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HUMAN RESOURCE MANAGEMENT

CASE ASSIGNMENT NO. 01

Case Analysis Report on

‘UNDERSTANDING HUMAN BEHAVIOUR AT WORKPLACE’

Submitted by:
Name: TEJASWINI SOLANKI
Roll No: 191158
Section: A
Batch: MBA-FT (2019-2021)

Institute of Management, Nirma University

Date of Submission: 11TH OF NOVEMBER, 2019

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PART A

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Employees are an organization's one of the most important resources and are also coined as the most valuable
assets to the organisation. This involves maintaining a work environment that satisfies the needs of individual
employees and the management. An effective employee relation involves creating together and cultivating a
motivated and productive workforce with a common goal and also helps in better decision making.

This case emphasizes on understanding employee relations practices, its underlying factors, issues and its
possible impact on the employee performance in Charora international (CI). A descriptive approach has been
used to describe the current discord between the junior most member of the merchandising team Shreya Bose
and the manager Mr. Manoj Singh and the QC manager Shalini Mathur.

The manager of the merchandising team was not satisfied with the work performed by Shreya and was
disappointed with her. He described her to be aggressive on being corrected. He also stated that his
performance may be affected if he does not receive the right support from his subordinates, which was
understandable. Shreya and the QC manager also had a row some time ago due to certain mistakes on part of
Shreya not following the requisite packing signs. The QC manager had tumult her on this mistake. Therefore to
address the issue the MD Richa Arora called Shreya as she expected her to provide a holistic perspective and
then discuss with the team.

Shreya on being asked broke down and described Mr. Manoj to be difficult to work with. Shreya criticised his
organisational skills and was not contended with his information delivery. She also stated his resistance to
technology making smart work hard work. This discord between the two employees of the organisation poses
as a possible threat to the export orders from Germany, where the company was planning for a potential
expansion.

This results that the MD Richa is under a predicament because she trusts the young employee and is impressed
with her ability to work independently but on the other hand her working abilities are criticized by her peers
and they do not trust her. It is observed that the objective at that time was to establish a coordination between
the merchandising team as that would enable them to execute the order properly. They had to get along well to
handle the pressure and meet all the requisite permissions as Germany was very specific with their order details.
For this the manager is looking out for ways to persuade the team to resolve their issues. Any trivial issues
could get their order sample rejected and thereby the company would lose an opportunity of business
expansion.

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PART B

Write your diagnosis to identify the core decision problems/concerns/dilemmas in the case. Specify the
decision objectives emerging from your diagnosis.

Through the given case I was able to identify a couple of problems, concerns and dilemmas that were brought
into existence due to the situation. They can be understood as-

GOAL ALIGNMENT- the organisation was facing the problem for possibly losing the Germany based sample
order due to the lack of team coordination. This would have an impact on their future prospects as well.

DIVIDED ATTENTION – There is a situation that has been put forward by where the manager complains that
Shreya did not listen to simple orders and that results to mistakes being done during the task. Similar incident
was also faced by the QC manager, when certain garment packing task was being looked upon by Shreya and
certain trivial packing related issues had taken place.

SPECIALIZATION- it is seen that in the merchandizing team of four, all of the members come from different
experience background, thereby creating a visible line of distinction of opinions of each other’s knowledge and
working pattern.

BEHAVIOUR PATTERN- the case reflects that the senior members of the team are more experienced and so
have certain perceived work standards which are comparatively high or unclear for the new and recently
associated member to understand. This results to less mutuality among the members. The behaviour was trigged
due to the reaction out of the situation mistakes by Shreya.

COMMUNICATING METHOD DILEMMA- the MD of CI, Richa Arora faces the dilemma of what method
should she adopt to persuade both Shalini, Manoj and Shreya to work out their internal differences so that they
would be able to focus their attention with coordination on the order sample from Germany.

POOR COMMUNICATION- it has been expressed in the case that there was poor communication on part of
both Mr. Manoj Singh while communicating the information and Shreya Bose while listening too and further
communicating the same.

ROLE PERCEPTION- The senior members expected a set off behaviour patterns as attributed to the position
and when Shreya was not able to fulfil them they were disappointed.

PREJUDICE: the case makes it ample clear that the MD does favour Shreya who is more qualified and
younger and has more enterprising for the organisation. There are chances that she may act biased on
addressing the issue in the merchandising team.

