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CASE STUDY
1
WANDERING AROUND
THE WORKPLACE
ANANDA WICKRAMASINGHE, CENTRAL QUEENSLAND
UNIVERSITY
Dr Dias is the CEO for a large private hospital located in the
capital of a South Asian country. This hospital is a franchise of
an international hospital chain, and the main hospital and
office is located in India. Dias is a qualified MBBS doctor with
additional administrative qualifications. Before he accepted
the current position, Dr Dias functioned as the head of a large
state hospital for children and maternity.
The hospital of which he is currently CEO is somewhat
different from his previous workplaces. It is managed by a
board of directors appointed by major shareholders, and the
business is publicly listed. There are 700 employees in this
organisation and there is a considerable number of doctors
who are consultants or who work on either a contract or a
job-availability basis. When Dr Dias assumed his job as CEO,
the hospital was making losses and its ownership was
transferring from an overseas company to a local businessman.
Within a year, ownership of the organisation changed again,
this time to a powerful politician who owned several
businesses.
Dr Dias has a unique style of management and he always
interacts with employees at all levels, whereas the culture of
management is usually based more on hierarchy, favouritism,
social class and patriarchy. Surprisingly, Dias was also educated
and has experience within such a culture, even though he
obtained his postgraduate training in Australia.
Dias usually comes to the office early in the morning to
organise his work for the day. Before finishing his day he
habitually completes all incoming work, and then plans for the
next day. He is a very organised person and he has open-door
policy towards his employees. One doctor commented: ‘he is
such a dedicated character, like I haven’t seen anywhere else
I’ve worked’.
As a practice, Dias visits places in the hospital without
prior notice. He chats to all staff and people informally. At
first when he started managing like this, employees did not
like it because they thought he was coming to observe closely
how they were working. However, gradually he managed to
change this perception, and employees even started waiting
for him in order to talk to him and even discuss their issues
and grievances. In this way, Dias managed to create an
environment that motivated people to engage in productive
work practices and which enabled him to stay in touch with
employees at all levels of the organisation. Even a cleaner
once commented: ‘When he started to visit regularly and
without knowing, we were so scared and thought he is coming
for inspection and check whether we are working, but later we
realised we can talk to him personally, and tell our concerns.
We did not have that in anywhere we worked.’
A doctor also commented that: ‘I observed that he
frequently comes around five minutes before we finish our
1
shift. He seems independent in his management practice and
walking around routinely. When I asked him about his
practices one time, he said that he believes that being in touch
with his employees on a daily basis has remarkable impact on
his capacity to understand and getting to know what is going
on the hospital. He didn’t want to be sitting in his office as “the
boss”; he wants to be with the employees to grasp and feel
what they are doing, and how they are doing, and what
difficulties they are having. Only then can you know your
employees and operations, and only then can you help to
make them better.’
Nonetheless, most senior managers of the hospital are
working as usual and do not seem to follow what the CEO is
doing. While they support his direction and actions as the
CEO, and they align with his commitment and passion for
excellence, they do not share Dias’ style or hands-on passion
for the workplace. A senior manager stated that: ‘…as he is
being an exemplar and walking around in the hospital, we
sometimes feel ashamed, it is obvious that we probably should
follow his example. Beyond this, when he asks us to do things
we can’t say no, even we want to because he is twice effective
and productive as us and we would look like poor employees.’
Another doctor who worked for this hospital also
recalled: ‘He goes around talking to people: patients, families
and employees. While he is working, he is also looking for poor
work behaviour and observing the quality of work. I saw many
times that he purposely touches staircases and beds and even
goes to toilets to see whether they are well cleaned. Normally
others cannot easily notice what he is really doing. For
example, one day while going to the surgery section, I saw him
touching the staircase and look at his hand, and then he
courteously called for a cleaner and asked to bring cleaning
stuff. The cleaner was scared and brought them as instructed.
Dr Dias started to clean the staircase and the cleaner was so
embarrassed and begged to be able to continue the cleaning
herself, but he maintained a very warm smile and completed
the cleaning. I was so surprised about that situation and how
he did it. I never saw cleaners doing a half job after that. Now
they are very serious about their responsibilities, and their
work quality’.
As time went on, employees became used to the CEO’s
daily routine. In fact, they now feel that the CEO is friendly
and supportive, and that this really helps them to undertake
their work roles in the best way that they can. Within the first
year of his employment at the private hospital, Dias
succeeded in making the business profitable. The customer
orientation of the business has also dramatically improved. A
significant number of overseas surgeons and consultant
doctors are now working for the hospital and continue to be
attracted to apply for positions there. Although the workplace
is not free from internal and national politics, Dias takes a
strategic approach to these issues in order to meet the
expectations of internal and external stakeholders, and more
often than not creates a positive and lasting change in
problem areas. He is an inspirational, down-to-earth and
friendly character who works with respect and dignity.
2
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CASE STUDY
2
ADVERT CO.
BY RACHEL MORRISON, AUCKLAND UNIVERSITY OF
TECHNOLOGY
Sue Yan and George Thong were transferred on a two-year
contract from the Indonesian office to the Auckland (NZ)
office of Advert Co., a large graphic design and advertising
company. Both Sue and George very were enthusiastic about
their new role in Auckland. They were also happy with the pay
increase they would receive. They would continue to get their
usual salary, which was equivalent to NZ$260 per week, as well
as an accommodation allowance of NZ$200 per week and a
one-off relocation bonus of NZ$3000.
However, not long after arriving in New Zealand, Sue and
George find out that the local New Zealand employees in the
same department, doing exactly the same job, are earning
nearly NZ$900 per week.
