The Business Game is an exciting and dynamic module, unlike no other that is studied by all students who are in their second year at Aston Business School. Primarily it was designed to allow students to explore and overcome numerous difficulties, challenges and obstacles they will be presented with when working as part of a team in real life situations.
Essentially preparing them for their third year, where they will be required to spend time being employed in the real world, and will be expected to work as part of a successful team whilst co-operating and working alongside individuals whom they have never met. Whilst ensuring students are made aware of the complexities they will face in the real world, the Business Game also allows them to incorporate theories and concepts that they have studied in past modules allowing them to apply them in a very much team based environment.
A team “consists of a group of individuals who work together to produce products or deliver services for which they mutually accountable” (Fincham and Rhodes, 2005).
The Business game was principally based upon teamwork, and the only way that a team could expect to prosper and be successful was by cooperating effectively and exercising superior teamwork. The primary concept of the game is simple, the task being for a group young entrepreneurs to work together in order to set up and successfully operate a simulation automobile company.
Each group or company was constructed at random by the Business School, consisting of five or six students who previous to the game had not met, of which each student was required to take on one of the roles of an operational specialist in the following areas; Managing Director, Operations Director, Finance Director, Marketing Director and Human Resources Director. The first task in the game was for the five members of our group to gather together in order to assign all members with an operational role. For most groups this was a simple task but this was not the case for our group.
The Term Paper on 401 Games Group Paper
The market for board games has seen annual increases of 10-20 per cent over the last decade, leading some to suggest we are in a “board game renaissance” (Carlson, 2013). 401 Games is a Toronto-based retailer of board games, card games, and collectibles which also provides on-site gaming space. A recognized early mover in the board game revolution, owner John Park was among the first to tap into ...
The first occasion that the group were required to meet resulted in only three out of the five members being present. My first impression of the other group members were mixed, one of the group members was very smartly dressed in a suit, shirt and tie and the other dressed very much as a student, with jeans and a t-shirt. This was of great significance, as my attention was immediately drawn to the smartly dressed individual and made me think that I might be able to take a backseat as he would be doing the bulk of the work, I later found to a large extent this was not the case.
As we were not aware of the whereabouts of the other two members the three of us began to discuss how the different operational roles would be allocated, and we also addressed the fact that if we were not able to contact the ‘missing’ group members soon we may have had to share the remainder of the workload. Between the three of us we mutually decided that as we had attended the class it was only fair that we got first choice of the available roles and if the other members were to turn up in the subsequent meetings they would have to choose from the remaining two roles.
Therefore the first issue required to be addressed by the three present group members was deciding who would be the most suitable candidate for each position. In order to allocate the roles effectively we all briefly introduced ourselves stating the academic course we were studying, the areas we had chosen to specialise in, a bit about our personality, our likes and dislikes and any preferences that we may have had regarding the role we wanted to pursue.
Although Mehul initially came across as being a fairly shy and quiet individual, which may have been a problem as marketing requires extensive communication, Chris and I were more than happy for him to take on his preferred role and were more than happy to provide guidance and help when necessary. When introducing myself to Chris and Mehul I explained I studied Business Management and had selected the Operations Management stream and therefore would have preferred the role as the Operations Director.
The Essay on Roles In Groups
As groups are forming it is easy to see that each group member has unique skills and strengths. As a group starts to develop, each group member starts to play a certain role within the group. Roles are very important within in a group because they are part of the basic structure. The roles of small groups are not usually assigned in advance, but overtime emerge within the group. Roles within a ...
I regard operations to be the most exciting and fastest moving area of a business and it is something I am seriously considering in pursuing upon the completion of my degree. Not only did I enjoy this but one of the main roles of the Operations Director was to calculate various requirements for production based on mathematical calculations, one of my strongest academic areas.
Again Chris and Mehul were more than happy for me to take on this role. We then had to think of a name for our newly found company, and Chris being the well prepared individual he was had already thought of some possible options. After a brief discussion it was decided the company would be called AMC (Aston Motor Company).
