AN EXPERIENTIAL UNDERSTANDING OF THE TRUST DIMENSION USING CONSULTING CASES TO TEACH BUSINESS POLICY New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 59 AN EXPERIENTIAL UNDERSTANDING OF THE TRUST DIMENSION USING CONSULTING CASES TO TEACH BUSINESS POLICY Joseph Ancona, Western Electric Company Kathleen A. Ross, Magnolia Insurance Agency Thomas L. Wallace, Blue Cross Insurance Company James E. Weir, Saint Louis University The purpose of a business policy capstone course Is usually taken to be the integration of concepts and principles from the common body of knowledge in accounting, finance, marketing, and management. In addition, the instructor seeks to impart the traditional “general manager perspective” by assigning textbook cases and conceptual articles. Conceptual-analytic knowledge is supplemented by providing students with the opportunity to practice individual and group problem-solving skills, and by having them write and defend their analysis of textbook cases. When the instructor wishes to supplement classroom acquired knowledge with some form of experiential knowledge, he will sometimes use the live case. The live case is used at the School of Business and Administration, Saint Louis University, to teach students interpersonal as well as technical skills. Our experience at the Small Business Institute has convinced us of the importance of using live cases as experiential vehicles for allowing students to apply newly acquired knowledge. In this brief paper, the advantages and disadvantages of the live case will be examined from the point of view of the instructor, the students, and the client firms. A major hypotheses has been suggested as an unexpected result of our success in using live cases to teach business policy to undergraduate and graduate students. We have found that students who had adequate, or even superior, technical knowledge sometimes failed to conduct a satisfactory live case analysis. Furthermore, sometimes students with a minimum technical knowledge seemed to conduct at least a satisfactory live case analysis. Our conclusion was that these latter students were often able to establish positive interpersonal relationships with the client firms whereas the former students had difficulties forming or maintaining interpersonal relations. As a result we have formulated the following guiding hypothesis: Since technical knowledge is only a necessary prerequisite for success in solving business problems, business students should be given an opportunity to show that they have the equally important requisite abilities to establish and maintain multi-dimensional trust relationships necessary for professional success. It is our opinion that experiential exercises are desirable in order to promote the development of the above mentioned abilities. New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 60 Upon first glance, this seems to be a rather simplistic tautological proposition. However, in our view, the interpersonal trust dimension is frequently forgotten as pragmatically oriented administrators and business professors tend to emphasize technical, conceptual, and factual knowledge. Our experience in using live business policy cases in evening MBA and undergraduate business policy courses demonstrates that the interpersonal dimensions can, and should be, effectively integrated in the business curriculum. The business policy capstone course provides a useful point in a business curriculum for interrelating technical and behavioral knowledge. INTRODUCTION In the 1976 spring semester, nine live cases described in Table 1 were accepted by evening students in separate graduate and undergraduate capstone policy courses. The instructor’s teaching objectives included a desire to demonstrate the practical usefulness of business concepts. The cases were carefully selected to match the student’s current job characteristics and interests and the client firm’s needs for consulting service. The instructor visited a number of the firms, talked with Small Business Administration officials about the potential cases, and extensively with students. Typically, it took about one month to establish a suitable “f it” between the firm’s needs for consulting services, student’s skills and interests in the firm’s problem, and the problem suitability in relation to course goals. The characteristics of student consulting teams shown in Table 2 demonstrate certain patterns. Table 2 provides evidence which supports the proposition that success in solving the client’s problem in a “successful,” or “highly successful manner,” requires requisite technical knowledge. Teams 1, 2, 3 and 6 all have one or more team members who have direct knowledge relevant to the client’s problem. Mr. S of team 8 was an expert on computers and on systems analysis. He well understood computer terminology and the general problems of microfilm processing. Even with the necessary technical knowledge this team experienced a failure to solve the client’s problem adequately. Suspicion and mistrust between the team members, and with the instructor, grew progressively worse as time passed. This team failed because they could not learn the lessons of working together. The symptoms of a downward spiraling interpersonal trust identified this deficiency in both members of the team. INSTRUCTOR’ S VIEWPOINT The major advantages and challenges of the live case must be balanced against the costs of using them. From the instructor’s viewpoint, the advantages include an opportunity to make the concepts and principles taught in the entire business curriculum become “relevant” to the students. Students who volunteer for live case work learn many lessons in talking directly New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 