Within a few weeks of realising the difference in the pay
scales, Sue begins to post personal items home to Indonesia
using the company postal service. She also surfs the internet
during work time and takes long lunch breaks. Sometimes she
delegates part of her workload to her local colleagues,
reasoning that if they are being paid more, then they should
also do more work. George, on the other hand, is very
impressed with the level of relevant qualifications held by the
locals. Most have at least a business degree, whereas George
and Sue only finished high school in Indonesia. He is also aware
that what his colleagues do is really helped by the fact that
most have English as their first language. George continues to
work as hard as he can for Advert Co.
Another reason why George feels grateful for his job is
that, on his first day in Advert Co., he was given a general
intelligence test, in which he scored very poorly. The test was
in English (George’s second language) and he spent much of
the time during the test making sure he correctly understood
the meaning of the questions. Consequently he did not
complete much of the test. George has always been very good
at arithmetic and has a sharp and logical mind, yet he got
many of the numeracy and reasoning questions wrong due to
his confusion with and misunderstanding of the wording of the
questions.
Sally Jones was hired at the same time as George and Sue.
She is the sort of person who gets stressed easily and worries
about things. She really wants to make a good impression in
her new job and is keen to make the most of this new
opportunity. In the first few weeks in her new job she often
turns up to work half an hour early and is happy to stay late in
order to make sure that she keeps on top of her workload. She
is surprised that others in her team often seem to complain
about their own workloads and regularly miss deadlines. Most
arrive at work late and, though they seldom leave early, they
will take very long lunch breaks, chat with each other, talk on
the phone to their friends and surf the internet. Although they
keep themselves separate from the rest of the organisation,
they all get on very well together, and there is a pleasant and
friendly atmosphere in the team. They will cover for each
other if someone is ‘pulling a sickie’ and exaggerate to
management about how long tasks really take so that they can
work slowly and take plenty of breaks. Sally really wants to be
liked by her workmates; she is a naturally shy person and
sometimes finds it difficult to make friends. It does not take
long for Sally to realise that she has to fit in with the rest of
her team if she wants them to like her. She particularly
admires Olive, a fun-loving, vivacious and popular designer
who always seems to be surrounded by friends. As a result—
although it goes against her nature—Sue soon begins to relax
about her own deadlines and to go out for extended lunches
with her colleagues. She and Olive become firm friends, and
although she is not happy about not being very productive at
work, she decides that she loves working for Advert Co. more
than ever.
Two months later
Management begins to notice that the members of Sally’s
team are not working very hard. The managers meet to discuss
what might be done to improve performance. They decide to
renovate the office in which the team works. They improve
the lighting in the office, put in new air-conditioning units and
give all the staff new computers. Although Sally’s team works
a little more efficiently for a few weeks, the change doesn’t
last long and the staff soon go back to their old ways.
Four months later
Because performance still has not improved significantly in
Sally’s team, management decides to initiate a performancebased reward scheme. A system is set up whereby goals and
expectations are communicated to the team with a memo on
the noticeboard in the hall outside the office. The goals that
the team is required to achieve in order to get rewards are not
only significantly more challenging than the level at which the
staff are currently performing, but they also include more
ambiguous requirements such as to ‘improve work quality’ and
to ‘try hard’. For example, the staff are expected not only to
design new layouts for many of the print advertisements of
Advert Co.’s clients, but also to learn how to use the brand
new computer software required for the redesign. No proper
computer training is given and not a single team member
manages to master the new computer software before the
first deadline passes.
Although some members of Sally’s team really did try hard
to learn the new software and meet the targets set by
management, the only way that performance is measured is by
whether or not the final product arrives to the clients on time.
The quality of the work and the time required to complete
each job is not taken into account.
Eventually, after a lot of hard work, the team does manage
to meet a set of goals. However, when it is time (a month
later) for staff to receive their rewards, the team discovers
that, to create a perception of fairness, all employees receive
exactly the same reward: an alarm clock with the company
logo on it. Not only can the team members now spend all day
at Advert Co., but they can also wake up to the company first
thing in the morning!
Sally’s team members are so upset that all their hard work
has come to nothing more than an alarm clock each that they
decide to send a letter complaint to management via email.
The staff try to be reasonable in their email. They outline all
the extra work they have had do to learn the new computer
software and they explain that the clocks are not very
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rewarding. The person who receives the email is Tom Jones.
Tom is already quite frustrated with Sally’s team and before he
even opens the email he thinks to himself about all the extra
time and energy that has been expended on the team, and
how irritating it has become. The staff don’t work hard and
always seem to be moaning.
When Tom reads the email and sees that these same
employees are complaining yet again—about a special reward,
3
no less!—he angrily writes a reply and sends it off to the whole
team without really thinking or reading it over. The team is so
surprised and outraged to receive the negative reply that the
staff all walk off the job, resulting in the loss of two very
valuable accounts for Advert Co. The conflict soon escalates
and Advert Co. is considering taking action against several
members of Sally’s team, including Sally.
4
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CASE STUDY
3
STEEL PLANT
ACCIDENT
BY ROBIN CHENG, TAYLOR’S UNIVERSITY, MALAYSIA
Ian Seah, the production manager, was still in mourning. The
conscientious manager of an established steel company in
Malaysia had tendered his resignation three months ago. Until
then, Ian had taken great pride in the fact that the steel plant
had remained accident-free during his 15 years of service.
In the last five days of Ian’s tenure, the process of melting
scrap metals was in progress as usual. All the employees have
to cope with intense heat at work, as aluminium melting
furnaces burn at a temperature of 1000°C. The job is very
perilous, as even a 0.0001 mm drop of liquid from the furnace
will burn right through human skin.
Then, the steel plant situated in the northern region of
Malaysia exploded. This was the last thing that anyone had
expected to happen under the watch of the meticulous plant
manager. The magnitude of the explosion was so great that it
had caused a big hole in the roof of the plant. When the
incident happened in the late afternoon, there were more
than 89 employees working in the plant. Many employees
suffered minor burns despite wearing safety glasses and
gloves. One of the employees, from China, did not recover. He
died as a result of 60% burns to his body. The steel production
halted for one month. The relevant authorities, consisting of
the police and the Energy Information Agency Administration
(EIA), conducted a thorough investigation of the explosion.