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COMPLETION OF THE ORDER- One of the concern is the completion of order. As mentioned in the case
that the coordination between managers and the merchandiser is of utmost important in order to complete the
order.

TRUST- One of the dilemma that can be comprehended from the case is that, as mentioned earlier that
everyone had different stories regarding the behaviour of another, so it was very difficult for Ms. Arora to trust
one person and come to conclusion. Like in the case of Ms. Bose and Mr. Manoj, they both accuses each other
for their mistakes.

DECISION OBJECTIVES:

1. Develop mutual trust among the employees.

2. Improve the way communication of information is shared among the employees in the organisational
design
3. Develop importance of cohesiveness which leads to improvement of coordination and collaboration
among the members.
4. Implement a performance analysis and a feedback system in the company to reduce misunderstandings
and minimize conflicts.

PART C:

List the causes and consequences-

A. GOAL ALIGNMENT:

CAUSE- The given case is a typical case of coexistence. Coexistence of varied kind of individuals in terms of
age, qualifications and experience in a team, in an organization with different set of values and belief. Thereby
making goal alignment achieving highly challenging.

CONSEQUENCES- Due to the differences within the team, they were not able to work in coordination with
one another and resulted too many arguments between the team. This would also result to decreasing respect as
team members and also loyalty between the team. Another future consequence was that of losing a very
important sample order from Germany, one of the future prospective market for the organisation.

B. DIVIDED ATTENTION:

CAUSE- In this case, if we look at the background of employees in the team, it is crystal clear that each one of
them has unique expertise and experience in the industry. There is good amount of gender and generation
diversity and to the some extent it is hampering the mutual understanding and alignment. No two employees

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have the same understanding capability and Shreya is still very knew to the industry and would require the very
basic training.

CONSEQUENCES- this results to improper understanding between the members thereby resulting to certain
trivial mistakes in the tasks by the relatively new members. If the same pattern of information sharing continues
the employee would eventually lose interest in the task or may react aggressively.

C. SPECIALIZATION :

CAUSE- The workplace consists of individuals who all have their own perspective of the work and how it can
be done. Some employees have strong beliefs. Such a situation is where the senior member Manoj Singh did
not like working with excel and that made it difficult for Shreya to maintain all the records. Thus he believed in
hard work and was resistant to smart work. These beliefs can conflict with co-worker perspective and beliefs,
creating conflict.

CONSEQUENCES- As she was unable to maintain records as per the working pattern of her senior, Shreya
couldn’t remember small details of information received, it would result to a row between the two team
members. Constant criticism would ultimately result to low job satisfaction, thereby also decreasing the work
productivity and affecting the team work and organisation in a broader view.

D. BEHAVIOUR PATTERN:

CAUSE- Manoj Singh and Shalini Mathur, are two members who have grownup from ranks and have long
working experience and then there are also employees like Shreya Bose who is young and are still new to the
industry. Thus both belong to different set of employees in an organisation and so they also have different views
and behaviour in an organisation. Their views on the recent members is also different.

CONSEQUENCES- Much more involvement of senior leadership is seen as compared to that of the new added
members. This results that the majority expectations are high due to the expertise the hold. This results that a lot
more of counselling, coaching, mentoring and training is required in order to create mutual acceptability of the
new team members.

E. COMMUNICATING METHOD DILEMMA:

CAUSE- The existing row between the manager of the merchandising team and Shreya and some of the previous
incidents whereby the manager was providing haphazard information and his non organisational skills as
explained by Shreya had resulted to a drift in the merchandising team. The MD had now received a view from
both the team members which were contrary to each other. This issues were affecting the team dynamics.

CONSEQUENCES- this existing sour relationship between the two employees had posed as a threat to the new
project development in Germany, which was also a potential business expansion. The order specifications were
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very strict and would require the skills and expertise of all the members along with their co-ordination. The MD
was on under the dilemma on what strategies to persuade the team to resolve their differences.

F. POOR COMMUNICATION-

CAUSE- If the manager asks one employee to relay important instructions to other clients, but the employee fails
to do so appropriately it results to forgetting important communication which may cause to lose face in front of
customers. Conveying wrong information can lead to projects being incorrectly done and to employees blaming
each other for the end result. Also misunderstanding occurred when important information was not communicated
from the manager’s side and he still intentionally blamed the younger employee. Poor communication is also a
result of confusing orders on part of the manager.

