Case Study 1: Importance of working environment

In 2008 when recession struck most of the organization, many people not only lost their job but
also the loyalty and belongingness they had from their company. Steve was also one of this many
people. Steve had been part of Orange.inc from day one and served ten years, but because of
recession Organge.inc had been through some hard times and even after honest efforts from
employers and employees they shut down.
Fortunately, Steve work experience had made finding another job fairly easy and he joined Macro
Soft Pvt Ltd. The working culture of both the organization is as different as it could get. MacroSoft
was a bigger organization than Orange.inc and was structured much more bureaucratically. In
MacroSoft no one was allowed to make any sort of decision without getting three signatures from
higher up where as in Orange.inc top managers apparently didn’t worry too much about who took
decision until and unless it is good and beneficial for the organization.
In Orange.inc everybody knew everybody top to bottom, work of each employees were appreciated
and recognized but in MacroSoft employees were indifferent to each other. Steve even felt that his
peers resent him as he was directly employed at the level which took them years to reach.
Sitting at his desk Steve wonder if perhaps he had made a mistake in accepting the MacroSoft offer
without finding out more about what kind of organization it is.

Questions:
1. What advice you give to Steve for his stay in Macro Soft?

2. Is it possible to find a happy work place?

3. Should management of MacroSoft do something to make new employees feel comfortable

or it is not important to see how and what new employees feel about the organization?
Answers:
1. Steve should concentrate on the job and worry less about the connection with other
employees. Because he just joined the organization the existing employees will take time
to mingle with him and eventually they will. His focus in the work might attract
appreciation from the management but he pondering about other employee will not bing
him any good.

2. Yes, it is very much possible to find a happy work place but that happiness will not be
throughout the year or your career. Every work has its up’s and down’s if we work keeping
that in mind in our low’s our achievement will motivate us and in our high’s our defeat
will keep us grounded.

3. MacroSoft should have induction or orientation programmes for new employees where
he/she can be introduced to companies’ employees and can feel welcome to the
organization. In Steve case if that would have happened he would not have felt that other
employees resent him. And other employees would have also got chance to know that Steve
just not got this job based on reference but he has ten years of job and he very well deserve
this job.
Case Study 2: Fixing the game and the way it is played
Nag raj Comics had started out as an innovative company, known for creative stories and animated
comics since four decades. Mr. Chaudhary headed the company since the beginning but now it is
time for his retirement. His successor Mr. Raka found the company’s procedures chaotic and
instituted strict rules for all the employees. Since then the profit of the organization and its brand
value had steadily declined.
To understand the problem behind the rules he made he called for meeting of all the heads of
various department. In the meeting when asked about what are the problems with the new rules,
he got an earful. The cartoonist, the animators, and the designers resented punching a time clock
and having their work evaluated once a month as per new rule. Before the implementation of the
new rules, they had often gotten inspiration from going down to the local book store and picking
up other comics and reading it for inspiration, but now they felt they could make such trips only
on their own time. And when a researcher came up with an innovative idea, it often took months
for the proposal to work its way up the company hierarchy to the attention of someone who could
put it into production. In short, all these sharp minds felt shackled.
Concluding that maybe she had overlooked the rigidity of the rules, Mr. Raka walked over to the
manufacturing building to talk to the printing supervisor. They responded to his questions with
one word: anarchy. With employees drifting in between 8:00 and 10:00 and then starting to drift
out again by 11:00 for lunch, the supervisors never knew if they had enough people to run a
particular operation. Employee turnover was high, but not high enough in some cases; supervisors
believed the rules prevented them from firing all but the most incompetent workers before the end
of the yearly evaluation period. The rules were so "humane" that discipline was impossible to
enforce.

By the time Mr. Raka got back to his office, he had a plan. The following week, he called in all
the department managers and asked them to draft formal rules and procedures for their individual
areas. He told them he did not intend to lose control of the company, but he wanted to see if they
could improve productivity and morale by creating formal procedures for their individual
departments.
Questions:

1. Do you thing Mr. Raka will lose control by decentralizing the power to respective
department heads? Justify your answers.

2. Describe both the styles of leadership shown in case study?

Answers:

1. No he will not, because he gave power to department heads to make rules for their
departments but all the heads still report to Mr. Raka and his say will be last on every
call this heads make.

