It is possible to identify various student-led organizations and associations in the university that address the diverse interest of students. One such association is ACM, or Association for Computing Machinery. This is an international, globally learned society for computing based in the United States (ACM, n.d.). Numerous universities have student representatives in such associations. ACM is organizing various programming-related events that empower minority students in the industry, promote coding as a profession, and satisfy the curiosity of interested minds.
The association constitutes numerous members due to its high popularity among programming students. We organize various events, such as hackathons, a social coding event that encourages participants to solve programming cases and build innovative software solutions. The event is sponsored by various tech companies that scout prospective employees and desire to solve various computing issues within the company. Consequently, the scope of the event may involve participants from outside of the university. Other events organized by the association involve public speeches and research updates in the IT industry, including minor activity events for those who are not familiar with coding. For example, treasure hunts promote interest in programming and imply small rewards for the finders.
I was elected as president of ACM in our university and had various responsibilities to uphold. The majority of responsibilities involved close contact with the event sponsors and speakers. In addition, I had to be a supervising event manager for every activity and review, organize, schedule and draft numerous details even though the association in our university consisted of board members of 6 students, among whom key responsibilities were divided. Core responsibilities remained on me as the president of the student club and my aide as the vice president.
This year we planned to expand our yearly hackathon and attracted several high-profile sponsors for the event. My job was to assign personal tasks and responsibilities to each member of the board and to carry on with the organization. We decided to manage the event in a similar fashion as in the previous year. However, the extension in the scope resulted in the increased demand for involvement in the club activities. Therefore, each member had to find some balance between studies and extracurricular activities in the form of participation in the association’s operations. I shared my tasks with the vice president, student A, and together we struggled to keep up with the review of the details for the event and the level of cooperation with partner companies.
The ACM board members were also overworked to the core from the upcoming tasks. Therefore, there we decided to expand the number of board members and appointed vice members for each student. Consequently, two students were working on media and communication, two students on event management, two students on human resources, and two students on finances and club management. We organized board meetings twice per week to discuss the progress of the event and future goals.
The first weeks proceeded smoothly as each member attended the meeting and reported satisfactory progress on preparations. New ideas were constantly introduced, and key tasks were executed. However, later on, one of the newly appointed members started to demonstrate poor working performance. Student C in the communication department was often late for the meeting, and in the progress report, it was identified that she often postponed her key tasks or submitted poor-quality copies. She was elected to help student B, in charge of communications, with the copywriting for social media, as she mentioned previous experience in this activity. She was also a friend of student B and was given a personal recommendation from her. Therefore, her qualifications nor excuses made for postponement of work were not questioned. However, this predicament forced student A to help student B and reduced his contribution to the main tasks.
The event was supposed to launch in a few weeks, and 40% of urgent tasks were not prepared for the event. The previously seen working performance was reduced, and the influence of student C on other members led to their reduction in quality of work. Consequently, me and student A were found in a tight predicament with an enormous amount of work to be done for the event. This led to the urgent need for drastic changes aimed at efficient division of work and help with the preparation for the event.
Case Questions
- What kind of measures should the president of ACM have taken to save the upcoming hackathon? Or should the event have been cancelled?
- What kind of circumstances could have forced student C to behave in such manner? Is it possible that this student did not have any interest in the club activities?
- Why do you think the rest of the board members started to demonstrate reduced progress in their tasks?
- What do you think about the aforementioned management style for such student association?
- How should the issue with student C have been handled? Should the president have directly confronted this member and had a reflective talk with her? Should student C have been present for the preparations for the event given that her qualifications are verified?
Reference
ACM. (n.d.). Association for Computing Machinery.