CONSEQUENCES- Due to the poor communication there grew a misunderstanding that led to a strife between
the employees thereby also affecting the team dynamics to work. It lead to contrary views of each other among
the team. They are not well aware of their role in the organisation, how the decisions they make have an impact
on the organisation and the management and the value they are providing to the organisation.

PART D.

Describe the relevant concepts and theoretical framework that can be used to resolve the
situations

While evaluating the psychodynamic approach between leaders and followers, it is critical for the leaders to
reflect upon their own behaviours first before trying to judge their subordinates’ personality characteristics.
Individuals each carry their own experiences which gives that personal and dynamic process its own
motivators. In the case, one of the situations that needs immediate attention is that of resolving the differences
among the members of the merchandising team.

A. PSYCHODYNAMIC APPROACH: The situation can be solved through the psychodynamic

approach. The psychodynamic approach is a theory which helps to bring upon an acceptance and
understanding of behaviours rather than change of one’s behaviours, attitudes, and feelings. Human
behaviour is a personal and dynamic process, which the members in a team need to take into
consideration while working in an organisation. If the team members in our case take an effort to
understand the behaviours of each other there is a possibility that they will be able to resolve their
internal issues and work as a team.

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B. TKI APPROACH: The TKI (Thomas-Kilmann Instrument) is a self-report assessment that allows you
to discover whether you might be overusing (a high score) or underusing (a low score) one or more of
these five conflict-handling modes: competing, collaborating, compromising, avoiding,
and accommodation.
C. ARBITRATION: Sometimes the conflicting parties need the employer to act as a neutral third party in
order to solve the problem. As an arbitrator, the employer will listen to each party’s argument and
consider their points carefully. They will then examine the proof and arguments presented and issue a
decision. The parties involved will be legally obliged to comply with whatever decision the arbitrator
issues.
D. MEDIATION: Mediation is similar to arbitration, except the mediator does not issue any decisions.
Mediation is one of the most popular conflict-resolution methods in the workplace. The mediator still
acts as an impartial third party that works to encourage the parties involved to communicate openly with
each other and arrive at a mutually beneficial solution to the problem. The parties will not be legally
obliged to act upon the solutions agreed upon. This is also possible in the current scenario as the given
case depicts an example to interpersonal conflicts.
E. TWO-PHASE COGNITIVE MODELING (TCM): It can be used to help organizational members
capture organizational conflicts and identify the means to alleviate them. The problem identification
helps to figure out methods to solve them. To support the method for real world applications, there is
also a developed computerized modelling tool, called Two-phase Cognitive Modelling Facility (TCMF).
Working procedures of the TCM method and the TCMF tool are illustrated with their application to the
real life cases.
F. THE CIRCLE OF CONFLICT:. The circle of Conflict Model, adapted by Gary Furlong provides a
means for diagnosing and addressing conflict between the employees through examining the five major
primary causes of conflict: Data, Values, Relationships, Externals/Moods, and Structure. The model can
be used as a tool for diagnosing the components of the conflict and as a process-directing tool for
facilitating resolution of the dispute. For applying this approach all the five components should be
present, which are in the present case.

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PART E

Propose decision options and your recommendations for addressing the situation with
reasons.

Conflict resolution is one of the hardest competencies to find and develop in managers and leaders because it’s
not fun, and people avoid it. But to be a highly successful leader, you need to be able to get in there, not shy
away from conflict, and work toward a proper solution.

DECISION OPTIONS:

After studying the case a few of the decision options that could be generated are as follows:

1. The first option I could come up with is that the MD solves it by not solving it. The merchandising
team has to understand the issues and solve them among themselves. All that the MD has to do is
mediate and facilitate the meeting. Such as for example, sit down with all the employees and state
the issues in form of situations and ask each of them how they will solve it. Let them develop a plan
as a team. Take their attention away from the conflict situation and bring it back to the goals. Let
them state their viewpoints, and share perspective this will enable them understand how one thinks.
However before the meeting the MD should establish certain guidelines. Such as, ask them to
calmly express themselves.

