Middle Management Problems - Case Study Example

Brenda’s predicament: Brenda Cooper, a regional sales director of Hausser Food Product Company is having problems in her job as part of middle management. She directly reports to the director of Sales, and is in charge of six district sales managers who are responsible for their particular regions in the United States. Pressured to meet and even surpass the sales plan set by the directors of marketing and sales, Brenda’s main problem is in motivating her direct employees to come up with fresh ideas to meet that goal. Most of her employees seem to be content with the traditional approaches in selling their products, except for a team in Florida, who never fails to remit 10% above their sales quota every year. That particular team led by a district sales manager named Jay Boyar refuses to let her in on their secret. What could Brenda do to earn the trust of her employees and motivate them to cooperate in meeting the company’s goals? Assessment of Brenda’s problem: Upon investigation by a researcher from a major business school of the problems being faced by the organization, it was found out that there were grievances that were failed to be considered by the middle and top management. Lower management and their staff realized that they are the ones doing the most work in achieving sales success, but are the least compensated for their efforts. They receive low regular salaries, and have to work hard in order to look forward to a substantial year-end bonus. Every year, the sales quota is increased, making it doubly hard for them to reach it, but receiving the same amount of income for it. When they offer a new idea that can help increase sales, the company takes it up and benefits much from it. The proponent of the idea gets rewarded, alright, but it is not commensurate to the profits the company has gained from the idea. Another objection is the upper management’s requirement for paperwork, which may take time away from the salespeople’s real job which is to be in the field to sell the products. These realizations have caused sales teams not to “waste their effort for the company” (Tushman, 2005, p. 4) and instead, just look after their own interests. Jay Boyar seems to be consistently successful in leading his sales team to maintain their position as the top team that yields the highest sales. Notwithstanding the lack of a college degree, his staff has the highest regard for him. Jay ‘s management style appeals to his staff. Although he is the district sales manager, he manages his authority well by being a team player. He looks out for his team’s interests by giving them the due freedom to do their jobs the way they know best and appropriate compensation for their efforts. He respects their ideas and knows how to delineate professional tasks from personal ones, as exhibited in their bimonthly team meetings, where productivity prevails in the business meeting and fun and camaraderie follows in the fellowship activity. In return, Jay’s employees are motivated enough to work efficiently, not wanting to be the one to bring the team down. They value the personal and professional relationship they share with each other and become cohesive and effective as a team. The end result is usually success for the whole group. The discovery of a new market for the HFP product line was advantageous for the whole sales team. Marketing baby food for elderly consumers was an effective strategy for boosting sales. With the impending pressure to meet the sales plan, Jay’s team kept this strategy from upper management because in revealing it, they expect that management will in turn raise their sales quota for them, giving more pressure to meet it, and not having enough time to cultivate fruitful relationships with their new customers. This new market also served as a cushion for them to meet their sales plan and even add 10% more to it without having to work too hard. In the end, each member of the team enjoys his job more, not to mention the huge bonus he can expect at the end of the year. This “conspiracy” to keep their new market from upper management does not adversely affect the team’s performance. In fact the company gains a lot from it. To Jay’s credit, allowing it to be the team’s cherished secret earns him the trust of his employees. It proves to them that their leader is really after their own welfare. Brenda Cooper can learn much from the management style of Jay Boyar. True, she has more people under her leadership, hence more responsibilities, but applying some of Jay’s strategies may be effective in motivating her employees to perform better. Success at one’s job may raise morale. Soliciting the employee’s trust will be easier if morale in the workplace is high. Possible Strategies Brenda Can Employ The following strategies outlined below are suggested to Brenda Cooper to enable her to motivate her employees and spur them to work towards the company’s goals: Understanding her employee’s needs and concerns In every employment, employees consciously or unconsciously expect a kind of “psychological contract” apart from the expectations the job usually presents – benefits and compensation for a particular job description. This psychological contract usually includes open and honest communication, managerial support and challenging and interesting work. Employees are becoming increasingly aware of the non-monetary rewards that companies can provide them. It is generally important that the job not only fulfills their economical needs, but their socio-emotional needs as well. Brenda Cooper must be cognizant of and responsive to her employees’ perception of their psychological contracts with the company. Things such as meaningful work, recognition, creative freedom and opportunities for personal growth are desired by all employees. As regional manager, Brenda must maintain open and honest communication with her employees, bearing in mind their socio-emotional needs and concerns, and being encouraging enough to boost their self-esteem. Lack of communication is ultimately problematic because it suggests to employees that management may be susceptible to perceived psychological contract breaches across a variety of areas because the basic issue of communication is not met. Brenda should be able to invest more time developing and strengthening healthy relationships with her employees in various districts so she is kept abreast of their progress in both personal and professional areas. Invest in employees’ professional and personal development In line with understanding her employees’ needs and concerns, Brenda should be ready to invest in their professional and personal development. Regular trainings and participation in seminars or enrollment in courses shouldered by the company (whether partial or full) may be perceived as part of the job, but it should be communicated to the employees that although application of their learnings will highly profit the company, ultimately it will redound to their own benefit. This knowledge from trainings is bound to increase their own market value. Promoting Knowledge-sharing Brenda needs to understand that refusal to share a team’s privileged information may be motivated by a lot of factors. Burgess noted that “as employees moved up through the organizational hierarchy, they appeared to identify more strongly with their division and