However, nobody could ascertain what actually happened
during the production process.
Despite the psychological trauma of the experience, all
the employees resumed work. The employees worked in three
shifts: 7 am–3 pm, 3 pm–11 pm and 11 pm–7 am. Of all the
three shifts, Ian was most troubled by his night-shift
employees. As the supervisor was not strict, the night-shift
employees would get their colleagues to punch their
attendance cards for them. Many of them would log in on
time, but they would leave the plant and come back at 5 am.
Ian had conducted several rounds of consultations with the
employees and encouraged them to rotate the work shifts.
However, no one was willing to take up the offer as the night
shift allowance was higher than those for the day shifts. Ian
proceeded to assign the uncooperative employees to the day
shifts anyway. However, every time Ian rescheduled his
employees’ work plans, the night-shift workers would retaliate
by complaining to their union. The night-shift employees
blamed the company for victimising them. The union would
then contact the company to find out how the company had
discriminated against its employees. The meetings between
the union, Ian and the HR manager were unpleasant and
unfriendly. There was always an air of tension, as the union
would tend to protect its members. On a few occasions, the
union would conduct demonstrations in front of the factory
together with the group of unruly employees. These events
attracted a great deal of interest from the news media in
Malaysia, causing much embarrassment to the company when
it was then accused of discriminating against its employees.
The steel produced by the company was to be delivered to
the construction and property development industry in
Malaysia, the Asia–Pacific region and Middle Eastern countries.
However, the coordination between the purchasing and
delivery departments was poor. There was always a delay in
the delivery of the raw materials due to the company’s
suppliers or because of late payments to suppliers by the
company. This caused the production schedule to be
interrupted, the company to suffer ‘down time’ as the
employees would be idle while waiting for raw materials to
arrive, and additional costs to be incurred when employees
were then required to work overtime. Yet when the sales
orders were received, the delivery of steel was required within
the same week. It was therefore difficult for Ian to plan the
production schedule. As a result, the company’s clients would
receive their goods one week later, and the company would
be charged a 0.1% liquidated agreed damages (LAD) penalty
per day on each purchase order.
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CASE STUDY
6
RESONUS
CORPORATION
BY STEVEN L. MCSHANE, THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN
AUSTRALIA, BASED ON AN EARLIER CASE WRITTEN BY
JOHN A. SEEGER
Frank Choy is normally a quiet person, but his patience has
already been worn thin by interdepartmental battles. Choy
joined Resonus Corporation, a hearing-aid designer and
manufacturer, eight months ago as director of engineering.
Production of the latest product has been delayed by two
months, and Choy’s engineering services department (ESD)—
which prepares final manufacturing specifications—is taking
the heat as the main culprit for these delays. Similar delays
have been occurring at Resonus for the past few years. The
previous engineering director was fired after 18 months; the
director before him quit after about the same amount of time.
Bill Hunt, CEO of Resonus for the past 15 years, responded
to these problems by urging everyone to remain civil. ‘I’m sure
we can resolve these differences if we just learn to get along
better’, he said whenever a dispute broke out. Hunt disliked
firing anyone, but he felt the previous engineering director was
too confrontational. ‘I spent too much time smoothing out
arguments when he was here’, Hunt thought to himself soon
after Choy was hired. ‘Frank, on the other hand, seems to fit
into our culture of collegiality.’
Hunt was groomed by the company’s founder and took
great pride in preserving the organisation’s family spirit. He
also discouraged bureaucracy, believing that Resonus
operated best through informal relationships between its
managers. Most Resonus executives were similarly informal,
except Jacqui Blanc, the production director, who insisted on
strict guidelines. Hunt tolerated Blanc’s formal style because
soon after joining Resonus five years ago, she discovered and
cleaned up fraudulent activity involving two production
managers and a few suppliers.
The organisational chart shows that Frank Choy oversees
two departments: ESD and research. In reality, ‘Doc’ Kalandry,
the research director, informally reports directly to the CEO
(Hunt) and has never considered the director of engineering to
be his boss. Hunt actively supports this informal reporting
relationship because of Doc’s special status in the organisation.
‘Doc Kalandry is a living genius’, Hunt told Choy soon after he
joined the business. ‘With Doc at the helm of research, this
company will continue to lead the field in innovation.’ Hunt’s
first job at Resonus was in the research group, and Choy
suspected that Hunt still favoured that group.
Everyone at Resonus seems to love Doc’s successful
products, his quirky style and his over-the-top enthusiasm, but
some of Choy’s ESD staff are also privately concerned. Says
11
one engineer: ‘Doc is like a happy puppy when he gets a new
product idea. He delights in the discovery, but also won’t let
go of it. He also gets Hunt too enthusiastic. But Doc’s too
optimistic; we’ve had hundreds of production change orders
already this year. If I were in Frank’s shoes, I’d put my foot
down on all this new development.’
Soon after joining Resonus, Choy realised that ESD
employees get most of the blame and little of the credit for
their work. When production staff find a design fault, they
directly contact the research design engineer who developed
the technology, rather than the ESD group that prepares the
specifications. Research engineers willingly work with
production because they don’t want to let go of their project.
‘The designers seem to feel they’re losing something when one
of us [ESD] tries to help’, Choy explains.
Meanwhile, production supervisors regularly critique ESD
staff, whereas they tend to accept explanations from the higher
status research department engineers. ‘Production routinely
complains about every little specification error, many of which
are due to design changes made by the research group’, says
one frustrated ESD technician. ‘Many of us have more than 15
years experience in this work. We shouldn’t have to prove our
ability all the time, but we spend as much time defending
ourselves as we do getting the job done.’
