Case Study A: The Effects of Restructuring in a Bakery

This case is based on a medium sized company in England. The company is a bakery and employs about 50 people. The company supplies baked products to the company shop on the site as well as a number of external shops. Salary and other costs have been going up over recent years and the company was only just making a profit. To cut costs, the senior management team decided to restructure the business to make it more efficient and profitable.Fortunately, only two people left the company as a result, but the jobs of many of those remaining have changed significantly.

One of the changes made is in the responsibilities of the Financial Manager. Previously, Mr. George Brown was responsible for Accounting activities in the company.Now he has been promoted to the position of Director of Administration and is responsible for finance, sales and marketing, administration, personnel matters and transport. George has no experience of working in anything else except finance. As a result of this change, Mrs Shona Martin has been promoted from being the Accounts Clerk to the post of Finance Manager. This promotion involves responsibilities for many activities that Shona has not been involved with before, and she is finding it very challenging.For example, she now has to deal with the bank as well as customers over delays in payment. She also has to deal with salary problems and has to be able to influence managers not to spend money beyond their budgets.

As a clerk, Shona had always been efficient, effective and worked hard. She did what she was asked to do and did it well. She was popular with the managers and the other staff within the company.However, she had never needed to take the initiative or responsibility in her work activities and has always been dependent on George. George always told her what to do and when to do it.

She now finds it quite difficult to have to deal with managers over budget issues, particularly when they have overspent or when they want to spend large amounts of money without providing adequate financial justification. Equally, she finds it difficult negotiating with the bank and customers over late payments.George is always telling her to be more aggressive and to push harder to get the best deal available or to force managers to follow procedures and to cut costs.

George is getting frustrated and annoyed with Shona.He feels that she is not working at the level required in her new position. As a result, he is frequently having to help her and is effectively doing his old job. This is taking time away from what George thinks is his main task which is to get on with his new responsibilities as Director of Administration. George frequently finds himself losing his temper and shouting at Shona when she goes to him for advice. He thinks this is the best way to get her to do what he thinks she should be doing in exercising her new responsibilities.

Shona, on the other hand, thinks that George has become a bully, simply shouting at her rather than training her and explaining what needs to be done and when. Shona had been promised some training in accounting but this has not taken place. Shona frequently loses her temper and shouts back at George, accusing him of not explaining what he wants her to do clearly enough.

Shona believes she is being treated unfairly by both George and the company. Her new job and responsibilities have not been defined clearly enough and she has not received any training nor has she been prepared for the job. She also thinks that George is struggling to cope with his new job and that as a result he is taking out his frustration and lack of ability on her.

One day, George is called to a financial review meeting with the Managing Director and he takes Shona along with him.During the meeting the Managing Director asks a question about how much late payment from customers had been reduced in the last week. Shona replies that she has not had time to chase any of the money that is still outstanding because she has been busy doing the salaries and preparing information for the present meeting. George immediately loses his temper, saying that she should have found the time and that if she did not concentrate on minor issues all the time, she could have done it.Shona defends herself by shouting back that if George was a better manager and explained himself to her properly everything would get done. The meeting collapses in chaos.

1. In Case Study A, what failures in leadership made by the senior management team regarding the restructuring could be considered as being at the root of the challenges faced by George and Shona. Name 2 or 3 issues and explain why. (60 to 120 words)

2. In Case Study A, how would you describe George's approach to working leadership approach to working with other people? What are the potential consequences or limitations of his approach? (60 to 120 words)

3. In Case Study A, what combination of management and leadership should George be using when working with Shona right now? Explain why? (60 to 120 words)

4. In Case Study A, what traits do you think George would benefit from developing and why? What approach would you use to develop George? (60 to 120 words)

5. In Case Study A, to what extent is Shona self-directed or other-directed as a learner? Why do you think so? What are the main assumptions of this theory about how people learn? (60 to 120 words)

6. In Case Study A, what traits do you think Shona would benefit from developing and why? What approach would you use to develop Shona?