IVK BUSINESS

REPORT

4/26/2016

JIM BARTON RECOMMENDATION

Caught in the midst of a controversy on your job, you have decided
against quitting. You asked me to help you assess the soundness of your
decision.

20 Sugar Maple Dr.

Sherwood, AR 72120

Phone: 501-681-8174
Fax: 501-944-1984
Jbarton1@ivk.com

JIM BARTON
RECOMMENDATION

RECOMMENDATION: YOU WOULD BE WISE TO KEEP YOUR JOB

Caught in the midst of a controversy on your job, resistance from your boss, and the risk of being fired, you have
decided to try and keep your job. You asked me to help you assess the soundness of your decision. With the
assistance of Jill Lambert, Jaya Raj, and Jintao Jiang, I have studied the issue for the last two weeks, and
identified the major issues. This report addresses two questions:

Why you should try and keep your job?

Why quitting is not prudent for you?

So that I would better understand the contextual basis on which you made your choice, you provided me with a
transcript of the dialogic communication that transpired pertinent to your situation. You also supplied me with
information regarding the context of your situation. It appears that the benefits of remaining in your present
position and striving to promote a healthier communication culture at IVK far outweigh the costs of quitting.

CONTEXT AND SCOPE OF THE PROBLEM

You state that you are CIO of IVK Corporation, a rapidly expanding financial services firm. You further state that
you were chosen for the job because you and your boss, Carl Williams, share the same vision for IVK. That is, IVK
moving away from the freewheeling, improvisational approach to management that it has been using, and
maturing into a grownup financial services firm by means of a professional managerial approach. The companys
process for making these changes would be to institute more formal systems and controls without sacrificing
organizational agility. This shared vision has gained you much favor with your boss, and he has given you great
latitude in making decisions. But neither you nor Williams have communicated your vision to others. Nor have
you begun the process of implementing it. Williams is on the verge of turning the company around following a
period of slowing business performance when a crisis occurs. An IT system malfunction is discovered just before
you are to make a presentation to a group of critical stakeholders. At this point, no one knows its root cause and
what long-term effects it will have. Williams is perplexed about whether he should disclose any information
about the crisis, fearful that it might tarnish his reputation. He cautions you to remain tight-lipped about the
situation, but you struggle to comply with his wishes.
When you try to implement the companys crisis management plan, you discover that it is not functional. In the
past, whenever you asked your staff about the status of the, they had always assured that it was up to date.
Upon discovering this was no longer the cause, and at the direction of Williams, the two of you have resorted to
using some of the same whimsical, unpredictable, and unprofessional tactics to manage the crisis. He has
instructed you to come up with some recommendations about handling the crisis, and to never let it happen
again. He lets you know that he does not favor a recommendation that would cause him to overact to the crisis

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because of the reasons previously stated. You and most of the other employees believe to the contrary. While in
the process of assessing the damage caused by the crisis, you became aware of inexplicable communication
disconnects between yourself and others, most noticeably your boss. To make matters difficult, he seems to be
taking away much of your autonomy, ignoring your recommendations, and making decisions that you consider
imprudent. Worse yet, his behavior threatens to dash all hopes of you or IVK ever realizing your dreams. In the
meantime, time is running out to take advantage of the option you recommended.

BENEFITS--AND COSTS--OF QUITTING

You may sincerely believe that there are many strategic reasons for quitting your job at IVK because:

You have a difficult work environment.

You are living with chronic uncertainty.
You are no longer able to communicate with your boss William.
No one has the same dreams as you.
Your job isnt letting you grow your skills.

But given the gravity of your situation, there are no advisable benefits for quitting, and your decision to do so
might even be career-threatening.
Conventional wisdom says, A quitter never wins and a winner never quits. And, in your case, that goes without
saying. If you quit now because you are concerned about the effects a disclosure will have on your career, you
would be wasting your time. Its too late. Generally, organizations have less than a day to tell their version of the
truth. After that, external stakeholders will have tapped into secondary and tertiary experts who will have their
own views on what has happened. The critical period for making the disclosure has ended. But as the saying
goes, Whats done in the dark always comes to the light. And when it does, you will have a tough time
convincing prospective employers that you have a successful employment track record. Regardless of how well
prepared a company may be, the reality is, crises are inevitable. The traditional managerial approach to handling
a crisis was to Never let it happen again. But this is no longer valid. The modern attitude is: Success is not
measured by how high you are, but by how high you bounce once youve hit the ground.
Regardless of whether the system glitch was deliberately caused or not, it is still considered a crisis. And because
you did not act as quickly as you could have, your reputation will take the greatest hit. Even if the threat is never

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publicly disclosed, or turns out to be non-material, it will set a dangerous precedent for the IVK employees and
foster a corporate culture that has a low regard for ethics and the law, and resistant to change. Before quitting,
you should know that when IVK starts to stink, youll be wearing it.

