Name Harsh Singhal

Question 1

Two instances where we could see friction between Lisa and her team members – Linton and
Scoville:

i) Lisa was told on her first meet with Linton, that Harvard MBA graduates like her
were not likeable. Such a first encounter made her hesitant to ever be seen as over-
aggressive or overenthusiastic. One instance where Lisa approached Linton on her
4th day to clarify doubts, Linton asked her to come back later which disappointed
her and made Linton feel like she was intruding.
ii) When Lisa couldn’t reach out to Linton, she went up to Scoville for help. But,
Scoville handed her a task of copying a large stack of reports at 4:00 PM even
after Linton had clearly mentioned that she would not take work from Scoville.
Linton had to stay back till 7:00 to finish her task whereas normal office hours
ended at 5:30 PM.
Question 2

Write your answer for Part A here.

Trait Level: High/Low Example supporting the answer

Openness to High Scoville worked in different domains and moved

Experience from the operations department to marketing
department, which consist of contrasting roles.

Conscientiousness Low Scoville kept making last minute changes and

also gave Lisa copying task frantically which
shows low conscientiousness from his end

Extraversion Low The other department workers kept suggesting

Lisa to “hang in there” while working with
Scoville which shows lack of communication
from Scoville’s end and that he doesn’t get
along with others well.

Agreeableness Low Scoville was always critical and held himself

high above others. On Lisa’s very first day, he
had a pre-conceived notion of MBA graduates.
Other employees also found him irritating
which shows lack of agreeableness from his
side.
 Neuroticism High Scoville gave an impression to Lisa that he held
himself above than the others. He was cordial
with Lisa in initially but had a negative remark
on the assumptions on Pure and Fresh’s pricing
strategy suggested by Lisa. He also behaved
very rudely when Lisa denied Scoville’s frantic
request to copy things for him while Lisa had
her projects to work on.

As we can see in the segment “Another Run-in with Scoville”, Scoville apologised to Lisa for
mistreating her and blamed it on his due promotion. Following ways can be adopted to
improve her relationship with Scoville:

- Since Lisa knows what was triggering Scoville, she can now be more careful with her
choice of words and actions and should rather focus on the fact that Scoville has
always been eager to share his knowledge and expertise with Lisa and use that to learn
more about the workings of Houseworld.
- She can try and make others help Scoville with his tasks and come forward to Scoville
with her suggestions and strategies to make Pure and Fresh a necessary consumer
product. Since, Scoville apologised to her, she should try and maintain a cordial
relationship with Scoville and have more open conversations with him, in case she
feels he’s being condescending again in the future.
Question 3

Write your answer for Part A here.

The things that Lisa can do to reduce the hidden area and improved relationship with Clinton
are:

1) She should request a meeting with Jack Vernon and Deborah Linton to learn more
about the goals and objectives they have in mind for her and to gain a better
understanding of the role's expectations. She should not be passive at the discussion
and should convey the problems she has been having and how they are impeding her
growth and performance to the best of her abilities. As Vernon is present, she has the
opportunity to ensure that there is consensus across all levels of management in her
team, that there are less problems with directions, and that there are no insults based
on her education, which is workplace harassment.
2) She should also request a review of the appraisal she received and express her
dissatisfaction with how it was conveyed to her. She should emphasise the objectives to
be covered in the review as well as the areas where she should concentrate her efforts.

Question 4

Linton had a misunderstanding about Lisa’s personality. She gave unofficial feedback over
Lunch that Linton lacked confidence and did not have strong skills required to carry out a
project as she never has an opinion during meetings and displays lack of confidence. Linton
could have used any of the below techniques to give gentle negative feedback rather than
being coercive:
 i) The ‘I like, I wish, I wonder technique”. Linton could have used the words “I wish,
I wonder, I like..” or started her feedback with these words.
ii) The 3-2-1 technique. Linton could have adopted the following approach while
giving negative feedback:
- Three things she liked about Lisa
- Two areas of improvement for Lisa
- One thing Linton liked the most about Lisa

Question 5

Following are the engagement techniques that could have helped Lisa feel more motivated to
work in Houseworld:

- Emotional engagement: It is very important to have a level of trust and emotional

connection between employer and employee. Linton should have been more positive
and warmer while welcoming Lisa on her first day and avoided mentioning her opinion
of MBA graduates and given Lisa a chance to make her mark and show her
personality.
- Physical engagement: The company should have a open door policy and give
employees a chance to put forward their opinions and criticism. The manager must
ensure that they are getting regular feedback from employees to see if employees are
facing any issue in their initial days.
- Cognitive engagement: The employers must ensure that while giving a project,
employee’s growth and personal development must not be hindered. The employees
 must have knowledge of the vision of the company and organizational goals so that
their own personal goals could be aligned with it.

