Case Study Analysis

Case study content:

Conflict Handling Styles

There are five different conflict management styles, avoiding, accommodating, compromising, competing and collaborating. In this case study, I noticed that Robert has used Competing conflict management style.

The Competing style of management will be considered for use when the other four are unsuccessful, as the competitive management style appears the most extreme of the five and can also damage relationships between people.
Robert has brought a large increase in profits to the company and feels that he needs to use the money from the increase to get a pay rise for his team. Robert refuses to listen to Kay’s offer to expand the company’s business by allocating the current funds and only cares about getting the benefit for himself. Moreover, Robert threatened Kay with union involvement in the case if his demands were not met.

Which bargaining approach (distributive or integrative) did Kay used.

In this case, I noticed that Kay used a distributive bargaining approach to find a way to use the money in a way that would benefit both the company and Robert’s team, not only in terms of accelerating the company’s growth, but also in terms of getting the oppotunities of team promoted, working abroad, etc. Kay was willing to sit down with Robert to talk through the new project and achieve a win-win partnership.

What aspect of interpersonal communication is contributing to the poor working environment? How is this demonstrated in the case?

There are four basic elements of interpersonal communication: verbal, listening, written and non-verbal communication. In this case, I found that Robert’s refusal to accept Kay’s invitation to negotiate and his refusal to communicate when Kay presented her ideas was a sign of a lack of effective listening; Robert was focused on his own interests and those of his team at the expense of the long-term development of the company. Perhaps Robert would have changed his mind if he had sat down with Kay and listened to her views on the project to expand the company and its business.

Using Hall’s context model (high and low context culture), describe one of the characters’ behaviour.

Through Kay’s desire to have a business conversation with Robert I can see that Kay is in a high-context culture mode and that Kay is thinking about the company as a whole and wants to work with Robert to negotiate a way of spending the money that will benefit both the company and the employees (Robert’s team). The fact that Kay has formally invited Robert for a business conversation shows the importance Kay places on how the funds are allocated and her respect for Robert’s ideas. This is a sign of collectivism.

Refernce

Manager, J.R.S.C.B.M. (2022) Interpersonal communication: How to improve it and why it is a must-have business skill, Beekeeper. Available at: https://www.beekeeper.io/blog/interpersonal-communication/ (Accessed: February 4, 2023).
Dupeyroux, C. (2023) 5 tips to improve interpersonal communication in 2023, Sociabble. Available at: https://www.sociabble.com/blog/employee-communications/what-is-interpersonal-communication/ (Accessed: February 4, 2023).

(no date) Hall_hofstede. Available at: https://stc.uws.edu.au/pwe/Assets/hall_hofstede.htm (Accessed: February 4, 2023).