to become more motivated to behave in ways that benefited their division rather than the organization.” (Burgess, 2005). Jay Boyar’s team saw that keeping the information for themselves may be a cushion or a weapon against competing units. Motivational barriers to knowledge transfer included a lack of extrinsic rewards, stronger levels of group versus organizational identification, reciprocity norms, and the view of knowledge as a means of achieving upward organizational mobility. (Burgess, 2005) One strategy in promoting “intra-firm” knowledge sharing would be to increase employees’ identification with the company and to promote cooperation between business units. This may be done by emphasizing external rather than internal competition. Brenda may stress that HFC units must work hand in hand so that they will not lose profits to the competition. She may suggest to the company to award bonuses based on the performance of the entire organization rather than the individual sub-units or hire reward, and promote people who cooperate and work across divisional boundaries. (Burgess, 2005) Being “one of the guys” According to the researcher, Jay’s staff fully appreciates how he relates to them -not as a boss but as an equal. The bimonthly meetings are opportunities for opening communication to the whole group as well as “bonding” with them via a fellowship activity. A leader who knows how to “go down to the level” of his people gains their trust and respect. It is this attribute that Jay gets to learn about their needs, concerns, opinions, ideas, etc. Jay respects these and considers them in making important decisions for the team. Since communication is easier, everything flows more smoothly, bringing synchronization to team efforts leading them to success in their endeavors. Part of Brenda’s strategy should be organizing team-building activities with her employees. Leisurely activities such as sportsfests, family trips, etc. relaxes employees from the demands of work and enables them to relate to one another as simple human beings. Being an instrument in communicating concerns to top management One of Brenda’s function as a middle manager is to serve as a bridge of communication between the employees and upper management. Being aware of employees’ gripes and complaints as well as constructive suggestions may be brought up to the proper authorities and dealt with seriously. Brenda should not be remiss in this duty of bridging communication or else her employees may perceive management to be incompetent. “This negative perception could also lead to widespread problems satisfying other psychological contract obligations. This may be particularly troubling because it may often be the responsibility of an employees manager (acting as the organizations agent) to see that the individuals psychological contract is fulfilled.” (Lester, Clair & Kickul, 2001) Rewarding Excellent Performance The perception that the “the company is out to screw the salesman” (Tushman, 2005 p.5) prevails among Jay’s team members because they do not feel appreciated enough for their hard work. The company earns much from their efforts, yet they are not compensated enough for it. Brenda must investigate the veracity of this claim and if proven true, should make a stand with upper management to review budget allocations for salary and commissions. Bonuses and merit increases should be given to employees who show evidence of excellence in the performance of their jobs. Brenda might even suggest profit-sharing with exemplar employees as a motivational strategy. Keeping in mind that for some employees, rewards do not necessarily come in form of money, benefits such as more flexible work schedule, scholarships for further studies, promotions, work-life balance may be enough to motivate them to maintain their good work. Encouraging creativity Another area of dissatisfaction among the employees is the unfair handling of the suggestion plan. The company solicits ideas for new and more effective strategies in marketing and sales of their products, and when an employee comes up with an idea that make a lot of money for the company, he is only given a token reward. This discourages employees from thinking up of creative ways to improve the company. Brenda may be instrumental in awaking that creative spark once again by advocating for dynamic ideas from the employees, who, coming from the field, may be the best people to rely on. She must be able to back up this advocacy with a reward system supported by the company. This way, research on development and improvement of product lines, effective marketing and sales strategies, etc. may be easier to come by. Recommendations for Brenda Cooper Brenda Cooper should take time to reflect on her leadership style. Being a leader, it is her responsibility to make her followers uphold the values the company stands for. When an individual’s allegiance is divided between personal and corporate values, the effective leader will seek to merge the two. Values Leaders focus on attitudes toward goals, relationships with co-workers, and sense of self. A good leader employs his ability to balance a blend of values that will influence people to accomplish organizational goals while meeting their own needs in the process. (Martin, 1998) Brenda’s issue of regaining the trust of her key employees can be worked on by aligning her values with theirs. Differing values create conflict and will impede goal achievement. According to Mishra and Morrissey (1990), the following factors propagate trust: open communication; giving workers a greater share in decision making; sharing of critical information and true sharing of perceptions and feelings. With her current predicament, Brenda has a long way to go in achieving the foregoing, considering communication is the major stumbling block in her relationship with her employees. However, there is hope. Trying out the various strategies outlined in this paper may be a proactive means to arriving at a successful end. The key here is commitment to becoming a better manager. In the absence of this commitment, it is unlikely that attempts to motivate and gain the trust of her employees to drive the company forward will succeed. References Burgess, D. (2005) What Motivates Employees to Transfer Knowledge outside Their Work Unit? The Journal of Business Communication. Volume: 42. Issue: 4 Dibble, S. (1999) Keeping Your Valuable Employees: Retention Strategies for Your Organizations Most Important Resource. John Wiley & Sons.New York. Gilbert, J & Tang, T. (1998) An examination of organizational trust antecedents. Public Personnel Management. Volume: 27. Issue: 3. Green, T. & Knippen, J., (1999) Breaking the Barrier to Upward Communication: Strategies and Skills for Employees, Managers, and HR Specialists. Quorum Books:Westport, CT Lester, S. Clair, E, Kickul, J. (2001) Psychological Contracts in the 21st Century: What Employees Value Most and How Well Organizations Are Responding to These Expectations. Human Resource Planning. Volume: 24. Issue: 1. Martin, M. (1998). Trust Leadership. Journal of Leadership Studies. Volume: 5. Issue: 3 Mishra, J., & Morrissey, M. A. (1990). Trust in employee/employer relationships: A survey of West Michigan managers. Public Personnel Management, 19.4, winter 1990, 443-463. Tushman, M. (2005). Hausser Food Products Company, Harvard Business School Read More