Jay Nguyen, President and CEO, needs to respond to his top manager’s tantrum but not before he has himself analyzed the finer nuances of the incident post a hobnob with both managers and a wee bit of introspection on his own account. While Jay needs to immediately deal with the current situation by either taking a stern action or diffusing the brawl he needs to have fast-thinking on Concord Machines future and deliverables he seeks from his executive team on the same.
Jay as a leader for the company must ensure his handling of the situation is such that he wants his managers to emulate in times to come. Like Victor Newman mentions, “Just as important as what he does is how he does.” As Nicole Garder affirms, “As for current situation, healing the wounds is going to take careful listening and straight talk.” Since Jay values both his managers and can’t afford to lose either (Bob for he is his best man for he’s being a learned manager aware of Company’s past and largely responsible for company’s turnaround in past. He is also an asset to company for the dire need for company currently is to ensure no body loses sight of the bottom line. And Annette for he strongly believes company needs a breath of fresh thinking for capturing new ideas and their channeling them into new products, services and strategies), he will need to search for a solution for this unfortunate situation between his two valued executives at an interpersonal level.
Jay would need to sit down individually with both and then later call for joint informal meeting. With Annette he must first clear the miscommunication that arose of his acceptance of proposal of acceptance of her proposal for establishing knowledge management committee – Knowledge Protocols Group and then hear her views. He must empathize with her and share her shock and disappointment at Bob’s behavior and learn her thoughts on possible legal action, if any she intends to take up to put his worries at rest for a lawsuit. Jay must also plan events such that Annette can have a thorough orientation to the business, covering company’s entire value chain and meetings with other VP’s only if he’s sure of Annette as the ideal resource for Knowledge Management VP.
In his meeting with Bob, who already has had a realization of his mistake and unacceptable behavior, Jay must lend a patient hearing and show concern about this work pressures and commitment to organizational goals. At the same time, he must judge Bob’s acceptance for a public apology for his misconduct since the incident had dotted the defined work ethics and culture at the company. He must also explain to Bob risks the company faces as a result of his actions, and he needs to persuade Bob for an apology in-person and in public. In case that doesn’t work, he must use his influence on Bob and as a last resort use his legitimate power status to have him mellow down.
As a next step, he must call for a joint informal meeting with the twosome wherein they listen to each other’s point of view, develop empathy for each other and re-negotiate their relationship. At the same time Jay must share his viewpoint and possible handling of the situation with both. He must share Bob’s consciousness of his unjust behavior at the onset while maintaining a neutral tone and outlook throughout the meeting. He must also deliver a hard message to Annelette about her myopia of company financial condition and decision to suddenly launch the new initiative and that too using an inappropriate use of communication method to deliver the request to her peers. He needs to exercise his influence on Bob to change his marching orders and have him persuade him to delegate day-to-day decisions and firefights to his team of workers.
He must share with Annette her unskilled handling of the weighty post of the knowledge manager for she could have handled her efforts for the group by taking into confidence and building bridges with key line mangers. More so she could have engineered the discussions with her peers and with Jay to support for her ideas before setting out email memo to line managers. Plus he would advice her some coaching to develop more cool in the face of fire than rebuffing people as destructive and constructive business people.
He must also create a top manager’s meet to for discussing company’s position and focusing balance between its long-term strategic initiatives and current operating realities where in Bob could apologize for his misconduct and Annette for her inappropriate use of medium for seeking members for the Knowledge protocols Group. He must also share with them his plans for tending the grapevine and plans of easing out the tension at the organization level by their working together at projects in near future.
At the same forum, Jay must share his share with his executive team fundamental issues about the company and its future. He must use this forum to share his thoughts and concerns with the top management team and ask them to set up exampling roles for the staff. For a company under operating pressures Jay must work towards striking a balance in its long-term strategic initiatives and current realities. Similarly, he must sit with Annette to chart out the scope and processing of the knowledge management initiative before hand and share his plans with the team. He must work as a transformational leader focusing development of trust, confidence, admiration, loyalty and commitment among his team and aim towards setting a direction for the company, aligning its people rather than organizing and staffing and motivating people rather than involve himself with controlling and problem-solving. More so, he must set the ball rolling for creating a culture of leadership within the company. His management team must work towards managing diversity on thought and perspective and use the differences within leadership groups as a source of strength that can be harnessed in a productive way. Finally Jay must institutionalize a leadership-centered culture as an ultimate act of leadership.