Conventional wisdom says,

A quitter never wins and a

winner never quits.

WHY STAYING ON AT IVK IS YOUR BEST BET

There are many practical reasons why you should try and keep your job:

You will be faced with a crisis in every workplace situation.

You are in the best position to help make your dreams come true.
You can mitigate the damage caused by the crisis by encouraging a positive communication culture.

CRISES ARE THE RULENOT THE EXCEPTION. The frequency and severity of crises suggest that they are
an inevitable part of business. That is the shared conclusion of two thoughtful analyses (Prates, 2013 and Turner,
2014). Thus, crisis management is not a special but an indispensable skill for management that you must master
in order to be successful at IVK.
NOBODY WANTS YOU WHEN YOURE DOWN AND OUT. Although it may seem counter-intuitive, that
recruiters and potential employers have a preference for passive (someone who is not looking for a job, but
would be open to taking one if the right opportunity came along)or still employedapplicants. In fact, the
longer you are unemployed, the harder it is to get a new job. Employers generally regard unemployed
candidates as being less desirable than their employed counterparts. Many assume that unemployed candidates
are substandard and are therefore willing to work for anyone who will hire them, which makes them less
valuable employees. It is an unspoken recommendation from one employer to another similar to that old saying
about men being more attractive to women when they are already in a relationship. Being in a [work]
relationship is a validation (albeit often erroneous) that someone can put up with you. This implies you are
worth putting up with. If you are jobless [single] and looking, there is always the chance that it is because you
are a loser.

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CULTIVATING A HEALTHY COMMUNICATION CULTURE. Communication is as much an issue of character

as it is a skill. No one can tame the tongue. It will speak out of what fills the heart. The key to managing the heart
is not the tongue itself, but the spirit of the organization as manifested in its vision, and communicated by
employees (ORourke, 2006)
Ethical communications from managers to employees are critical because studies show that an overwhelming
majority of employees will override their own ethical assessment of a situation and accept an ethically purged
interpretation if their manager conveys it. When a crisis strikes, organizations face potentially devastating legal
consequences as well. One study (Fitzpatrick, 1995) which examined organization responses in times of crisis
found that in almost two-thirds of the cases studied, a legal strategy was applied, with three of the top five
approaches taken by organizations being: say nothing, say as little as possible and release it as quietly as
possible, and say as little as possible, citing privacy laws, company policy, or sensitivity. By cultivating a greater
understanding of legal issues, you and Williams can better position yourselves for leadership roles.
Open, honest, direct communication practices can really make a difference in staff morale. Encourage staff
members to practice direct communication by modeling good communication yourself and offering advice and
training on communication skills. Ensure that other managers at IVK are being held accountable for healthy
communication, too. All staff members must be willing to take responsibility for both sending and receiving clear
communication. Your degree of ability to communicate will either evoke trust or distrust in those you lead. It will
instill either confidence or fear. It will determine to a large extent how eagerly your followers will follow you.

CONCLUSIONS REACHED

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Your decision to continue as IVKs CIO appears to be a wise choice. It is the most difficult one to make but the
rewards greatly outweigh the risks. Being on the inside and learning how to communicate effectively with your
boss and others gives you the prime advantage of helping to create a positive communication culture that will
be shared by internal and external stakeholders alike. And as complex and challenging as it may be, compared to
the first option considered, staying on the job and successfully managing a workplace crisis will be much more
rewarding to you, both career-wise and personally. The least prudent option considered is quitting. It is the
simplest to take but has the greatest consequencesmostly negative.

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References
Fitzpatrick, K. R. (1995). Ten guidelines for reducing legal risks in crisis management. Public Relations
Quarterly, 40(2), 33.
Herndl, C. G., Fennell, B. A., & Miller, C. R. (1991). Understanding failures in organizational discourse: The
accident at three mile island and the shuttle challenger disaster. Chapter 12. In C. Bazerman & J. Paradis
(Eds.), Textual Dynamics of the Professions: Historical and Contemporary Studies of Writing in
Professional Communities (pp. 279-305). Madison, WI: University of Wisconsin Press.
ORourke, J. S. (2006). Management communication: A case-analysis approach. Boston, MA: Pearson.

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