61 New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 62 New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 63 New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 64 to company presidents and their staffs. Table 1 shows that the entry level in all live cases is at the president or general manager level. The professor who teaches business policy asks his students to take on the role of the general manager in solving text-book cases. That is very hard for students who have never personally met a general manager. However, the student who risks working on live cases must even defend his solution to a consulting problem before the president of a company! Second, live cases expose the student to the effects of uncertainty on business decision- making and requires that he deal with it in some satisfactory manner. The live case allows the student to separate uncertainty due to lack of information from uncertainty due to the complexity of the problem situation. Third, and most important, the live case allows the student to experience the complexities of establishing and developing functional working human relationships with their team members, the client, as well as with the instructor. A failure in ability to establish and develop relationships among the team members results in a high cost as the burdens of work are unequally shared among students. A relationship failure with the client causes less than satisfactory amounts and quality of information. Finally, failure to establish a suitable trust relationship with the professor has an impact on one’s final grade. That there are significant costs connected with using live cases cannot be denied. First, the time requirements can be significant when the professor himself attempts to foster a climate of trust and support with students and with the client firms. For example, the professor required each team to develop a work statement. Each of the four successful teams (1, 2, 3 and 6) did develop detailed work statements of what was to be done to complete their work. It is interesting to note that the less successful teams (4, 5, and 8) either had significant delays in developing a work statement, or did not take this task seriously. There is evidence that this behavior tended to foster mistrust with some clients since they did not understand what the students were attempting to accomplish. Second, live case research, since it is a class of consulting work, usually cannot be published. One of the conditions under which the consultant accepts a case is that he will protect the confidentiality of information provided him. This tends to run counter to the academic norm of freely publishing research findings. Therefore, some professors will not undertake live case work for instructional purposes. Others may undertake this work at a minimal commitment of time and effort. The danger here is that students do not receive the proper instruction. They may sometimes make mistakes reflecting poorly on the integrity of the school, the university, and the professor. New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 65 STUDENT’S VIEWPOINT From the student’s viewpoint, there are both advantages and disadvantages to performing a live case analysis. Among the major advantages there is the opportunity to work on a “real world” business problem. This gives the student a greater appreciation of conceptual-analytical knowledge including its limitations. Second, being able to ask questions and discuss various issues with different persons in the firm is a rewarding experience. Third, the student has an opportunity to work closely with the professor. However, there are risks in attempting live case work. First, the motivated student must usually work with other students whose motivation and desire for achievement are unknown. Thus, his grade is not necessarily dependent on his own efforts alone. Second, there is what might be called a triple-risk of failure connected with live case work. The failure to develop a suitable case cannot be hidden, it is public knowledge. One’s possible failure is on display in front of an outsider, the president of a firm and his staff. It is also visible to one’s peers and to the professor. Whereas the student’s possible failure in more traditional academic courses is a private failure. Finally, Table 2 demonstrates the great amount of time live cases can consume when students get involved in the experience. Many students are in work situations in which it would be impossible to accept the challenge of a live case. FIRM’S VIEWPOINT From the firm’s viewpoint, live cases provide some significant advantages as well as significant risks. The firm obtains the services of a work team who will attack a problem no one in the firm has time or knowledge to handle. Second, an outside viewpoint often results in fresh insights, especially by students who often bring new knowledge and perspectives to bear on old problems. Third, the firm’s out-of-pocket cost to support a live case study of a problem of interest is insignificant, particularly when compared to the cost of professional consultants. The cost of the live case is reflected in the time the chief executive and his staff must spend with students. It is well known that even busy executives seem to enjoy spending time discussing their firm and its problems. Second, the firm must trust the student team in order to provide them with the necessary information to complete their analysis. As long as the student team continues to display a required degree of trust there is usually no difficulty in obtaining what is necessary. New Horizons in Simulation Games and Experiential Learning, Volume 4, 1977 66 FOSTERING POSITIVE MULTI-DIMENSIONAL TRUST RELATIONSHIPS The professor who seeks