Question

The morning project team meeting promised to be an interesting one. Tensions between the representatives from marketing department, Jane Pauley, and finance department, Juan Castro, have been building for several weeks now --- in fact, since the project team was formed. As the project manager of Project Excellence, Sammy Bonsu, the head of the Special Projects Division for Excellent Products, was aware that Jane and Juan do not see eye to eye, but he (Sammy) figured that over time they would appreciate each other’s perspective and start cooperating. So far, unfortunately, that has not happened. In fact, it seems that hardly a day goes by when Sammy Bonsu does not receive a complaint from one or the other regarding the other team member’s behavior, lack of commitment or cooperation, or general shoddy performance.   

Project Excellence has been in the works for about 4 months. The deadline for the Project Excellence was set by Denise Robinson (the President of Excellent Products) to be January 1st, 2021. Sammy Bonsu was responsible for 4 other projects with inter-functional teams. Over the years, Excellent Products was known for bringing new products quickly to the market and delighting the customers. Sammy was an integral part of the 20 years of the company’s existence. In fact, Denise and Sammy were classmates in college. They always a great deal of trust and respect for each other. However, it was a different story between Jane Pauley and Juan Castro. Jane and Juan joined Excellent Products five years ago. Each is fiercely competitive and takes great pride in her/his work. While they (Jane and Juan) may have differences of opinion, each is loyal to the company.
As the team gathers for a regular monthly project status meeting at 9:00 a.m., Sammy Bonsu starts with an update on the project tasks, any problems the team members are having, and their assessment of the project’s performance to date. Before Sammy can get too far into the meeting Jane interrupts, saying, “Sammy, I’m going to be out of town for the next 10 days visiting clients, so I can’t make the status meetings either of the next two Fridays.”
“That figures,” Juan mutters loud enough for all to hear.
Jane whirls around. “I have another job around here, you know, and it involves selling. It may be convenient for you to drop everything and come to these meetings, but some of us have other responsibilities.”
Juan shoots back, “That’s been your excuse for missing half of the meetings so far. Just of curiosity,” he continues sarcastically, “how many more doing figure on blowing off while hanging out poolside on your little out-of-towners?”
Jane turns bright red. “I don’t need to put up with you that from you. You bean counters have no clue how this business works or who delivers value. You’re so busy analyzing every penny that you have permanent eyestrain!”
“Maybe I could pay some attention if I didn’t have to constantly stay on the backs of you cowboys in sales,” counters Juan. “I swear you would give our products away if it would let you make your quarterly numbers, even if it does drive us into the ground!”
Sammy Bonsu sits back, amazed, as the arguments between Jane and Juan flares into fullscale hostility and threatens to spin out of control. The other team members stare at Sammy for his response. Anil Patel, from engineering, has a funny expression on his face, as if to say, “Okay, you got us to this point. Now what are you going to do about it?”
“People,” Sammy looking at his watch (that is showing 9:45 a.m.) raps on the table, “that’s enough. We are done for today. Jane, see me in my office in the next hour an hour. And, I would like to see you, Juan, immediately after lunch at 1:00 p.m.  
As everyone files out, Sammy Bonsu leans back in his seat and considers how he would be handling the situation. The project was running behind schedule as well as one other project for which he was responsible. More thoughts were running through his head. At a quiet private lunch (just between the two) last week, Denise Robinson suggested the following: “Sammy, we have been with this company for last two decades. We have been using successfully using the Waterfall method of managing projects. I understand our competitors are experimenting with the Agile Project Management approach. May be, we should seriously consider that so we can hasten some of our projects.” Sammy is also fully aware that Jane Pauley and Juan Castro report to Denise Robinson and they (Jane and Juan) could separately (or collectively) carry their tales of woe to Denise to unsettle Sammy himself.  
Take on the role of Sammy Bonsu and answer in detail the following questions:

d) Is this an issue of team building or conflict resolution? If so, why? And if not, why not? Substantiate your answer with a detailed description of the two concepts as they relate to the situation at hand. Do you plan to have a conversation with Denise Robinson on this subject? Take a position and substantiate your plan of action.

Answer 1

d) The above example is an issue of conflict resolution and not team building.

Team building refers to the process of form a cohesive team by selecting a group of individuals for performing specific tasks. A team refers to a group of people who work together in an interdependent and cooperative manner for meeting the requirements of the customers by achieving the goals and objectives. The general issues that occur in building a team are the absence of diverse skills and interests, poor communication, lack of leadership, confusion in roles, conflicts and poor work environment. In the case study, it is seen that the marketing department representative Jane and the finance department person Juan have a negative relationship existing between them. They do not cooperate and get along with each other in any situation. Besides, they do not work in a single team as they belong to different departments. However, they are bound to interact with each other for organizational projects. Thus, it can be said that this is not an issue of team building. Instead, this is an issue of conflict resolution. Conflict resolution is the process of finding a solution for a dispute between two parties without hampering their rights or interests. It enables individuals to respect others and negotiate with them for solving problems. It is evident from the above case study that Jane and Juan do not possess a healthy relationship with others. They are always complaining about each other regarding the other person's behaviour, lack of commitment, absence of coordination and poor performance. This indicates that there exists conflict between the persons, which has not been resolved. Sammy, the Head of Special Projects Division for Excellence Products thought that the conflicts between the two would be resolved over time when they start cooperating and appreciating each other's opinions. However, it is evident from the case that this issue has not been resolved, which resulted in the conflicts to fester. Thus, it is a problem of conflict resolution.

A conversation with Denise Robinson is required in this case as the conflict might hamper the project completion, which in turn would damage the company’s reputation. After discussing with him, a plan of action needs to be decided for conflict resolution. The strategy of collaboration would be suitable for resolving the conflict. This technique emphasizes on the assertiveness and cooperation capabilities of the individuals involved in the conflict. Thus, a meeting with both Jane and Juan needs to be arranged. In this meeting, both of them would speak their minds and state the problems or concerns they are facing with each other. After the whole picture is clear to Sammy, he would help in meeting their needs to the greatest extent possible. Furthermore, he would provide personalized guidance to both of them and emphasize why they need to cooperate with each other at work. Besides, Sammy must also point out the fact that their conflicts would hamper the project at hand, resulting in damage to their company's reputation. In addition, brainstorming ideas to meet their needs would be encouraged so that both the employees arrive at a possible solution for resolving their conflict. After both parties agree to the solution, it would be implemented.

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