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A small team of Canadian managers from a large financial institution is faced with the challenges of managing a recently acquired Mexican operation. Managers must cope with a language barrier and cultural differences as they try to restructure the over-staffed Mexican financial institution. A second teaching note (5A97L01) discusses how to use this case from a cross-cultural orientation perspective.

The director of human resources must contend with internal and external pressures to make changes quickly and smoothly for the new year. She had been with the company for six months. In her capacity as director of human resources, she had spent her time establishing a baseline for the division so that she could then create a departmental vision and strategy for 2000. It would be one of the most interesting challenges of her career. Since joining, she had gained an understanding of the division's future direction from its leadership team. The team was under the direction of the division's new general manager.

The president and chief executive of a hospital, is anticipating resistance to his newly-formed vision for the hospital. The exact source and reasons for the resistance are not totally clear to him. Notwithstanding the difficulty of the change he would propose, he recognizes that the conventional hospital is no longer able to respond effectively to its demands with the resource constraints caused by government funding cutbacks. With varying degrees of support from the administration, doctors, nurses, and other professionals, he has to take action to get the proposed redesign plan back on track.

The general manager must determine how to contend with a project overrun. The team had been working on their project for more than two years. In their presentation of the projected budget and schedule to the executives, the team identified a potential $1 million overspend in order to satisfy their contract. Their original budget was $3.5 million, of which $2.5 million was provided by the company. When the general manager questioned team members during the presentation about what had caused the overrun, he was amazed that the team was unable to respond.

The Executive Director of a non-profit organization must deal with the fact that over the past few years, the organization has experienced a decline in volunteers, men who offer consistent adult male companionship to boys from father absent homes. They must tackle the challenges of:<ul><li>Recruiting and retaining volunteers in the cash-strapped 1990's.</li><li>Motivating people within the organization without the usual motivational tools (raises and threats of dismissal).</li><li>Practicing persuasive leadership techniques where they must constantly communicate, reiterate and reflect the shared values of the agency's volunteers.</li></ul>

The Vice President - Manufacturing, is faced with a series of disputes between his direct subordinate, the maintenance supervisor, and one of the maintenance foremen. The situation is threatening to disrupt maintenance operations and the VP feels it is time to intervene. His problem is what to do and how to do it. (To be used in conjunction with Martin Brass Company (B) Harry Smith, Supervisor, Maintenance Dept., case 9A96C006; and Martin Brass Company (C) Jim Jones, Foreman, Maintenance Dept., case 9A96C007.)

The Vice President - Manufacturing, is faced with a series of disputes between his direct subordinate, the maintenance supervisor, and one of the maintenance foremen. The situation is threatening to disrupt maintenance operations and the VP feels it is time to intervene. His problem is what to do and how to do it. (To be used in conjunction with Martin Brass Company (A) Tom Fuller, Vice-President, Manufacturing, case 9A96C005; and Martin Brass Company (C) Jim Jones, Foreman, Maintenance Dept., case 9A96C007.)

The Vice President - Manufacturing, is faced with a series of disputes between his direct subordinate, the maintenance supervisor, and one of the maintenance foremen. The situation is threatening to disrupt maintenance operations and the VP feels it is time to intervene. His problem is what to do and how to do it. (To be used in conjunction with Martin Brass Company (A) Tom Fuller, Vice-President, Manufacturing, case 9A96C005; and Martin Brass Company (B) Harry Smith, Supervisor, Maintenance Dept., case 9A96C006.)

The human resources/operations manager must design an action plan to implement the mission statement he has developed: the store will offer the best in customer satisfaction. The challenge lies in translating this goal into specific actions for the three groups of employees involved in sales: sales supervisors, department heads, and sales associates. Each of these groups will play a different role in attaining the goal and, therefore, each group will require training and motivation.

A glossary of some commonly used Industrial Relations terminology to be used in conjunction with introductory Industrial Relations cases.