2. In the case study we saw two styles of leadership, one is Mr. Raka a democratic leader
who gives instructions only after consulting the group. He sees to it that policies are
worked out in group discussions and with the acceptance of the group. Participative
manager decentralizes managerial authority. His decisions are not unilateral like that
of the autocratic leader. Unlike an autocratic manager who controls through the
authority, a participative manager exercises control mostly by using forces within the
group. And the other one is by Mr. Chaudhury a paternalistic style, in this style, the
leader assumes that his function is paternal or fatherly. His attitude is that of treating
the relationship between the leader and his group as that of family with the leader as
the head of family. He works to help, guide, protect, and keep his followers happily
working together as members of a family. He provides them with good working
conditions, fringe benefits and employee services.
Case Study 3: A chance taken back

After serving jail time for 5 years, Robin was given second chance as asst. production manager in
BISWAMOTI Furniture Pvt Ltd by the owner Mr. Bishwanath Kapoor. Robin started his new life
with honesty and hard work and gave two truthful and faithful years at the same post. He got
promoted as Production manager and now the responsibility of recruiting came on his shoulders.
He started taking interviews and he came across a profile which caught his intention. The profile
was of a guy name Tom who just got out of Jail after serving six month of jail time.
Robin called Tom for interview and Robin understood how Tom felt when Tom tried to explain
his past and asked for another chance. Robin decided to give him that chance just as his boss had
given him one. Tom eagerly accepted the job as assistant production manager. Things had gone
well at first, everyone seemed to like Tom, and he made several new friends. Few days later an
employee complained his wallet missing. Robin confronted Tom about this and was reassured
when Tom understood his concern and earnestly but calmly asserted his innocence.
Next day someone from accounts department discovered some money missing from petty cash.
Another worker claimed to have seen Tom going to account department in the morning. Most
people assumed Tom was the thief as all such incident started happening after his joining. Even
the worker whose wallet had been misplaced suggested that perhaps Tom had indeed stolen it but
had returned it when questioned. Robin problems hiked when someone from human resource
department called him and confirm about Tom background. He was scared how other employees
will react knowing Tom’s background.
Several employees approached Robin and requested that Tom must be fired. Meanwhile, when
Robin discussed the problem with jack, he had been defensive and said he will never do anything
like this and go back to a life he left behind.
Robin have a real problem and he is not sure what to do next. Should he fire Tom? Should he
explain employees about Tom’s background? Should he keep Tom’s background as secret? Should
he talk to the owner and ask for suggestions?
Questions:
1. Should Robin fire Tom? Justify your answers
2. Is perception playing any role to misguide the employees or Robin?
Answers:

1. Robin should not fire Tom, because none of the incidents prove that he is the thief.
Everyone and situations are against him but all this are mere speculations no evidence to
proof that he stole either the wallet or the cash from accounts department.

2. Perception is how people look at and understand the things. It is a unique interpretation of
the situation rather than recoding of it. Perception is a complex cognitive process of
understanding the world, sometimes not in its real form. Perception is a learning process
and hence it differs from person to person.

In the case perception playing a huge role against Tom. As per Robin is concern his
knowledge about Tom’s past is creating doubts in his mind about Tom. And as per
employees is concern the situation such as Tom being present in both the situation near the
incident and all such incident happening after his joining creating negative perception in
employees mind.
Case Study 4: Real Life after College life
After a great and fun filled college life srijit joined a local newspaper as junior editor. The
pay wasn’t very high, but srijit already was good at the work, and he believed all he needed
was a steady job to boost his confidence to ask his girlfriend Annie to marry him. Once he
did, events unfolded rapidly. He started work in May, he got married in December, Annie
also took a job as a columnist in the national newspaper.

Two months after his marriage in February, the senior editor of Srijit Company resigned
just when they had more work than they could handle. Srijit now has to finish his and his
senior job and it meant jump in his salary so he said yes to it. He was scared as he was
never so ambitious and he was never serious about the job so he never paid attention to
what his senior ever taught him. For him this was only a medium to get married to Annie.

During his first few months as senior editor, Srijit began doing things that hi wife thought
he had outgrown. He frequently talked so fast that he would stumble over his own words,
stammer, turn red in the face, and have to start all over again. He began smoking, too,
something he had not done since they had started dating.

