Case Study: Team Effectiveness Colin and Raouf had been having one of their typical sidebar conversations during the meeting when an obviously irritated Henri looked at Colin. "In my 20 years of experience, I've never seen such a shabby hardware design. A first year college student could do better," said Henri, raising his voice at Colin. "No wonder we're a month behind schedule. Now we're going to have to spend more time and money on redesign. If you were in over your head, Colin, you should have asked someone for help. I'll review the situation with Jack when he gets back on Friday. That's it-the meeting is over. We need to spend more time working than chitchatting at meetings." Everyone else on the project team was somewhat stunned by Henri's tirade, but it wasn't the first time. They all felt badly for Colin, but others had experienced the wrath of Henri in the past. Henri is the hardware systems team leader, and Colin is a hardware system designer assigned to Henri's team. Jack, the project manager, was out of town several days for a meeting with the customer and had asked Henri to run the weekly project meeting in his absence. After the meeting, Colin went to 's office. Raouf is an application software designer. Colin and Raouf have developed a friendship during the past year. They discovered that they both graduated from the same university, a couple years apart. They are among the younger members of the project team, along with Fatima, the software system team leader. "I'm get that jerk if it's the last thing I do," Colin told Raouf.

"Take it easy, Colin. You're right; he's a jerk. Everybody knows he doesn't know what he's doing, and he is in over his head. We all have his number," responded Raouf. "But notice that Henri never behaves like that in front of Jack. Only when Jack isn't around or in meetings when Jack isn't there." "Well, I'm gonna see Jack first thing on Friday when he gets back and tell him about Henri. Nobody needs to take that kind of crap in front of everybody," Colin said. "Maybe you should talk to Henri first, Colin," suggested Raouf. "Yea, right!" chuckled Colin. "What do you think Jack will do?" asked Raouf. "Fire him, I hope," answered Colin. "I doubt it," Raouf said, "Jack seems to always cut him a break, like he feels sorry for him or something." "Maybe Jack should be concerned about all the good apples, and get rid of the one bad apple!" replied Colin. Jack was back in the office Friday morning. He was just taking off his jacket when Colin appeared. "Jack, at one of the project meetings you said you had an open door policy, so I'm here to talk to you about a problem with Henri," Colin said. Jack began unpacking his briefcase and had a lot of things to catch up on after being out the whole week. He saw Colin was upset, so he said, "Sure, Colin, I have about 10 minutes before I need to meet with our contracts department to go over some amendments to the contract." Colin blurted out, "This won't take long.

I just want to say that while you were out, Henri accused me of being a lousy designer in front of the whole project team. He blamed me for the project being a month behind schedule. He always does this kind of stuff. Why do you let him get away with it? Nobody likes him. Can't you get rid of him or assigned to some other project?" Jack was taken aback. He responded, "Colin, you really seem upset. Let's get together on Monday when I have more time, and you can have the weekend to cool off." "There's nothing more to talk about. That's all there is to it. You can ask anybody if you don't believe me," replied Colin, as he left Jack's office. Jack asked Rosemary, his administrative assistant, who had been intently eavesdropping on the conversation from outside of Jack's office, to schedule a meeting with Henri for later that afternoon. At that meeting, Jack told Henri about Colin's comments. Jack knew Henri had been under stress because his son had recently been arrested for selling drugs. Henri told Jack, "It sounds to me like Colin overreacted and blew things way out of proportion. At the meeting, I told Colin that there were some shortcomings in his design and suggested he get together with some folks and take another look at it. You know how these young people are; they have got to learn to be responsible for their actions." "What about the project being behind schedule? That's news to me," asked Jack.

Henri replied, "Well, I didn't mean it was Colin's fault. To be honest with you, Fatima and her group of software whiz kids aren't the hardest workers. I mean, I always see them clowning around and yakking with each other and bothering my hardware team. No wonder the project is behind schedule. Anyway, don't worry about Colin. He's young and will have to learn to develop a thick skin. I'll talk to him. I'll tell him to stop hanging around with those software people so he doesn't develop any bad habits." That same Friday afternoon, Colin went around asking most of the younger members of the project team to meet for a few drinks at a happy hour after work. They included most of the software people, and Rosemary, Jack's administrative assistant. She is attracted to Colin and has been hoping he'd ask her out. She told Colin that she overheard Henri tell Jack that Fatima and the software group were causing delays in the project because they spend too much time fooling around rather than working.

Later in the evening, Colin went over to talk with Fatima and who had been sitting together. Colin told them, "I have firsthand information that Henri told Jack that the project is way behind schedule because of your software team. I suggest you go and talk with Jack. Henri is poisoning this project. If Jack believes him, we'll all be fired before this project is over. Hey, I had the guts to go to Jack. Now you've got to do it, too. We have got to stand together against Henri. Jack has to be told that Henri is a big bag of wind and is disrupting the whole project team and causing dissension, and that's why the project is behind schedule. Simply put, the project will never be successful as long as Henri is working on it. And that is going to affect all of our careers-being associated with a failed project. Jack won't have any choice when he sees it's all of us against Henri."

CASE QUESTIONS

1. What are some things Colin could have done in or after the meeting when Henri verbally attacked him?

2. Is there anything more Raouf could have done during or after his meeting with Colin to prevent the situation from escalating?

3. Could Jack have handled his meeting with Colin in a better way? Was there anything Jack could have done after his meeting with Colin and before he met with Henri? What are some things Jack could have done in his meeting with Henri?

4. What should Fatima do?