Organizational management is one of the essential foundations of teamwork, with which the best results from each of the team members can be achieved. Due to its efficiency, this technique is used not only in the civilian but also in the military sphere. The purpose of this essay is to examine the operation of Anaconda in the context of organizational management to identify its effectiveness.
This theory consists of several items that are performed sequentially. These items are planning, organization, staffing, leading, control, time management, and motivation (Juneja, n.d.). Naturally, not all the stages of this plan can be applied to the army; however, most of these points can be analyzed. The main object of study is in the context of army actions in the planning of this military operation. It is worth noting that the initial intentions of the U.S. Army should have led to success. According to Fleri, Howard, Hukill, and Searle (2003), the plan was to maximize the use of Afghanistan’s friendly forces to deliver a significant strike against al Qaeda militants. The American troops had to fulfill the role of support, luring the enemy under the fire. However, it could not be implemented due to severe problems with planning.
At the stage of preparing the operation, at least two problems can be distinguished that complicated its implementation. First, there was insufficient intelligence work because the actual enemy strength was underestimated (Fleri et al., 2003). Because of this, the combat group encountered much more resistance than expected. Secondly, the planning problem arose due to the late appointment of Task Force Mountain as a joint task force. Because of the lack of detailed joint processing, one of the Navy’s aircraft carriers left the war zone (Fleri et al., 2003). Its absence lasted for several days, which became the most stressful time for the U.S. soldiers. Besides, the request for support of the marine helicopter carrier was also made with a delay, which resulted in the lack of the necessary fire support.
Thus, it can be concluded that one of the aspects of organizational management, namely planning, was extremely poorly designed, which resulted in a significant complication of the combat situation. However, it was not the only problem of this operation, and further study of this issue is required. It is appropriate to take the staffing, leading, and control aspects of organizational management theory as future topics for studying the operation Anaconda.
References
Fleri, E., Howard, E., Hukill, J., & Searle, T. R. (2003). Operation Anaconda case study. College of Aerospace Doctrine, Research and Education, 1-28.
Juneja, P. (n.d.) Organization management – meaning, need and its features. Web.