Jo Brown is General Manager of ABC Computer Services

Economics Dec 17, 2020

Jo Brown is General Manager of ABC Computer Services. Jo receives an urgent call from XYZ, an important customer in Durban, who has a ‘major fault in his computer system’ and demands a service engineer immediately as his whole operation has ground to a halt. Jo tries to contact Edward Smith, the Service Manager, at once but finds he is out visiting PRQ Engineering, another important customer. As Jo considers that the Durban problem is urgent, she goes to the service department and finds service engineer Helen Jones working at her desk. They have the following conversation:

JB: Have you any really urgent work on hand?

HJ: Well, I’m sorting out a few patches for the new system we’ve sent to PRQ. Mr Smith is expecting me to have them done by tomorrow.

JB: But is it really urgent?

HJ: Well, I don’t know . . . I don’t suppose so.

JB: Good – you can sort out the Durban problem first.

Jo then decides that Helen should fly to Durban on an afternoon flight so she can start work at XYZ first thing in the morning. Jo suggests that she leave the office immediately to pack and get to the airport. As she is about to leave, Helen says, ‘I had better leave a message for Edward Smith.’ Jo says, ‘Don’t worry, I will let Edward know what is happening so he can reschedule your work for the next few days.’ Jo returns to her office and phones XYZ to confirm that Helen Jones will be there first thing in the morning. She then calls Ann Botham, her personal assistant, leaves a number of messages and instructions, and answers some queries. At the end of the call, she says, ‘Oh, by the way, let Edward Smith know that Helen Jones will probably be in Durban for a few days working on XYZ’s computer problems.’

When Edward Smith returns just after 2 p.m., he finds that Helen Jones is not at her desk, so he leaves a note instructing her to drop everything and go to clear up an urgent problem at PRQ Engineering first thing in the morning. He then leaves the office at 3.30 p.m. to meet another customer and does not return that day.

After working through the other jobs from Jo by around 3.45 p.m., Ann Botham sends an email to Edward Smith saying that Helen Jones will probably be in Durban for a few days on the XYZ job.

Next morning, Edward Smith arrives, notes that Helen Jones is not there, and assumes that she has gone to PRQ Engineering. He has an urgent report to finish, so does not check his email as he usually does first thing. About 9.30 a.m., he receives an irate phone call from PRQ Engineering saying that the promised service engineer has not arrived and threatening to cancel the lucrative service contract. At first no one else in the office knows anything about Helen Jones’s whereabouts. As a last resort he checks his email, to find the message from Ann Botham: ‘Jo has asked me to let you know that Ms Jones will probably be in Durban at XYZ for a few days.’ He is both puzzled and annoyed by the brief message.

About five minutes later, Smith storms into Brown’s office and says, ‘How the hell do you expect me to run an efficient service department, when you send my staff round the country without letting me know? We will probably lose the PRQ Engineering contract because Helen Jones did not report there this morning as I promised.’

Answer the question:

1) Does this case study simply illustrate poor interpersonal communication? Or do you recognize

Expert Solution

The idea that our physical surroundings in?uence how we communicate persuaded many organizations to move to open-plan of?ces. Sundstrom’s review of research studies shows that the outcomes can be more complex. Moving to open plan does give more opportuni- ties for conversations and can lead to perceptions of improved communication. But studies report consistent dif?culties in having con?dential conversations, and Sundstrom concludes that ‘visual accessibility of work spaces is not consistently associated with communication’ (our emphasis) but does tend to increase ‘discretionary, work-related conversations or formal contacts that the initiator considered desirable but not necessary’.
INTERPERSONAL SKILLS IN ACTION

Edward’s confrontation with Jo

It immediately puts Jo on the defensive, both in the tone and
the speci?c accusation – it is aggressive rather than assertive. Jo will almost certainly respond
to the accusation, and the conversation will turn to arguing over who told what to whom,
rather than resolving the immediate crisis.
And the principle: the opening to a conversation will establish the tone and the agenda. If
you ‘say’ you want a ?ght, do not be surprised if you get one.

Resolving the issues

As with so many problems in organizational communication, this crisis could have been
avoided if the participants had communicated more carefully. And everyone contributed to
the crisis. Even Ann, who simply passed on the message, can be criticized; she did not check
whether the message was important or urgent, which she could have done.

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