Srijit found it particularly hard to adjust to being "senior editor," especially since one of
his colleague Satvik was getting a journalism degree at night school and both were the
same age as he. He felt sure that Satvik, would take over his position in no time. He kept
feeling that Satvik was looking over his shoulder and began snapping any time they worked
close together.

Things were getting tense at home, too. Annie had to give up her full-time day job because
of health reasons, so she had started working nights. They hardly ever saw each other, and
it seemed as though her only topic of conversation was how Srijit has become workaholic
and do not give time to her. Larry knew his wife was dissatisfied with her work and
believed her intelligence was being wasted, but he didn’t know what he could do about it.

Question:

1. How Srijit can strike balance between work and personal life?

2. What are the factors contributing to srijit’s job stress?

Answers:

1. As per work is concern srijit should work on the insecurity about losing the job by doing
the same course or a better course in journalism which can help him keep this post and in
job in long turn and in the meanwhile try to do his job in the best way possible so that even
if he cannot do a course he can at least showcase his experience.

As per life is concern srijit’s wife problem is his growing bad habits and his scarcity of
time for them. So, he can stop his smoking habits which is good for his health too and if he
cannot give quantity of time to her try to give quality time to her.

2. Factors which are contributing to Srijit’s job Stress are:

 Organizational Stressors- his senior leaving the organization and the work burden on
his lap is stressing him.

 Group Stressors- His peer doing an extra course which might end up him losing his
post.

 Individual Stressors- he was not serious about the job and suddenly he is over burdened
with job, now even he is serious about his job no one is there to teach him. He also
inculcated bad habits which is also because of stress. He also having problem giving
time to his wife which is again disturbing him mentally
Case Study 5: Multi cultural problems
Jai Singh was a highly successful marketing manager for Dasgupta Auto, a Delhi-based company
that makes original-equipment specialty parts for Maruti, Ford, and Volvo. Rather than retreat
before the onslaught of Japanese automakers, AAS decided to counterattack and use its
reputation for quality and dependability to win over customers in Japan. Jai had started in the
company as an engineer and worked his way up to become one of a handful of senior managers
who had a shot at the next open vice-presidential position. He knew he needed to distinguish
himself somehow, so when he was given a chance to lead the AAS attack on the Japanese
market, he jumped at it.

Jai knew he did not have time to learn Japanese, but he had heard that many Japanese executives
speak English, and the company would hire a translator anyway. The toughest part about leaving
India was persuading his wife, Nidhi, to take an eighteen-month leave from her career as an
attorney with a prestigious Delhi law firm. Nidhi finally persuaded herself that she did not want
to miss an opportunity to learn a new culture. So, armed with all the information they could
gather about Japan from their local library, the Singh’s headed for Tokyo.

Jai felt very uncomfortable at that first meeting. He got the feeling that the Japanese executives
were waiting for something. It seemed that everyone but Jai was in slow motion. The Japanese
did not speak English well and appeared grateful for the presence of the interpreter, but even the
interpreter seemed to take her time in translating each phrase. Frustrated by this seeming lethargy
and beginning to doubt the much-touted Japanese efficiency, Jai got right to the point. He made
an oral presentation of his proposal, waiting patiently for the translation of each sentence. Then
he handed the leader of the Japanese delegation a packet containing the specifics of his proposal,
got up, and left without thinking of his career, his wife career and future of his organization.

Questions:

1. Was leaving India was a right decision?

2. What specific errors jai made in his first meeting?

 Answers:

1. Leaving India was a right decision for Jai himself and also for the company by and large.
But the problem was he was neither ready to leave India nor he was ready to land in Japan.
He could have done his homework about Japanese clients and left accordingly. BY
preparation here means about the culture, about their understanding of English language
about his understanding of Japanese language. Because as a company dasgupta is going to
their land and approaching, so Jai should be well-equipped with their notion.

2. Jai was very uncomfortable at that first meeting. He went in the meeting with an assumption
that the Japanese executives were waiting for something. The Japanese did not speak
English well and appeared grateful for the presence of the interpreter, but even the
interpreter seemed to take her time in translating each phrase. Frustrated by this seeming
lethargy and beginning to doubt the much-touted Japanese efficiency, Jai got right to the
point. He made an oral presentation of his proposal, waiting patiently for the translation of
each sentence.

The worse part was he handed the leader of the Japanese delegation a packet containing
the specifics of his proposal, got up, and left without thinking of his career, his wife career
and future of his organization.