Choy’s latest troubles occurred when Doc excitedly told
Hunt, the CEO, about new nanoprocessor technology that he
wanted to install in the forthcoming high-end hearing-aid
product. As with most of Doc’s previous last-minute revisions,
Hunt endorsed this change and asked Choy and Blanc (the
production director) to show their commitment, even though
production was scheduled to begin in less than three weeks.
Choy wanted to protest, knowing that his department would
have to tackle unexpected incompatibility design errors.
Instead, he quietly agreed to Hunt’s request in order to avoid
acting like his predecessor and facing similar consequences (i.e.
getting fired). Blanc curtly stated that her group was ready if
Choy’s ESD unit could get accurate production specifications
ready on time and if the sales director would stop making wild
delivery promises to customers.
When Doc’s revised design specs arrived more than a
week later, Choy’s group discovered numerous
incompatibilities that had to be corrected. Even though
several ESD staff were assigned to 12-hour days on the
revisions, the final production specifications weren’t ready
until a couple of days after the deadline. Production returned
these specs two days later, noting a few elements that
required revision because they were too costly or difficult to
manufacture in their current form. By that time, the
production director had to give priority to other jobs and
move the new hearing-aid product further down the queue.
This meant that manufacturing of the new product was
delayed by at least two months. The sales director was furious
and implied that Frank Choy’s incompetence was to blame for
this catastrophe.
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CASE STUDY
7
FINDING A HOME FOR
DIGITAL IN THE
CREATIVE
ENTERPRISE
BY STEVEN L. MCSHANE, THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN
AUSTRALIA
A few years ago, TBWA Worldwide’s hired Colleen DeCourcy
to fill its newly created chief digital officer position. Soon
thereafter, she unveiled a new organisational unit,
TBWA\Digital Arts. DeCourcy’s announcement came in a
decidedly new-school way: she tweeted it. With this unit,
TBWA would use its roving band of digital geniuses as a centre
of excellence and thereby catapult the organisation’s
traditional creative talent into the digital age. In DeCourcy’s
words, it was to be ‘advertising at the speed of culture.’
What DeCourcy and chief digital officers at other megaagencies failed to anticipate was the number of barriers.
DeCourcy’s Digital Arts group never integrated well with
TBWA, beset as it was by the typical agency bureaucratic
infighting, turf wars and the realisation that injecting digital
into hulking organisations like TBWA would need more than
just hiring a crew of hotshots. According to one source, ‘I don’t
think everyone in the company had clarity about how it was to
work.’
Even the CEO of TBWA Worldwide Tom Carroll
acknowledged that Digital Arts hit some bumps in the road.
‘We played with certain things, we experimented with certain
things, and some of it has worked and some of it hasn’t’, he
noted. ‘We get better every day. We learn more every day.’
But perhaps the most important thing that Carroll and
other corporate heads learned was that chief digital officers
do not fit easily into traditional creative giants. DeCourcy
recently left TBWA, as did her counterparts at the creative
agencies Ogilvy & Mather and Young & Rubicam. None of the
companies has since filled these positions with new staff. The
remaining digital geniuses have been folded into existing
media departments. In effect, the experiment of creating an
organisational structure with an elite digital SWAT team has
come to an end.
Perhaps the main problem with a chief digital officer and a
team of digital geniuses is that the unit will never match a
sprawling organisational structure. DeCourcy’s Digital Arts
group operated at the worldwide level, as part of the Media
Arts unit. Thus, financial questions arose when it plugged in to
local agencies, such as whether billing for the wellcompensated digital artists would come out of a local office’s
budget. The New York-based digital units also faced resistance
from local offices that were wary of losing client revenue to
headquarters. They appeared to ‘parachute in’ on projects and
take too much credit.
Another problem was that the digital leaders found
themselves pulled in different ways. It was unrealistic to
expect a single digital leader to take responsibility for the
entire agency’s digital success or failure. ‘It’s just one person,’
said Ogilvy North America CEO John Seifert. ‘What I think the
flaw has been is that too much has been assumed or made of a
single person in that role’, which meant that the digital chiefs
were ‘just stretched in a million directions’.
Finally, digital was never a centrepiece in the competitive
strategy of traditional agencies. Although they wanted greater
digital know-how, such all-purpose shops mainly tout their
breadth of services, not their digital prowess.
‘The reality is there is a degree to which these agencies
feel the need to get digital’, said one source. ‘And if we
remember at their heart that they’re advertising agencies, then
there’s probably only a certain degree [of digital expertise]
that they need to have as creative services companies.’
This reality seemingly has sunk in. Chief executives claim
that their agencies no longer need chief digital officers, and
they assert that digital is ‘not all or nothing’, in TBWA’s Tom
Carroll’s words. ‘Our guys get closer and closer to doing what
[digital agencies do]. We get closer every day—and that’s
enough.’
In response, Ogilvy’s John Seifert argues for closer digital
integration rather than a distinct corporate structure for
digital experts, because the rank and file ‘have to be part of
this digital revolution’. The chief digital officers who have
departed generally agree, noting that ‘Digital needs to be so
integral to the organisation that it’s not distinguished by a
group or individual leaders’. In effect, traditional creative
agencies are taking a bottom-up rather than top-down
approach to their digital transformation.
Sources: B. Morrissey and A. McMains, ‘The Twisting Path to New Agency Models’, AdWeek, 10 May 2010; A. McMains, ‘New
Strategies Replace Solo Acts’, AdWeek, 28 June 2010.
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CASE STUDY
9
PROFITEL INC.
BY STEVEN L. MCSHANE, THE UNIVERSITY OF WESTERN
AUSTRALIA
As a formerly government-owned telephone monopoly,
Profitel enjoyed many decades of minimal competition. Even
today, as a publicly traded enterprise, the company’s almost
exclusive control over telephone copper wiring across the
country keeps its profit margins above 40%. Competitors in
telephone and DSL broadband continue to rely on Profitel’s
wholesale business, which generates substantially more profit
than similar wholesale services in many other countries.