to use live cases as a vehicle for experiential learning in teaching a business policy course is faced with a challenge. He must demonstrate to students by his own supportive and trusting behavior how they ought to relate to persons in the client firm and to each other. Otherwise he will not be able to illustrate and discuss one of the most important lessons which ought to be taught in any business program: business decision-making is most effectively conducted in a positive social environment, an environment of interpersonal trust and confidence. This has been repeated empirically demonstrated. For example, trust has been shown to be a critical variable in Gibb’s [1] T-group investigations, by Likert [2] in the study of organizational change, and by Zand [5] in the investigation of low and high trust managerial problem-solving groups. Since there is evidence that trust is such an important variable in business, it ought to be one of the factors the business policy professor emphasizes in a capstone course. It is reasonable to assume that the quality of trusting behavior displayed by the professor becomes a reference point for student behavior with a client firm and even with peers. It is recommended that the professor’s behavior on live cases might follow the model of helping behavior suggested by Carl Rogers [ 3, p. 33]. This behavioral model appears to have been adopted by professional consultants even though it is known by various names such as process consultation [4, p. 78] REFERENCES 1. Gibb, Jack R., “Climate for Trust Formation”, in Leland P. Bradford, et. al., (eds.), T- Group Theory and Laboratory Method (New York: John Wiley, 1964), pp. 279-309. 2. Likert, Rensis, The Human Organization, (New York: McGraw- Hill, 1967) 3. Rogers, Carl R., On Becoming a Person, (Boston: Houghton- Mifflin, 1961) 4. Schein, Edgar, Process Consultation, (Reading, Mass.: Addison-Wesley, 1969) 5. Zand, Dale E., “Trust and Managerial Problem Solving,” Administrative Science Quarterly, Vol. 17, No. 2, June 1972, pp. 229-239. Table of Contents Volume 4, 1977 Double Play for Gaming Effectiveness Adaptive Rule Changes in Computer Simulation Gaming Œ A Means of Pedagogical Reactive Interchange Monte Carlo Simulation in Personnel Management Training Teaching About the Implementation of Job Redesign Using Simulation and Group Discussions An Interactive Simulation of Private Sector Collective Bargaining Leadership Evaluation and training through Behavioral Simulations: Method, Results and Future An assessment of the Effect of Experiential, Simulation and Discussion Pedagologies Used in Laboratory Sections of an Introductory Management Course An Experiential Understanding of the Trust Dimension Using Consulting Cases to teach Business Policy An Experimental Testing of Teaching Methodologies in Marketing Interpersonal Skill Development: The Experiential Training Unit (ETU) and Transfer of Training An Analysis of the Relationship between Personality characteristics and Preferred Styles of Learning Analysis of Effective Communication Skill Development in Graduate Business and Engineering Experiential Education Changing Perceptions of Learning in a Simulated Environment Student Perceptions: Simulation and the Corporate Policy Course Degree of Uniformity in Achievement Motivation Levels of Team Member: Its Effect on Team Performance in a Simulation Game Channel Conflict, Cooperation and Control: an Experiential Learning Exercise Differences in Experiential and Non-Experiential Learners' Reactions to Conflict between Individual and Organizations Behavior The Evolution and Evaluation of a Required, Senior-Level Course in Experiential Business Applications Building Management Skills through Problem Solving A Live-Case Approach to the Business and Society Course Experiential Learning: Toward the Development of a Theoretical Base and the Identification of Variables and the Hypotheses to Guide Research The Role of the Administrator in Experiential Learning and Simulations Some Thoughts on a Theory of the Use of Games and Experiential Exercises Three Applications of the Management of Learning Grid An Analysis of ABSEL: Its Past Achievements and Future Prospects New Horizons in Simulation Research Prediction of Academic Achievement in a Simulation Mode via Personality Constructs Sex Differences in a Bargaining Simulation COM-GAME: A Commodity Trading Game for Use in an Introductory Business Statistics Course A Financial Institution Management Game with Direct Participant Interactions A Non-Computerized Marketing Planning and Strategy Game Delphi in the Classroom: A Demonstration of Forecasting Economic Activity The Potential of Programmable Calculators for Processing Small Business Simulations Can a Small Predominantly Clack University Incorporate the Computer Simulation Gaming Teaching Methodology into it Curriculum Measuring the Effect of an Experiential Exercise Experiential Learning - Analysis of a Partial Success Predicting Participants' Performance and Reactions in an Experiential Learning Setting: An Empirical Investigation A Simplified, Non-Computerized Marketing Channels Game Manufacturers and Retailers: A Negotiation Game for Beginning Management Students Petroleum Management Game A Securities Dealer Simulator SIM ECO SOC with Business Curriculum Modules: A Simulation for Business Ethics and Morals The Picnic: A Perceptual Errors Exercise Salt III; an Experiential Exercise to Highlight the Interpersonal Dynamics Involved in the Negotiation Process Experiential Exercise on Values, Attitudes and Conflict Resolution in Organizational Behavior Kick'N Go: A Product Management and Social Responsibility Dilemma The Use of Self-Assessment Work-shops in a school of Business Administration The Dilemma of Self-Perception