Course+of+action

The Quebec Major Junior Hockey league (QMJHL) often referred to as “The Q” is the smallest of the three Canadian leagues with its President Giles Courteau. The QMJHL experienced some issues with one of their players Patrice Cormier on Jan 17th 2010 where he elbowed another player Mikael Tam in the middle of the game and caused Mikael Tam to convulse and incur some injuries. Giles Corteau, The president of the league suspended Patrice Cormier for the remainder of the season and play offs. This strategy of dealing with unruly players is what the QMJHL has adopted. This is not the first offence this player has committed. Other offensives were clearly not handled appropriately which is why Patrice repeatedly elbowed other players. If the matter had been dealt with earlier, the problem would not have reared its head severally in the league. In December 2009, during the World Junior championships in the space of three days, Patrice elbowed both Anton Rodin of Sweden and Teemu Hartikainen of Finland. The hit on Hartikainen earned Patrice a penalty only as opposed to a full blown suspension which would have corrected the situation and prevented it from happening again and would have served as a lesson to the other players in the league. The media has contributed a great deal to the knowledge of the situation of Patrice and Mikael because the injury was very severe and graphic. This caused the league to take drastic measures by suspending Patrice. This leads to the question: “//If the media was not involved in this situation and the injury was not as severe would Patrice Cornier have been punished?”// The media influenced this situation majorly through the internet, television and news paper articles. The You tube video went viral and received 835 million views. This made the situation more serious than it appeared. Majority of these problems can be avoided in the league if the following steps are taken:
 * Course of Action**
 * The QMJHL should have a strong philosophy stated in their mission statement
 * They should have concrete rules so that the person in power does not make biased decisions and thereby disregard the influence of the media in the decision making process.
 * Make decisions to punish misconduct so they avoid bad representation.
 * Reward players that have the least violent record at the end of a season for motivation.

__**Strong philosophy in Mission statement**__ An organization requires a strong philosophy in its mission statement so that regardless of who enters the organization, the philosophy would be consistent throughout the the existence of that organization. The aim of a strong philosophy in a mission statement is to strategically guide an organization to achieve its goals even in a changing environment. In the situation of the QMJHL, their current goal is “ // The Quebec Major Junior Hockey League's mission is to develop players for professional hockey while supporting them throughout their academic endeavours in order to mold them into responsible and educated citizens. It must offer high entertainment value within a profitable framework in order to ensure the continued success of its activities.” ( // __[|//http://www.lhjmq.qc.ca/lang_en/index.php?page=232&id_nouvelle=2392//]__ // ) // This mission statement should include the fact that if any player goes out of line they would face severe consequences and would be applicable to both current hockey players or prospective players. This way, whatever issues the organization has they would deal with it appropriately regardless of who committed the offence. This sets a standard for the league and allows prospective players get their acts together before applying to get into the league. This could create a differentiation strategy for the QMJHL in the sense that they are distinguishing themselves from other leagues in Canada as the league that strictly entertains and harnesses the talents of hockey players not causes injuries. The QMJHL organization currently applies the concept of “operative goals” (explains what the organization is actually trying to do) to their mission statement as opposed to “official goals” ( formally stated goals an organization is trying to achieve). Operative goals are more adaptable to innovation and change and allow flexibility in the decision making process which could lead to confusion and inconsistency throughout the organization. Official goals however, help distinguish an organization in the midst of others by their values and strategies in their management. The QMJHL should adopt the concept of “official goals” so they create consistency within their organization.

__**Concrete rules should be set aside to avoid biased decisions**__ The way to set concrete rules in order to avoid biased decisions is to implement bureaucratic control in an organization. Organizations view bureaucracy as a threat to personal freedom but it is in fact an efficient way of controlling an organization to avoid inconsistency. Bureaucracy supplies an organization with rules and procedures that assist an organization to perform activities in a predictable manner. Some measures that have been taken to accommodate bureaucracy in a flexible environment is the implementation of the // incident command system // (ICS) in organizations that require it, others have been reducing layers of hierarchy within an organization. This helps the lower level workers make some important decisions in an organization as opposed to being burdened with all the rules and regulations they must follow. Bureaucratic control standardizes the behaviour is an organization and helps assess the performance of the workers. In this case the workers are the players, commissioners and other staff involved in the QMJHL. The bureaucratic control strategies in the league would be for the commissioner and the other people in power to decide on concrete regulations that are put in writing to accommodate every situation ranging from industrial age to the information age and beyond. Another strategy would be to allow the other players decide the fate of their fellow player that has committed an offence. In the case of Patrice Cormier, the other players should have been given a chance to make the decision of whether Patrice should remain in the league or not in conjunction with the decision of the commissioner. This helps the organization be more efficient because if for example Patrice Cormier is the best player in the league and always helps the team win championships then the other players may vote for him to be suspended for a smaller period of time so that he can return and help the team achieve its goal of the league which is to be successful in a profitable framework. The media played a strong role in this situation by allowing access to the information so freely and covered the story in depth. This is an example of a changing environment and the QMJHL should be prepared for such situations by laying out their rules to accommodate many situations so they do not make obviously biased decisions.