However, Profitel has stiff competition in the mobile
telephone business, and other emerging technologies (e.g.
voice over internet protocol, or VOIP) threaten Profitel’s
dominance. Because of these threats, Profitel’s board of
directors decided to hire an outsider as the new chief
executive.
Although several qualified candidates expressed an
interest in Profitel’s top job, the board selected Lars Peeters,
who had been the CEO of a publicly traded European
telephone company for six years. This was followed by a brief
stint as CEO of a mobile telephone company in the United
States until it was acquired by a larger organisation. Profitel’s
board couldn’t believe its good fortune; Peeters brought
extensive industry knowledge and global experience, a highoctane energy level, self-confidence, decisiveness and a
congenial yet strongly persuasive interpersonal style. He also
had a unique ‘presence’, which caused people to pay attention
and respect his leadership.
The board was also impressed with Peeters’ strategy to
bolster Profitel’s profit margins. This included investing heavily
in the latest wireless broadband technology (for both mobile
telephone and computer internet services) before
competitors could gain a foothold, cutting costs through layoffs and the reduction of peripheral services, and putting
pressure on the government to deregulate Profitel’s
traditional and emerging businesses. When Peeters described
his strategy to the board, one board member commented that
this was the same strategy Peeters had used in his previous
two CEO postings. Peeters dismissed the comment, saying that
each situation is unique.
17
Peeters lived up to his reputation as a decisive executive.
Almost immediately after taking the CEO job at Profitel, he
hired two executives from the European company at which he
had previously worked. Together, over the next two years,
they cut the workforce by 5% and rolled out the new wireless
broadband technology for mobile phones and the internet.
Costs increased somewhat due to downsizing expenses and
the wireless technology rollout. Profitel’s wireless broadband
subscriber list grew quickly because, in spite of its very high
prices, the technology faced limited competition and Profitel
was pushing customers off the older technology to the new
network.
In the meantime, however, Profitel’s customer satisfaction
ratings fell. A national consumer research group reported that
Profitel’s broadband offered the country’s worst value.
Employee morale also declined due to lay-offs and the
company’s public image problems. Some industry experts also
noted that Profitel selected its wireless technology without
evaluating the alternative emerging wireless technologies,
which had been gaining ground in other countries. Peeters’
aggressive campaign against government regulation also had
unintended consequences. Rather than achieving less
regulation,
criticising
the
government
and
its
telecommunications regulator made Profitel look even more
arrogant in the eyes of both customers and government
leaders.
Profitel’s board was troubled by the company’s lacklustre
share price, which had declined 20% since Peeters was hired.
Some board members also worried that the company had bet
on the wrong wireless technology and that subscription levels
would stall far below the number necessary to achieve the
profits projected in Peeters’ strategic plan. This concern came
closer to reality when a foreign-owned competitor won a $1
billion government contract to improve broadband services in
regional areas of the country. Profitel’s proposal for that
regional broadband upgrade had specified high prices and
limited corporate investment, but Peeters had been confident
that Profitel would be awarded the contract because of its
market dominance and existing infrastructure with the new
wireless network. When the government decided otherwise,
Profitel’s board fired Peeters, along with the two executives he
had hired from the European company. Now, the board had to
figure out what went wrong and how to avoid this problem in
the future.
18
CASE STUDY
10
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TAMARACK
INDUSTRIES
DAVID J. CHERRINGTON, BRIGHAM YOUNG UNIVERSITY
Tamarack Industries manufactures motor boats that are
primarily used for water skiing. During the summer months, a
third production line is normally created to help meet the
heavy summer demand. This third line is usually created by
assigning the experienced workers to all three lines, and hiring
university students on their three-month summer holidays to
complete the crews. In the past, however, experienced
workers resented having to break up their teams to form a
third line. They also resented having to work with a bunch of
university students and complained that the ‘kids’ were slow
and arrogant.
The supervisor, Dan Jensen, has decided to try a different
strategy this summer and have all the university students work
on the new line. He asked Mark Allen to supervise the new
crew because Allen claimed that he knew everything about
boats and could perform every job ‘with my eyes closed’. Allen
was happy to accept the new job and participated in selecting
his own crew. Allen’s crew was called ‘The Geek Team’
because the university students were always talking about
computer technology.
Allen spent many hours in training to get his group running
at full production. The students learned quickly, and by the
end of the first month their production rate was up to
standard, with an error rate that was only slightly above
normal. To simplify the learning process, Dan Jensen assigned
The Geek Team long production runs that generally consisted
of 30 to 40 identical units. Thus the training period was
shortened and errors were reduced. Shorter production runs
were assigned to the experienced teams.
Within six weeks, a substantial rivalry had been created
between The Geek Team and the older workers. At first, the
rivalry was good-natured. However, after a few weeks the
older workers became resentful of the remarks made by the
students. The Geek Team often met its production schedules
with time to spare at the end of the day for goofing around. It
wasn’t uncommon for someone from The Geek Team to go to
another line pretending to look for materials, just to make
demeaning comments. The experienced workers resented
having to perform all the shorter production runs and began
to retaliate with sabotage. They would sneak over during
breaks and hide tools, dent materials, install something
crooked and in other small ways do something that would
slow production for The Geek Team.
Jensen felt good about his decision to form a separate
crew of university students, but when he heard reports of
sabotage and rivalry, he became very concerned. Because of
complaints from the experienced workers, Dan equalised the
production so that all of the crews had similar production
runs. The rivalry, however, did not stop. The Geek Team
continued to finish early and flaunt their performance in front
of the other crews.
One day The Geek Team suspected that one of their
assemblies was going to be sabotaged during the lunch break
by one of the experienced crews. By skilful deception, they
were able to substitute an assembly from the other
experienced line for theirs. By the end of the lunch period, The
Geek Team was laughing wildly because of their deception,
while one experienced crew was very angry with the other
one.