2. If talks don’t work, then the MD should think about organizing sessions such that will help the
employees to work well together. Mastering conflict management in all situations is part of their
growth as a team. These coaching sessions will help them to recognize conflicts, respect the
boundaries, respect others behaviour, thereby understand and prevent other unwanted situations
from arising. This is a time building activity. Since it is an activity under supervision they would
work without being defensive. The activities should enable them to be open to adjustments, just like
they want adjustment if the performance is not at par. Here Richa may be able to tackle the issues
through promoting teamwork across the generations in CI by a training programme and address the
issues subtly but immediately, before they get out of hand.

3. Another one the solutions possible is, where the MD can directly address the manager and Shreya
directly at a meeting and also call a HR Executive. She should patiently listen to their arguments
again. Allow them to speak but in a respectful manner. If the conversation becomes bitter or mean,
Richa needs to step in and stop those comments. Richa needs to explain them why they need to
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control themselves and ask them to understand each other’s perspective. If the behaviour still
precedes then she should authorise her power and make them aware of the impact on the
organisation, which is their first priority. Make them aware of each other’s importance in the team,
without being biased towards someone and direct their attention towards the upcoming project and
the value it holds for the company and how it will have a tremendous impact on their individual
growth.

4. Activities related to appropriate behaviour should be conducted subtly. Behaviours that encourages
active listening skills, valuing different views from our own and different cultural backgrounds, help
decrease ambiguity of thoughts and support the sharing of expectations and valuing hard work.
Richa should take the time to study the organisational structure. To ensure that the job description
and the job allocation has been done in such a way that it reduces the chances of conflicts to the
minimum. The issues related to the coming late and uninformed can be resolved through a proper
placement of system of attendance regularization for all the employees.

RECOMMENDATION:

Once the MD has taken time to gather information, talked to all the parties involved, and reviewed all the
circumstances, she has to make a decision and act. She can’t leave the issue in limbo. Taking too long to make a
decision could damage her credibility and their perception. Moreover since they need to work on the order
sample of Germany and so the same needs the skills, expertise and co-ordination of the entire team. Therefore
we need to also take into consideration the time constraint to solve the issue. Moreover the decision should not
be biased. All the decisions other than the 3 one are time based activity. I am through the case inferring that as
she had received the order for sample and would have a time limitation to complete the same. so she could not
dedicate more time on any activity planning as she would have to make the employees prepare for the same.

Under such a situation the best option which I would like to recommend is option 3. As it may act as a
temporary solution it will still work till the execution of the order properly. It is not ethical to bribe them with
the individual growth card but since we have a time constraint to execute a potential business growth order the
MD should proceed with the plan. Once the order is completed then any of the feasible options such as 2 should
be implemented to remove this problem from the roots.

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PART F:

LEARNINGS:

1. The success of your organization doesn't depend on your understanding of economics, or organizational
development, or marketing. It depends, quite simply, on your understanding of human psychology: how
each individual employee connects with your company and how each individual employee connects
with the other employees and their level of understanding each other.
2. Understanding human behaviour is incredibly useful especially in a business setting. Obviously people
aren’t 100% predictable but they are at least understandable on a basic level. Understanding human
behaviour can help you do many things, from getting on better terms with the boss to establishing real
long lasting partnerships and colleagues. It helps you align yourself better in the work environment to
aid in your future success.
3. In order to coexist, thrive and excel in the workplace, you need to know how to interact with other
people in order to achieve your goals and also learn to understand the perspective of other co-workers.
4. Recognition helps employees receive a balance of positive to negative feedback. A little unexpected
appreciation can go a long way. It satisfies our fundamental need for praise, reinforces the
right behaviours and culture, and leverages social engagement. Therefore feedback and performance
appraisals are very important.
5. Any team member should not be resistant to change and adaptability. As both of these qualities help to
minimise conflicts in the groups and help to develop better productivity.
6. Trust acts as one of the most important components of the organisational behaviour of an individual.
There should be mutuality among the group members in a team for the best results. Workplace biases
and stereotypes make people adapt to aggressive and defensive strategies to survive.
7. Communication is one of the contributing factors to the effective productivity as a team. A proper
communication enables the managers to work more closely to the subordinates.

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Annexure: Undertaking for Company Report

UNDERTAKING

To Whom It May Concern:

I, TEJASWINI SOLANKI hereby declare that this assignment is our original work and is not copied from
anyone/ anywhere. If found similar to other sources, we shall take complete responsibility of the action, taken
thereof.

Roll No.: 191158

Section: __A___
Batch: MBA – FT (2019 – 2021)
Date: 11/11/19

Signature: _____________

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