Case-A: Communication Problems at Ozark Corporation

March is the busiest time of the year at Ozark Corporation. Thus, when the production line in Section A has trouble for the second time in a week, Sam Case decides he’d better get it straightened out immediately. As the lead supervisor, Sam is directly in charge of Sections A and B.

Sam calls in Paul Banks, the new supervisor in Section A. Their conversation is as follows:

Sam:Paul, we seem to be having some problems in your section. The line has been down twice in the last three days. This is our busiest time of the year. We can’t afford to have recurring problems of this type. I want you to stop that quality-control project I have you working on, find out what the problem is out on the line, and get rid of it.

Paul:Okay, I’ll get out there, find out what’s causing the problem, and get rid of it.

Sam:Fine.

A quick check of the line reveals that there was a problem with the automatic control unit. Paul checks and finds that it would take four hours to replace the unit. "If you put in a new one," the maintenance man tells him, "you won’t have a problem with it for at least sixteen months. It’s up to you. I’ll do whatever you tell me." Paul tells the man to replace the automatic control unit.

By late afternoon the new unit is installed and the line is operating at full speed. However, the next morning, after Sam receives the previous day’s production figures, he calls Paul in. "What happened in your section? I thought you were going to fix the problem."

"I did," Paul tells him. "The automatic control unit was giving us trouble, so I replaced it."

Sam’s voice indicates that he is not happy with this decision. "You pulled the unit in the middle of a workday? Why didn’t you wait until the shift was over and have the unit pulled then? You could have done preventive maintenance to get through the rest of the day. You gave up two hours of production time to replace a unit that could have waited for maintenance."

Paul is shocked. He thought he had done the right thing. "Look, Sam," he says, "you told me to get rid of the problem and I did. You didn’t say anything about preventive maintenance or not stopping the line."

Sam realizes that the discussion is beginning to get out of hand. "Look, let’s stand back and quietly discuss this matter." With that, the two men start discussing the matter from the beginning.

Responding to the Case

1. Analyze the communication between the lead supervisor, Sam Case, and the new supervisor in Section A, Paul Banks. What did Sam do wrong?

2. How could the problem have been prevented? In your answer discuss the requirement for active listening.

3. Discuss the barriers to effective communication. What should Sam and Paul learn from this experience that will make them better communicators and more effective supervisors?

Case 10-B: A Pinch of This and a Dash of That

How do you combine two packaged-food companies, both with well-known household brand names, and make it work? That’s the challenge managers at General Mills faced when it acquired Pillsbury. The company’s chief learning officer, Kevin Wilde, said, "Let’s get the best out of both of our marketing organizations. And let’s not stop there." So they decided to identify, share, and integrate the best practices from both companies. And employee teams played a major role in how the company proceeded.

An intensive training program called "Brand Champions" was created and launched. The program was designed not just for marketing specialists, but for all employees from different functional areas who worked on particular brands. These cross-functional teams attended the in-house training together as a unified group. According to one of the program developers, Beth Gunderson, specific benefits of including these teams soon became evident. "A person from human resources, for instance, would ask a provocative question precisely because she wasn’t a marketer. And you’d see the look on the marketers’ faces: Whoa, I never thought of that." It helped employees understand and appreciate different perspectives.

Another benefit of including people from different functions was improved communication throughout the company. People were no longer griping about what other functional areas were doing. Employees began to understand how the other functional areas worked and how each area’s contribution was important to the overall success of the company.

The training program has been so successful that now General Mills’ production plants have asked for a mini-version of the course. "They want to understand the language marketers speak and why things are done as they are." Oh . . . and one other example of how successful the program has been. Betty Crocker is well known for packaged cake mixes, but less so for cookie mixes. Inspired by input from the group, the cookie-mix team decided to go after scratch bakers. (These are people who bake from scratch rather than from a boxed mix. As one person said, they were "taking on grandma.") The cookie mixes were reformulated and now the brand owns 90 percent of the dry cookie mix category.

Responding to the Case

1. What barriers were there to communication between the employees of General Mills and Pillsbury?

2. Although not a "different language" per se, how might the language of the functional areas within the organization have interfered with communication?

2. How did the employee roles from the combined organizations impact the communication process?

3. As a supervisor, what suggestions would you offer to improve the communication between groups?