Dan Jensen decided that the situation had to be changed
and announced that the job assignments between the
different crews would be shuffled. The employees were told
that when they appeared for work the next morning, the
names of the workers assigned to each crew would be posted
on the bulletin board. The announcement was not greeted
with much enthusiasm, and Mark Allen decided to stay late to
try to talk Jensen out of his idea. Allen didn’t believe that the
rivalry was serious enough for this type of action, and he
suspected that many of the university students would quit if
their team was broken up.
26
CASE STUDY
14
ONLINE CASE STUDIES
TALENT
DEVELOPMENT AND
CAPABILITY AT
SUNNY OPTICAL
BY PETER LOK AND JO RHODES, UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH
AUSTRALIA
In late 2007, John Wu, CEO of SUNNY Optical in Shanghai, was
struggling to retain talent in his firm. He expected that the
new policy of ‘life employment’, 1 to be introduced by the
Department of Labour in China over the next few months,
would impact negatively on attracting and retaining the right
talent for SUNNY. In order to sustain the number-one position
in optical retailing in China, Wu took up the challenge to retain
and develop human capital as a strategic priority in his
company.
China’s looming talent shortage
In 2003, China had roughly 9.6 million graduates with up to
seven years’ work experience, and an additional 97 million
people who would qualify for support-staff positions. Despite
this apparently vast supply of graduates, multinational
organisations and top domestic service companies were
finding that few local graduates had the necessary skills for
service occupations. By 2007, this problem had become even
greater. As a result, these companies were confronting many
challenges in retaining quality employees. Job-hopping was
common among successful managers, and above-average
wages and benefits were needed to retain talent.
Company background
SUNNY Optical originated in 1956 as a small watch and clock
retailing store in Taipei. By merging with other similar retail
outlets, by 1981 SUNNY had established its name in Taiwan.
The company initially entered mainland China in 1997. With
only four shops, SUNNY lay its footing in the four ‘tier two’
cities of Wuhan, Xiamen, Fuzhou and Guanzhou. Once they
were consolidated, SUNNY expanded quickly into other cities.
By 2007, SUNNY had become the biggest Chinese retailer
for optical products in the world, with 610 optical retail
outlets in Taiwan and 1118 outlets (staffed by 7700 employees)
spread across all the major cities of mainland China. Its sales
revenue had grown exponentially to 1.8 billion yuan (US$300
billion) per year, and it was projected that SUNNY could be
one of the biggest optical retailers in the world within three
years.
Leadership style
Although SUNNY was a family-owned company, it had a flat
organisational structure. Senior executives consisted of John
Wu (CEO), Lee Chu (CFO) and Ming Chen (COO). There were
five other heads of departments responsible for sales, research
and development, human resources, operations and
finance/accounts. A total of 32 other employees were
1 The life-employment policy in China requires all companies
to provide life-employment contracts to individuals after their
second contract renewal (i.e. after two years of continuous
full-time employment).
stationed at its Shanghai headquarters. Department heads and
executive members were involved in regular weekly meetings,
and monthly staff briefings were conducted for all staff.
John Wu maintained an open-door policy and encouraged
staff to voice their ideas and complaints directly to him. He
‘modelled the way’ for his employees. He liked informal
exchanges and showed great emotional intelligence. Despite
difficulties and setbacks in the past, he had great resilience and
the ability to pick himself up and go again; he treated setbacks
as lessons to be learned. He had good insight into the business
environment and the industry, and identified with his staff,
which earned him much respect from his employees.
However, one of Wu’s weaknesses was his inability to say ‘no’.
When asked about this aspect of his personality, he simply
concluded that he liked new challenges too much!
SUNNY’s philosophy and value system
From the first day the business started, SUNNY considered
product quality, innovation and professional service to be the
cornerstones of its business. All the products on its shelves
went through a rigorous quality assurance system to ensure
the highest technical standards. SUNNY guaranteed that all of
the products it sold were entered into its tracking system,
along with all the buyers’ information. If the buyers were not
satisfied with the products purchased, they could exchange
them for other products.
The mission of SUNNY was ‘to become a world leader in
the retailing industry for eye-care optical products and
services’. John Wu believed that the key to success was reliable
service, high-quality products and superior customer value.
Furthermore, he considered that these activities could be
enhanced by structured employee learning and development
programs to ensure continuous innovation. Continuous
innovation would require systematic programs and support
from the firm, and Wu realised that learning involved trying
new ideas and making mistakes. He made his employees
comfortable in working on new ideas by modelling an honest
response to failure: ‘My idea did not work so well and I have
wasted time, energy and resources. I’m sorry for that, but I
have learned from this and hope you can do the same.’
Wu found that this approach generated some excellent
ideas. One new idea suggested by an employee was
enthusiastically received by the organisation. The idea was to
use information technology and internet interfacing to allow
customers to try on different spectacle frames from the
company’s online catalogue (different style, sizes, brands,
colours, and so on), then submit orders to the nearest outlet
for fitting and purchase. Although the online experience was
still in its developmental stage, this innovation had the
potential to expand the company’s market share even further.
SUNNY implemented a structured mentor system; work
teams were encouraged to hold informal functions in order to
build up collaboration and support for each other. A special
‘collaborator fund’ (small seed money) could be used for any
of these informal functions to enhance the company’s
networking capabilities. Overall, the organisation had a
‘people-first’ policy whereby employees who performed well
would always be retained by the company, even when
downturns occurred in the industry. The company had
experienced three major downturns in its fifty-year history,
yet had limited its redundancy rate to only 4% in total during
these hard times.
ONLINE CASE STUDIES
Current HR practices at SUNNY
John Wu was fully aware of the critical importance of the
company’s employees. He considered them to be strategic
assets of the company. From its earliest days, SUNNY focused
on employees’ training and made great efforts to improve
employees’ professional skills and abilities. The professional
skill and competence of SUNNY’s optometric technicians
ensured the company’s competitive position in its markets,
and gave it a cutting edge when competing with other
businesses in the same industry.
