Assignment:  Dunn's Emporium Experiences Growth

Dunn's Emporium is going gangbusters and George who owns the deli next door is getting ready to retire.  Dunn is in the process of acquiring The Deli.  Although most of the local long-time employees at Dunn's and The Deli have been on board with the merger some employees have never been happy.  

The Deli people did not trust the new ice cream manager because of his age.  Fresh out of culinary school, John Levitz, at age 22 became the ice cream manager.  Ice cream was one of The Deli's biggest iconic menu offerings.  The ice cream is homemade and The Deli offers a special flavor each week.  John has big ideas in expanding the ice cream business by having classes and opportunities for customers to make their own flavors.  He is passionate about his job but sometimes rubs the older employees the wrong way.  He can be arrogant about his skill.  He thinks he is being confident.  The chef at The Deli is jealous of the newcomer because he has wanted to change the menu for some time.  He thinks that George's retirement will be the demise of his dreams because the new General Manager that is working with George is not on board with innovation.  His attitude is "if isn't broken don't fix it."  However, the new General Manager tells Dunn and George that he is happy with making changes. 

Dunn's sporting goods has had a change of employment as well and a new group of South American immigrants has come to work at the Emporium. Dunn is impressed with the wonderful skills of the workers as they display outstanding repair work and the group's work ethic as seen by their willingness to work long hours during the ski season is impressive.  Dunn's long term employees agree that the new employees are a good addition to the staff but find working with the group hard because they are not able to understand Spanish and sometimes it creates problems in communicating order information.  Also, the group tends to stick together. They even eat lunch together despite attempts by the other employees to get them to join in with the rest of the group. There seems to be a growing frustration on the part of the original group.  What neither the original employees nor Dunn know is that because of the language barrier the new South American employees are apprehensive about being included in the group because they cannot speak English well and do not know how to break the language barrier.  What the original employees do not know as well is that Esteban Enrique has asked to be promoted to the vacancy as head of the second shift in the repair shop.  Dunn has concerns that if Estaban is promoted that it might be hard to keep the cohesiveness of the group.  He is especially concerned because his nephew who works the evening shift during the off season would like the job. In short, Dunn has to revisit his organizational structure, culture and vision to make the changes necessary to prevent future problems with the business.  Further, he hasn't told anyone but he wants to put in new software to monitor the staff hours, payroll, and business sales.  It will make information gathering much easier but will require some staff scheduling changes and authority delegation.

Using you first organizational plan, culture, vision and mission, discuss all the changes that Dunn might consider in keeping his business expansion going strong. Also consider all the leadership challenges that Dunn himself must address in the areas of personal skills, leading change, diversity, knowledge management, office politics and empowerment.

• You are to help Dunn address his role as relationship builder. Interface the plan you have created - leader vs. manager assignment with a plan for Dunn's need to address the potential threats to workforce harmony.  Emphasize his role as leader and what he can do to build his relationship with his employees so that he empowers his managers and workforce to implement his vision for the company.

The goal of this paper is to have students link the concepts of Dunn as a social architect, change agent, and individual to Dunn as a relationship builder.  Think of a relationship builder as a leader who aligns people to his or her vision.  Again, students will write from the leader's perspective.

Remember that in order to determine strategic direction, the leader must look inward, outward, forward and beyond.

Students will create a Leadership Plan:

•  
  • Discuss the role of Dunn as a leader to motivate, empower, create followers, and promote communication;
  • Discuss how Dunn should address cultural diversity within the organization;
  • Discuss the areas in the original plan that would require change to accommodate Dunn's role as a relationship builder. 
  • Discuss how Dunn can use John's knowledge of The Deli business to his advantage;
  • Students are expected to be creative but realistic in applying the concepts from the course to expand Dunn's environment and leadership role.