__**Punish misconduct to avoid bad representation**__ Despite the fact that the organization has to be more accommodating and flexible, they still have to punish players that go out of line. This makes an example to current and prospective players. An organization is represented by its workers and whatever they portray is what is interpreted as the culture within that organization. In this case, the QMJHL has as its workers the people in charge and the players. If the players show violence 50 % of the time, people would arrive at the conclusion that it is a violent league. If the commissioner does not punish misconduct, people would arrive at the conclusion that it is a league that does not take severe matters seriously. These are symbols that people use in interpreting the type of organization that is running so it was necessary for Giles Courteau to punish Patrice Cormier for his misconduct because this shows that the league is a place for responsible and educated professional hockey players that entertain their audience and not promote violence. In this information age in which people have access to numerous information it is difficult to hide certain situations and these situations have to be addressed fast if not that also provides a negative interpretation of what an organization stands for. In the case of the Patrice Cormier situation, if the commissioner Giles Courteau had not responded quickly to the situation, it would have caused people to assume that the QMJHL does not take violence as a serious issue in hockey.

__**Reward players for motivation**__ A way to encourage players and possibly prevent violence in the league is to reward the non- violent players. This is a strategy that would reduce the amount of violence existing in hockey. If the players are rewarded at the end of the season for not being violent, they would work harder not to be and this could increase efficiency in their organization by not having to deal with these cases again. The human resources department would be in charge of creating incentives for their players that do not greatly affect the funds of the league but still encourage their players so they can play without violence. They could organize awards for hockey players within Canada that includes the award for the least violent but efficient player. This shows the prospective players that it is possible to have a successful career in hockey without being violent and so they don't end up suspended like Patrice Cormier. The frameworks that applied mostly to the situation the group chose were the Symbolic and Political Framework. The symbolic framework showed the importance of building an organization culture to handle situations. The QMJHL has to have an organization culture where certain incidents are norms and things out of the norm are dealt with and corrected. For example the two elbowed incidents that Patrice Cormier had in December 2009 could have been dealt with by giving him a penalty the first time and if it did happen a second time placing him on probation. This however has to come from the organization's culture and their creative way of dealing with situations. That may have prevented the Mikael Tam hit. Another reason why the league should have an organizational culture is because culture: increases organizational identity, enhances commitment and helps the system remain stable and these cultures come with rules and solid goals in a mission statement that have been established by the people in power in the league. This leads to the political framework which shows the different ways in which an organization standardizes control and makes rules to accommodate changing environments and still makes fair decisions despite the changes. In an organization, conflict occurs as a central process while power is the most important resource. There would always be conflict in an organization, the most important thing is to have rules that resolve conflicts and powers that implement those rules. In the case of Patrice Cormier, the conflict he had should have a solid rule of how to manage the conflict and resolve it. The information age has influenced the way situations are handled. In this case, the media influenced the decision making process of the conflict as it was highly publicized and it was difficult not to punish this action. This is why an organization requires constant rules and a well defined goal in its mission statement to function as an efficient organization. In summary, Patrice Cormier's situation could be handled better if they had punished him for earlier offences from a well defined rule book not by media influences, if the QMJHL incorporates operative goals into its mission statement and if the players are educated on the importance of representing their league by behaving appropriately at all times.

__ [] __ __ [] __ Leahy Sean. Patrice Cormier's elbow could lead to criminal charges. Jan 18 2010. From : __ [] __ Beacon Bill. QMJHL suspends Patrice Cormier for rest of season and playoffs after hit on Tam. Jan 25 2010. From : __ [] __ Trevor Slack, Milena Parent (2006). Understanding sport organizations. The application of organization theory Armstrong Ann, Daft L. Richard.( 2008) Organization Theory and Design.
 * Works Cited**