Question 6

Two soft tactics that Lisa can take help of:

i) Impression management: It is very important that everyone sees us as likeable and

trustworthy while working in an organisation. Since Lisa was aware of the fact that
Linton and Scoville were bestfriends, she could have ensured that both of them look
at her in a good light. She should manage the micro tasks given by Scoville along
with her work while simultaneously ensuring that her own project is going on
smoothly and let Linton know of all the tasks she is managing throughout the day.
ii) Information exchange: It is very important to collect as much information as
possible about the company, project, tasks, people, etc. for a new joiner in an
organisation. Lisa has always had a “roll-up your sleeves” approach which she
should put in use while dealing with Scoville as it was a known fact that Scoville
was very un-organised and needed help last minute. Lisa should help Scoville with
his projects to increase her knowledge of the organisation and gather as much
information as possible, considering Scoville and Linton are bestfriends.

Two hard tactics that Lisa can take help of:

i) Coalition formation: Everyone in the organisation including Linton’s boss other

than Linton and Scoville had a great impression of Lisa. Lisa could have taken help
from her colleagues to push an idea about herself, to showcase her skillset and
positive attitude through word of mouth.
ii) Information control: In order to change someone’s behaviour in your favor, you
sometimes have to restrict access to information. Lisa could have done the same
 when Linton asked her about the conversation with Vernon. Restricting information
would make Linton anxious and be more careful/cautious of her behaviour towards
Lisa.

Question 7

Breach of ethics Microlevel - relates to the behaviour of persons who work in or interact with
enterprises.

Breach of ethics Mid-level – for activities, policies, and governance Firms, non-governmental
organisations (NGOs), professional groups, industry associations, and regulatory bodies are
examples of organisational structures. In the case study, the beach of ethics is covered under
microlevel and violates the rights approach and fairness or justice method. This has been
accomplished by;

- Discrimination in employee treatment: Linton and Scoville made it obvious to Benton

from the start that they did not like MBAs because they are pompous. However,
Linton's ability to contain herself demonstrates an unprofessional bias towards MBAs,
as well as being on the opposing side of the company's hiring and promotion policies,
as well as the code of conduct.
 - Non-transparency in communication: due to the homecare division's policy, the
recruiting procedure focused on hiring MBAs from prestigious colleges for entry-level
marketing positions. This choice makes it harder for Linton and Scoville to get
promoted because they believed that they did not have an MBA degree, which might be
a disadvantage for them and fosters their negative attitude about MBAs. Unfortunately,
this had resulted in Benton's difficulty in establishing a favourable impression on
Linton. In contrast to the earlier kind and enthusiastic welcome she received during
her interview, Benton received the opposite reception, which diminished her motivation
in her department.
- Equal opportunity: Due to his disdain for Benton, Linton seemed to purposefully
neglect Benton's ability and did not offer demanding tasks to Benton. Linton eventually
failed Benton by presuming Benton's task Maturity was poor and preventing her from
developing her expert power. Benton, on the other hand, performed an excellent job in
her full-time internship Right Away; she had qualifying job abilities to grow her
competence. However, she was unable to do so due to her threatening interactions with
Linton and Scoville.
- Scoville and Benton's lack of mutual regard: She had a number of run-ins with Scoville
over the course of her job. This resulted in a sense of dissatisfaction and enmity
between the two. When Lisa Benton entered Scoville's office to present him with her
analysis and recommendations. He appeared impressed at first, but Scoville soon
began questioning her assumptions. Frustrated with his attitude, Benton murmured
"That's ridiculous," which prompted Scoville to yell at her in a voice that could be
heard across the entire floor, which is a clear violation of workplace ethics and can be
covered under sexual harassment at work.

Question 8
Three arguments exist to support the idea that Lisa should not discontinue/quit her
employment at home:

1. The low choice alternative option- The advantage linked with Right Away is the provision of
a compensation package that is higher than the house world; the disadvantage associated with
Right Away is Lisa's lack of self-confidence to manage the massive marketing obligations.
Despite the fact that she is capable of managing challenging tasks. She believes that because it
is a small company, there will be no long-term goals and that she would not learn anything
from it.

2. If Lisa leaves HouseWorld, she may be glad because she no longer has to deal with
unhelpful management, but she may be sad because she has less possibilities to improve.

3. She could build an excellent reputation as an employee and future leader if she stays in her
role. She could show her commitment to the organisation as well as her capacity to handle
work with Scoville and Linton. She can include Vermon and investigate the possibilities of
going to another brand where Ben 10 will receive the training she has always desired and she
will be able to focus on your professional progress without distraction. Benton also chose the
division she is in since it is the highest in the sector and the majority of people working in the
residential world have great job satisfaction.