Sunnyvale is a beautiful, peaceful, and rapidly growing county in the heart of the Sunbelt. One winter day Joseph Andraselli, MPA, who had just moved from out of state and accepted the position of City manager, was told by his secretary that there were five park employees who wanted to see them (without an appointment) and seemed angry. Although he was six organizational levels above the employees, he had talked about an "open door policy" in his interviews and decided to see them.

 Park employees were among the lowest paid and least skilled employees in the county and most of their work was done outdoors. These five workers who had come to see him were all older and wished to complain that they supervisor, who was much younger, always assigned tem the worst parks in the county. They said that the younger employees, all of whom were "friends" with the supervisor, were able to choose the parks in which they worked. The older employees were never given any say or choice, and they wanted this changed.

 Andraselli was in a tough position. The grievance had clear overtones of age discrimination and had the potential to escalate. Yet, he did not want to undermine the authority of the managers and supervisors who stood between him and the complaining workers. He had never met their supervisor and had only been introduced briefly to their department director.

The union that represented the parks workers also was a possibility for these workers, but Andraselli did not want to involve the union if he was able to solve the problem internally. These workers had obviously not gone through the chain of command, but what could he do to address the problem and prevent it from escalating?