Part 1
It was on a Monday 3rd April 2016 when I was asked by my immediate manager at Unilever Company, to come up with a marketing plan. The plan would aim at increasing the production rate through online sales on the firm product lines. The development of the plan was to be done in collaboration with the company’s internet marketing department. I was given a period of two for the setting of the plan.
Shortly, after conversing with the web marketing team on the same, I realized the deadline would elapse before the work was accomplished and the deadline would not be realistic. I went a step ahead to inform my manager that based on our discussion on the same with the internet marketing the period of two weeks would not be possible. The manager said that he understood and concurred with us. He asks over on me to get it to him once done but as soon as possible.
Two weeks later, my manager sends an urgent memo via my email requesting the plan. Unfortunately, he wanted to present the plan at a board meeting on the following day. I reminded him that after concurring with our cry following our previous conversation he extended the deadline, he blasted me by saying that he had no reminiscence of the deadline extension and flattened at me. The conflict came in when he extended the two-week deadline, and yet he did not escalate the same to the top managers. Probably if he had escalated the same, an agreed time frame would have been established and no one in the company, from either marketing or production line, would have been blasted. Poor communication brought the biggest problem.
After the detonation, first of all, I was momentarily disgusted by the unexpected response, but I remained calm. Rather than arguing with my manager on the blast out of the deadline, I immediately changed conversation’s focus to the developed strategy for supporting the significant increase in deals through online especially for each of lines in production. The strategy developed was what he had earlier identified. After discussing the plan with him in detail, he becomes relaxed a little. I promised him to have the detailed marketing strategy draft on his desk ready for his meeting the following day in the morning. The promise gave him hope of getting something to say during the meeting.
Again, by being solution oriented with my manager, I was able to provide him with what he needed, something significant to present at his board meeting. He later congratulated me and mentioned to the company that the strategies I had come up with were brilliant. He then called me in his office and apologized for blasting me. Some of the strategies I had developed were adopted at a division level. Although I didn’t get specific results of the strategy implementation, by two years my manager got promoted to regional manager, and I too got promoted to division manager.
The conflict I encountered with my manager I was able to solve them through a few tips. To begin with is defining an acceptable behavior (Eunson, 2007). In the scenario, I had to understand the job given and the leadership management. The reason made me not to argue with my manager but behave in a manner that will lower his tempers.
Another tip I used was hitting head on the conflict. It is said that the secret to resolve a conflict is to prevent it where possible. Conflict prevention can be achieved by seeking potential conflicts out and intervening them in a just and definitive way. I managed to reduce the conflict by staying calm and evading the conflict focus.
Other than that, to manage the conflict I picked the battles and avoided the conflict for the conflict’s sake. The issue created was too important to create a conflict, and so I had to promise my manager that the following morning he would get a detailed marketing strategy. Again, according to Eunson, (2007) I had to do what was necessary to open the lines of communication between my manager and me and close the outstanding positional gaps.
Furthermore, to manage the conflict l viewed it as an opportunity. I knew virtually every conflict act as a potential for exceptional teaching and learning opportunities. Again, according to Collins, Henry, & Video Education Australasia, (2006) it is so clear that where there is disagreement, there is always a growing and developing potential. Therefore, I had to use the upside in the differing opinions. The unexpected opportunity was the promotion that came along after some time and the experience I learned out of the conflict. The experience would build me in my managerial position as a division line manager. Besides, that if I couldn’t have taken the conflict positively, it would mean that l could not have developed the strategy and probably my manager could not even get the promotion. Again the company couldn’t have increased in production through online sales.
Part 2
Brief summary
The globe insurance company is a firm with three different lines namely; ordinary life, accident and health and group. Each line has a manager by the title vice present. The president, John Livingston has somewhat been reluctant on accident and health and group lines and placing a lot of attention, time and energy on ordinary life line which happened to be his first love. The company has a well-outlined chain of command. It has branches in fifteen major cities with the offices being managed by three managers, one for each of the line. Each office has field representatives and clerical employees. The representatives maintain the brokers and reports to their respective vice president. The Miami office was established through Livingston’s and Brake’s efforts. The two at one point feels that the company’s success was due to their efforts after a long acquaintance. Probably, the feeling could have been through Brake the office has a unique setup, unlike other offices.
The Brake’s behavior in the company did not impress Hughes and Whites the managers of accident and health and group respectively. It reached a point when Hughes was so irritated with Brake and openly told him that accident and health line was doing better than any other line in Miami office. Again he conducted the vice president of accident and health in Chicago informing him of Brake’s behavior. The vice president later in passed the message to the president.
Why the problem occurred
The biggest problem in this company is that President Livingston is self-centered, and that’s the reason he thinks that the success of Globe insurance company is as a result of his own and Blake’s efforts only. He fails to acknowledge the efforts of other employees below him. Again, Blake, the director of Miami office fails to give autonomy to his subordinates, the reason he takes the responsibility of supervision personally and hiring and firing rather than giving his juniors the privilege. His major weakness was that he wanted to do everything by himself. Again, Brake did not practice the right chain of command in his line. For instance, instead of letting Davis deal with financial matters and human resource he was taking the issues on his hands leaving Davis and others worried since they had less say in the office.
3. What I would do
Since the company has a well-outlined hierarchy, l would ensure that job description of each employee is well understood and that the employees are given autonomy to play their roles in the company. It could reduce the feeling of being ignored in a workplace. Then again, l would cultivate a culture where every employee feels acknowledged by the top management and the sense of success to be as a result of everyone’s efforts in the organization.
References
Collins, C., Henry, M., & Video Education Australasia. (2006). Conflict management. Bendigo, Vic: Video Education Australiasia.
Eunson, B. (2007). Conflict management. Milton, Australia: John Wiley & Sons.