A newly appointed maintenance supervisor for the day shift at a pharmaceutical company must make a decision regarding whether to discipline an employee for inappropriate behaviour on the job. The situation became more complicated as the employee, who was a steward for the local union, had a history of filing grievances within the plant and was himself in line for the maintenance supervisory position. (Two sequels to this case are available, titled Carl Jones (B) and Carl Jones (C).)

A newly appointed maintenance supervisor for the day shift at a pharmaceutical company must make a decision regarding whether to discipline an employee for inappropriate behaviour on the job. The situation became more complicated as the employee, who was a steward for the local union, had a history of filing grievances within the plant and was himself in line for the maintenance supervisory position. This is a sequel to Carl Jones (A) and describes an incident with Jones which leads to a grievance. (A sequel to this case Carl Jones (C), describes further events.)

A newly appointed maintenance supervisor for the day shift at a pharmaceutical company must make a decision regarding whether to discipline an employee for inappropriate behaviour on the job. The situation became more complicated as the employee, who was a steward for the local union, had a history of filing grievances within the plant and was himself in line for the maintenance supervisory position. A temporary truce between Jones and the employee is followed by defiant behaviour. This is a continuation of Carl Jones (A) and Carl Jones (B).

The president and owner of a small sandal factory realizes that if his company is to survive in the long-run, the manufacturing operation would need to become more efficient. Relaxed tariff barriers had increased the level of foreign competition in the country, particularly in the footwear industry. He had recently attended a seminar on total quality control (TQC) sponsored by the local trade association. Despite the potential benefits of TQC and its record of past successes, John was uncertain whether the Mexican employees would be able to implement TQC, a system that appeared to be based on different norms and values than those of Mexican workers.

The president and owner of a small sandal factory decided to implement TQC in his company factory. This case outlines the steps he followed, the problems he encountered and the measures he took to correct them as he introduced his employees to TQC. This case is intended to be used in conjunction with Sandalias Finas de Cuernavaca, S.A.: Total Quality Management (A), case 9A95C018.

An extremely successful consultant is having difficulty balancing his career and family needs. He is mid-career in a demanding job requiring increasing amounts of time and commitment. The pressures to produce from his boss and clients are becoming more difficult to manage and his family life is suffering.

The general manager and director of training are becoming frustrated with the significant obstacles they must face. The challenge they face is converting an unfinished building into a Western-style hotel. Achieving this standard of quality and service did not come easily and the hotel required twice as many employees to operate than comparable hotels in the West. There were 20 expatriates managing the hotel when it opened. This number was to be reduced to 10 but it increased to 22. The number of employees and expatriate managers had a major impact on the budget. The inability to interest the staff in a career in the hotel or to want to become supervisors are significant obstacles facing management.

The president of a national computer sales and installation company wants to develop a plan to improve morale and reduce turnover. The company has grown rapidly is experiencing high employee turnover and low morale. In addition, a report, prepared by the controller, indicates a link between the increasing turnover and reducing customer retention (sales) data.

A project manager in the Operational Research Department of an automobile assembly plant must decide how he can most effectively redirect his team to meet management's deadline and design expectations. For five months, he had been supervising the work of three young company employees who were developing a simulated assembly line. However, because his current responsibilities left him in charge of four or five projects at a time, all in varying stages of completion, he had left his assistants to work together with very little intervention from him. As a result, he was facing the pressure of an uncompleted project and an unnecessarily elaborate design. (This case should be used with Antar Automobile Company - Part I: The Automation Project and Antar Automobile Company - Part III: Conflicting Objectives.)

A project manager in the Operational Research Department of an automobile assembly plant has to decide how he can most effectively redirect his team to meet management's deadline and design expectations. For five months he had been supervising the work of three young company employees who were developing a simulated assembly line. However, because his current responsibilities left him in charge of four or five projects at a time, all in varying stages of completion, he had left his assistants to work together with very little intervention from him. As a result, he was facing the pressure of an uncompleted project and an unnecessarily elaborate design. (This case should be used with Automobile Company - Part I: The Automation Project and Antar Automobile Company - Part II: Team and Individual Objectives.)