Janet Ramirez is the supervisor of a ten-person design section at Eco Landscape, an employee-owned company that plans, designs, and builds exteriors of large commercial development projects. Although the company has projects all around the United States, their work is heavily concentrated in the Minnesota area, where the exterior building season is limited to six months in the spring and summer. The schedule forces the company to rely very heavily on the winter months to complete all the design work for its projects. Janet is very aware that the quality and output of her department during January through March will have serious impacts on the company’s financial performance for the year. During December, Janet notices that one of her designers, Alex, is drafting plans for a lot his family owns near a local vacation lake. Alex is an employee who Janet values for his competence in design and his initiative on projects. For the moment Janet decides not to do anything about this incident, thinking that it may just be an unusual occurrence. Two weeks later Janet is reviewing some design plans for a major project with another two of her designers. In the meeting Janet is made aware that this project is running seriously behind schedule and has a number of problems that must be addressed. Janet asks the two designers what is holding up the project and what is being done to get the project completed on schedule. Ted, an experienced and senior designer, says, “Well, we need some input from Alex that we have asked for several times, but he seems busy with other things.” Becky, the other designer, chimes in with, “And we are not going to stay late and work on this project when some other members of the department are leaving early to work on personal projects.” At this point Janet realizes there is a potentially serious problem with Alex and sets up a meeting with him. At the meeting Alex denies working on personal projects and cannot remember or understand the items that the other designers claim are late. Alex thinks about the situation and says to Janet, “You know, those two designers are constantly late on projects and always blaming someone else for their poor planning and sloppy work. Remember last year when the Bank project was delayed? That was their project, and I worked overtime for three weeks to fix their design and to complete their paperwork.” A week later Janet stops for coffee with a group of designers in the cafeteria, and one of the designers says, “Well, morale and productivity are as low as I have ever seen it. I guess the arguments will cost us all our year-end bonus payments, not to mention the fun of working at Eco.”

RESPONDING TO THE CASE

1. Where did this conflict originate?

2. What type of conflict resolution is called for in this case?

3. What would you suggest is a good first step for the supervisor to do in this case?