Contents

• This assignment answers the following case study –
• The following is a case study to be analysed.
• After graduating from a prestigious business school, Laura Kravitz accepted a job at Madison, Jones, and Conklin, a medium-sized firm that did accounting and consulting projects. After a series of successful assignments working as a member of a project team, Laura was promoted to a team manager position with broader responsibilities. Laura felt confident about her qualifications. The other team managers seemed to respect her, and clients were happy with the projects she managed. With this record of success, Laura hoped to eventually become a partner in the company. However, as the only woman manager in a male-dominated company, she knew that there would be some obstacles to overcome.
• Laura felt that some of the senior managers were very conservative and did not accept her as equal. In the quarterly planning meetings, these managers were often inattentive when she spoke and seemed unreceptive to her suggestions for improvements. Several times she proposed an idea that was ignored, and the same idea was later suggested by someone else who received credit for it.
• Laura did not have a mentor in the company to tell people about her skills and help to advance her career. Moreover, she did not feel accepted into the informal network of relationships that provided opportunities to interact with senior managers. She did not like to play golf and was not a member of the exclusive golf club to which many of the male mangers belonged. She was not invited to most of the social activities by senior
• managers for friends and select members of the company.
• Laura also felt that the assignment of projects was biased. The high-profile projects were always given to the male managers. When Laura asked her boss for more challenging projects, she was told that the older clients usually preferred to deal with men. Because she was not given the more profitable accounts, her performance numbers did not look as good as the numbers for some of the male managers. Two male managers who had
• joined the company around the same time she was hired were promoted ahead of her.
• Ed Tyson, the CEO of this organisation, knows you have recently completed a course in HRM Competencies and hires you to investigate conflict at the organisation. He gives you a verbal briefing on the latest communication breakdown between Laura and most of the male senior managers. Ed tells you of a major rumour that Geoff Hawkins, Laura’s immediate supervisor, had made a pass at her. After Laura repulsed his moves, it is said that Geoff made some comments to the effect that he would put a stop to hiring and promoting women and minority groups in his division. Although Ed has known Geoff as a good manager for a long time, he fears the reputation of the organisation will now be severely damaged if Geoff’s comments are found to be true. To make matters worse, Geoff’s comments have created an atmosphere of mistrust, resentment and anxiety from many employees who think their jobs are at risk. Ed also tells you that he has heard 'on the grapevine' that Laura has been seeing a psychologist for "work related problems" and may be considering going on stress leave. Ed says he has also heard rumours that Laura’s marriage is in trouble because her partner, Joe, is angry that Laura comes home every day with tales about how she is being mistreated at the workplace. Ed asks you to prepare for him an analysis of the situation and to make recommendations for strategies that could be used to address the problems.
• (Based on a case study from Yukl, G 2010, Leadership in organisations, 7th edn, Pearson Education, Upper Saddle River, NJ, pp. 539-540.)
• Learning task
• Prepare a case study on the situation outlined above. If the case does not have specific details you feel are relevant, you can make assumptions as long as these are clearly identified at the beginning of your case study.
• In relation to the case study, you should:
• classify the type of conflict (and the models or theoretical approaches you have relied upon in making your assessment)
• identify the players in the conflict, their role and possible perspective on the conflict
• identify the major issues in the conflict and any special issues such as power imbalance, gender, high emotion, race, disability etc
• identify the strategy/ies you believe will be most appropriate for the effective management of this conflict
• – you will need to justify your choice/s
• provide detail and discussion of how your chosen strategy/ies might be actually implemented given the circumstances you have outlined in your analysis.

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