Sid Shawn is a 10-year veteran of NMO Financial Services and a mainstay of the pensions marketing group. He's been a good, consistent worker and an invaluable resource for the salespeople and consultant relations managers. Sid also weighs 400 pounds. So when he is the only internal candidate for the customer-facing position of consultant relations manager, sales and marketing VP Bill Houglan feels that he has a tough hiring decision to make. Sid knows the company's products backward and forward, but to succeed in the new job, he would have to impress the polished professionals at major benefits consultancies. What kind of image would Sid present in face-to-face sales situations? Could he keep up with the job's physical demands and fast pace? Does Sid's weight matter? Bill wonders. With obesity reaching epidemic proportions in the United States, companies are feeling its impact on their insurance costs and their employees' health. They are increasingly compelled to adopt policies concerning overweight workers. Offering expert advice on this fictional case study in R0505A and R0505Z are Howard Weyers, CEO of Weyco, which has fired employees for smoking and is now targeting the issue of obesity at work; Sondra Solovay, a California attorney focusing on weight-related issues and the author of Tipping the Scales of Justice: Fighting Weight-Based Discrimination; Mark V. Roehling, a Michigan State University professor whose research has focused on issues of obesity in the workplace; and Amy Wilensky, author of The Weight of It: A Story of Two Sisters.

Sid Shawn is a 10-year veteran of NMO Financial Services and a mainstay of the pensions marketing group. He's been a good, consistent worker and an invaluable resource for the salespeople and consultant relations managers. Sid also weighs 400 pounds. So when he is the only internal candidate for the customer-facing position of consultant relations manager, sales and marketing VP Bill Houglan feels that he has a tough hiring decision to make. Sid knows the company's products backward and forward, but to succeed in the new job, he would have to impress the polished professionals at major benefits consultancies. What kind of image would Sid present in face-to-face sales situations? Could he keep up with the job's physical demands and fast pace? Does Sid's weight matter? Bill wonders. With obesity reaching epidemic proportions in the United States, companies are feeling its impact on their insurance costs and their employees' health. They are increasingly compelled to adopt policies concerning overweight workers. Commenting on this fictional case study in R0505A and R0505Z are Howard Weyers, CEO of Weyco, which has fired employees for smoking and is now targeting the issue of obesity at work; Sondra Solovay, a California attorney focusing on weight-related issues and the author of Tipping the Scales of Justice: Fighting Weight-Based Discrimination; Mark V. Roehling, a Michigan State University professor whose research has focused on issues of obesity in the workplace; and Amy Wilensky, author of The Weight of It: A Story of Two Sisters.

Teams often collapse over personality issues. This case explores such a collapse, in the context of an MBA student learning team. Students can explore personality differences, analytical strategy, gender, ethnicity, and race issues. Joann Moyer, an MBA student facing her first year exams, is anxious and conflicted at what she perceives as personality conflicts among her team members. In the (A) case, she prepares to confront the other people in her group. The (B) case reveals that the team actually has process issues around their learning frameworks and that many of the team's problems revolve around that and not personalities. The business world requires people to work together successfully, and good learning teams learn to cultivate the skills necessary to do so.