Wu always maintained full commitment to developing
talent in his company. His human resources department had
fully integrated systems in recruitment, selection, training,
mentoring, career development, team reward systems and
bonus packages, performance management and leadership
27
development. For example, SUNNY spent 3.9% of its overall
payroll on training, and each employee received an average of
224 hours of training per year. Although SUNNY’s staff
turnover rate was around 16% per annum, this was below the
industry average of 22%. Wu was keen to maintain and
improve on the level of staff retention and development.
Current challenges
With the introduction of the new life employment policy, and
the continuing shortage of quality managers in the service
sector, John Wu wondered what new strategies he could use
to sustain his growth and expansion ambitions for SUNNY
Optical in China.
Sources: D. Farrell and A. Grant, ‘China’s Looming Talent Shortage’, McKinsey Quarterly, November 2005.
30/12/2017
Assignment 2: Case study team report
Teaching period 3, 2017
ORG20003: Organisa onal Behaviour
Assignment 2: Case study team report
Word limit: 2000 (+/ 10%)
Weighting: 25%
Due date: 5pm AEDT Monday 22 January 2018 (Week 10)
After you have read this information, head over to the Assignment 2 Q&A discussion board to ask any
questions and see what your peers are saying about this assignment.
Assignment overview
Reports are used in many fields to communicate information in an organised and structured way.
They are prevalent within business environments and thus form an authentic assessment task. An
employee who can analyse issues and provide solutions, backedup by evidence, is a valuable
asset for any organisation.
Assignment 2 is a team assignment. The teams are made up of four to five students. You will use
a team discussion board to collaborate on assignments. Your eLA will ensure that you know how
to access your team discussion board.
Working as a team to produce this report will provide you with an opportunity to hone your
teamwork skills. These skills are directly transferable to workplace environments where individual
and team accountability is expected.
Successful completion of this task will lead to partial achievement of the following learning
outcomes:
1. Identify the basic determinants of individual behaviour, group dynamics and organisational
processes, and explain how they impact on organisational performance from both an efficiency
and wellbeing perspective.
2. Identify, describe and evaluate varied managerial approaches and organisational behaviour
theories, concepts and models as applied to reallife management situations (exemplified by
personal experience and case studies) and determine their relevance at the level of the
individual, group and organisation.
3. Explore different disciplinary approaches to organisational behaviour and understand how
each approach explains individual and group behaviour in the workplace.
4. Develop skills in group work and reflective learning and explore the importance of these skills
in managing self and others.
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
Assignment details
As a team of four to five students, you will draw on your understanding of Organisational
Behaviour (OB) theory and apply it to a case study. The following eight cases (McShane et al.
2016) form the basis for this assessment. You are required to choose one of them, as a team, and
produce a report drawing on two or three of the OB theories you have covered during this unit. You
can access them via the link below:
Online case studies (PDF 136 KB)
You should thoroughly research the issues you consider relevant to the case and link them to
associated OB theories providing recommendations.
Your report should cover the following items:
An overview of the case study.
A summary of the key issues in the case study.
An explanation of these issues and recommendations to address them (supported by relevant
OB theories).
The team charter you developed during the Week 6 activity is an essential part of establishing a
common focus for this task. It should be appended to your report to attract an automatic 5% of the
overall mark for this assessment.
Please note: the team charter is not included in the word count for this assessment.
Please draw from the following suggested structure to guide your report development:
Title page
Executive summary
Table of contents
Introduction
Brief overview of the case study.
The purpose of the report.
Your methodology (including the scope of the report).
Body
Overview of the case study.
Issues identified (an issues statement).
Conclusion
Highlighting what has been learnt from the case study.
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
Recommendations
The issues you have identified should be addressed here using relevant academic
literature to support your decisions.
References
All sources used should have intext citations and should be properly referenced using
Harvardstyle referencing.
Appendices
Including the team charter (WORD 64 KB)
(not included in word count) you created
in Week 6 as well as any relevant information (such as tables, graphs, etc.) that supports
your findings.
The Study Resources area of the Student Portal has a section on Report writing
(https://portal.swinburneonline.edu.au/studyresources/reportwriting) and a document on Tips for
successful teamwork (https://portal.swinburneonline.edu.au/studyresources/tipssuccessful
teamwork) that may help you with this assessment.
Submission details overview
This assignment will be submitted via Turnitin. You will find the relevant submission point below.
Please allow a 24hour turnaround for an originality report to be generated. See the Turnitin
originality report (https://portal.swinburneonline.edu.au/studyresources/turnitinoriginality
report0) area of Study Resources for several guides to assist with the submission process.
Assignment support
Don't forget that in addition to your eLAs who provide disciplinespecific content advice, you can
access the 24/7 draft writing service from Studiosity.
If you need assistance with academic feedback on a draft of your assignment task see
Assignment support: Studiosity.
Assignment criteria
1.
2.
3.
4.
Structure and format of report (including referencing).
Content knowledge.
Critical analysis.
Written communication.
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
5. Team charter.
Your work will be assessed using the following marking guide:
Criteria
Structure
and format
of report
(including
referencing)
No Pass
Did not
meet
criterion.
(15%)
Pass
5059%
Credit
6069%
Distinction
7079%
High
801
The report
contains
most required
sections,
although each
section could be
better developed
or detailed.
The report
contains all the
required sections,
which have been
adequately
developed and
detailed.
The report contains all
the required sections.
The
cont
requ
The majority of sources
used are correctly cited
and referenced according
to Harvard style. There
are fewer than 5 errors in
the
referencing. A reasonable
number of reporting
verbs have been used to
introduce and integrate
the ideas of others.
All s
are
and
acco
Harv
The
erro
refe
All significant issues in
the case study have been
identified.
The
case
been
These issues have been
addressed in the
recommendations section
using a range of relevant,
The
have
addr
reco
An attempt has
been made to
correctly cite and
reference all
sources used.
