with the organization with the view of getting a deeper understanding and presenting your understanding of the issues it faces. You will play a critical role in guiding the organization’s strategic planning in a way that confines the organization to a hedgehog approach in planning and its overall operations.
Firstly, this council will play a critical role in ensuring that DoDEA becomes the best organization in the world in offering educational services. The organization has established educational imperatives that seek to guide its success in education and help it become the best educational organization in the world. As such, this council will play an important role in confining its planning and operations within the set operational imperatives. First, the council will ensure that it builds an educational system that has the potential to prepare learner and make them ready for college as well as career lives (Anderson, Bracken & Bracken, 2000). In achieving this, members of this council will be required to bring together their skills and competencies from their different backgrounds in helping the leading executive to establish ways in which they can improve the educational system in a way that focuses on the college and career needs of the learners and consequently make them prepared for them. The council will point out the weaknesses and shortcomings of the current system and suggest ways through which such shortcomings will be addressed (Provizer, 2008). Such advice will enable the organization to simplify the entire complexities of the educational system and tackle them from one simplified point of view of college preparedness as well as career preparedness.
Secondly, the council will be required to present their views about the effectiveness of its organizational structure. It is important that the structure be effective and equally efficient in ensuring that DoDEA effectively prepares learners for both college as well as their subsequent careers. The structure needs to support this simplified and unified approach to education. Each council member will be required to find to examine whether the existing structure supports this simplified approach and goals of education rather than a generalized approach to all complexities of the educational systems from their respective functions and competencies within the organization (Anderson, Bracken & Bracken, 2000). Therefore, the council members will present views and debate on the required organizational restructuring with the view of learning from each other and presenting informed positions. Through these two strategies, the council will help the leading executive to make an informed decision in planning that will confine DoDEA into a hedgehog organization.
The major economic driver of DoDEA relates offering educational facilities. This council will play a critical role in ensuring that it optimizes on its economic drivers in different ways (Collins, 2001). First, the council will ensure that the organization is the best in offering educational services in the world that prepares learners for their colleges and future career. In doing so, the council will help in giving it a competitive advantage over all its competitors. The responsibilities that I have already highlighted will ensure that this council contributes to giving it a competitive advantage and hence enhance its main economic driver. Secondly, the council will be resourceful in providing information about how the organization can concentrate on its niche and approach to education (Provizer, 2008). This will distinguish the organization in that niche of education and equally give it a competitive advantage and enhance the DoDEA’s main economic drivers.
Lastly, the members of this council will be resourceful in ensuring that it excels in the area it is personate about (Collins, 2001). More than just concentrating on aspects that the organization is good at, it should equally ensure that it establishes itself in other relevant areas. While DoDEA is good at providing educational services, it is passionate about preparing learners for their colleges and subsequent careers. This council will be responsible for proposing ways through which it can concentrate and optimize in the areas it is passionate about. The council will do this by proposing ways in which the organization can avoid generalization in education but concentrate on the simplified objectives that govern the areas of its greatest passion.
In summary, this council will serve as a watchdog to ensure that the organization is competent in the areas it is passionate about and enhance its main economic drivers. It will suggest ways through which it maintains a focus on the simplified objectives rather than a generalized approach to the complexities of education. Consequently, the council will be instrumental in ensuring that the organization remains as a hedgehog organization rather than a fox organization.
References
Anderson, L. B., Bracken, J., & Bracken, M. C. (2000). Review of Department of Defense Education Activity (DoDEA) Schools. Volume II: Quantitative Analysis of Educational Quality.
Collins, J. (2001). Good to Great . Harper Business.
Provizer, N. W. (2008). On hedgehogs, foxes, and leadership: Uncovering the other Tolstoy. The Leadership Quarterly, 19 (4), 453-458.