There is an over
reliance on direct
quotes (>10% of
total word count)
and the
integration of
others' ideas with
the writing can at
times be
awkward.
Most sources
used are correctly
cited and
referenced
according to
Harvard style.
There are fewer
than 10 errors in
the referencing. A
limited number of
reporting verbs
have been used
to introduce and
integrate the
ideas of others.
The reference list
adheres mostly to
Harvard style.
Content
knowledge
(35%)
Did not
meet
criterion.
Some
significant issues
in the case study
have been
identified.
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Most
significant issues
in the case study
have been
identified and
discussed with
appropriate and
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Criteria
Assignment 2: Case study team report
No Pass
These
Pass issues
have been
5059%
addressed in the
recommendations
section using
some relevant
academic
literature and OB
theory.
Nevertheless,
some unclear and
irrelevant content
remains.
The conclusion
section mostly
highlights what
has been learnt
from the case
study.
Credit
6069%
Distinction
7079%
High
801
accurate detail
and description.
current and highly
credible resources,
showing a consistent and
sound understanding of
OB theory.
sect
wide
relev
and
cred
reso
show
cons
soun
unde
OB t
These issues
have been
addressed in the
recommendations
section using a
range of relevant
and reliable
academic
literature and OB
theory.
The conclusion
section highlights
what has been
learnt from the
case study.
There is a consistent
justification of answers to
identified issues and the
learning reflection.
The conclusion section
clearly highlights what
has been learnt from the
case study.
The
cons
conf
dem
accu
and
com
unde
the r
theo
expl
deci
thes
clea
thor
of th
and
litera
The
sect
and
high
has
from
stud
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
Criteria
No Pass
Critical
analysis
Did not
meet
criterion.
(30%)
Pass
5059%
Credit
6069%
The writing is
largely
descriptive with
statements of
theories provided.
Critical analysis
requires greater
analysis of the
applicability of
these theories
and
considerations to
the particular
case study, so
this needs to be
evident.
Information from
more relevant
and reliable
The relevant
theories are
correctly
identified, defined
and applied to the
case study
example. There is
some
comparative
evaluation.
The writing
questions some
assumptions in
the literature. It
identifies several
relevant contexts
when presenting
a position.
Distinction
7079%
High
801
The report demonstrates
the ability to construct an
issues statement based
on the relevant theories
with evidence provided of
the most relevant
contextual factors.
However, the issues
statement could be more
complex.
The
state
com
com
writi
dem
attrib
critic
critic
and
thro
repo
and
supp
illust
sources could be
presented, so
that greater
points of
view/approaches
are presented.
Proposes
recommendations
that are difficult to
evaluate because
they are vague or
only indirectly
addresses the
case study
situation.
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
Criteria
No Pass
Written
expression
Did not
meet
criterion.
(15%)
Pass
5059%
Credit
6069%
Distinction
7079%
High
801
There is some
evidence of
appropriate word
choice in terms of
academic and
professional
standards.
Nevertheless, this
is inconsistent
throughout. There
are >10
significant errors
in grammar and
punctuation.
These can prove
intrusive and
disruptive for the
reader.
There is some
evidence of
appropriate and
deliberate word
choice.
Nevertheless,
there remains
half a dozen
significant errors
in grammar and
punctuation,
some of which
require
reformulation of
the sentence by
the reader. .
Word choice is
appropriate to both an
academic as well as
industry context. There
are fewer than 5 errors in
grammar and
punctuation, none of
which significantly impact
on the readability of the
writing.
Wor
delib
high
to bo
acad
indu
The
sign
care
gram
punc
The report has
little evidence of
final editing so
some careless,
ambiguous
and/or
inappropriate
language use is
evident.
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The review has
some evidence of
editing as
demonstrated in
some sections of
the writing.
Editing is obvious in the
final preparation of the
critical analysis as
demonstrated by the high
professional standard of
the writing.
Edit
obvi
key
the p
the r
dem
the e
prof
stan
writi
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Assignment 2: Case study team report
Criteria
No Pass
Pass
5059%
Credit
6069%
Distinction
7079%
High
801
Team
charter
Did not
submit
charter.
The team charter
has been
submitted
providing
evidence of skill
development in
teamwork.
Successful
submission of the
charter
guarantees the
awarding of 5%
of the total mark
for this
assessment.
The team charter
has been
submitted
providing
evidence of skill
development in
teamwork.
Successful
submission of the
charter
guarantees the
awarding of 5%
of the total mark
for this
assessment.
The team charter has
been submitted providing
evidence of skill
development in
teamwork. Successful
submission of the charter
guarantees the awarding
of 5% of the total mark
for this assessment.
The
has
subm
prov
evid
deve
team
Suc
subm
char
guar
awa
of th
for t
asse
(5%)
Assessment declaration and statement of authorship
By submitting my assessments below I declare that:
This is an original piece of work and no part has been completed by any other person than signed
below.
I have read and understood the guidelines on How to avoid plagiarism
(https://portal.swinburneonline.edu.au/studyresources/howavoidplagiarism0) and no part of this
work has been copied or paraphrased from any other source except where this has been clearly
acknowledged in the body of the assignment and included in the reference list.
I have retained a copy of this assessment in the event of it becoming lost or damaged.
I agree and acknowledge that:
I have read and understood the Swinburne Assessment Declaration.
I accept that use of my Swinburne account to electronically submit this assessment constitutes my
agreement to the Swinburne Assessment Declaration.
If I do not agree to the Swinburne Assessment Declaration in this context, the assessment outcome
may not be valid for assessment purposes and may not be included in my aggregate score for this
unit.
Further information relating to the penalties for plagiarism, which range from a formal caution to
expulsion from the University, is contained in the Student Academic Misconduct Regulations 2012 and
at the Assessment declaration (http://www.swinburne.edu.au/currentstudents/manage
course/examsresultsassessment/submitwork/assessmentdeclaration/) page.
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