Zara Management Problem Analysis. Management Essay

Based on the issue analysis(attached), write about options that we could do and solutions to the problem, using different materials we learned in class(attached). Two main things included:
1. Alternatives (options, what should do? Evaluating options you consider.)
2. Solution (which alternatives you accept/reject? why?)

The following case is based on personal work experience in a ZARA store located on Broadway, New York. Names have been changed to respect the identity of those involved:

Kathy Taylor, General Manager - was known for her positive attitude and her ability to get along with people, however, in difficult situations, she showed a lack of problem-solving skills, a major obstacle to the team, which would become visible later on.

Jazmine Martinez, Assistant Manager/ team leader - for reasons that remained unknown to the team members, Jazmin was demoted from her ZARA Corporate position and had been working as an assistant manager/team leader for less than a year now.

The stockroom consisted of two teams complementing each others schedule, this case includes the team consisting of:

Erica Jones - stockroom team member; women’s department.

Christopher Brown - stockroom team member; women’s department.

Gina Rivera - stockroom team member; women’s department.

Simon Taylor - stockroom team member; women’s department.

Just like every other Monday morning in the stockroom women’s department, the team would get together for a brief twenty-minute meeting to discuss the week’s agenda. This morning was a little different as Kathy introduced to the team their new team leader Jazmine. Nevertheless, the meeting went as normal and shortly after the meeting was over everybody started working on their own tasks as usual. The team was very strong and the members liked each other as they had been working together for quite a while now. Gina and Christopher usually worked in the women’s clothing department, while Simon and Erica would work in the women’s shoe department. They had divided the sub-departments in this way informally and it worked out great. As the two sub-departments where right across each other the four members of the team would still interact with each other throughout the whole shift. While some good music was playing in the stockroom, Gina and Christopher started organizing clothes, still sipping on their morning coffees and having small talk. That was the favorite part of Gina’s experience when working as a stockroom associate. Jazmine approached them and told them that even though she does not have anything against the chit-chatting here and there, they should throw the coffees out as they could spill it on the clothes and ruin the fabric. Christopher with a smiley face told her that they had become professionals at this and not to worry about it. She told them that accidents can always happen and she prefers no drinks in the stockroom unless they are sealed. After she left Gina and Christopher both thought that she was rude but at the same time they didn’t think much of it and tried to understand her point and the stress she must be under as it was her first day in the stock room. In the next couple of weeks, Jazmine started implementing microscopic changes the effects of which became visible only when seen in retrospect.

One notable incident happened between Simon, Christopher, and Jazmine, while Erica and Gina had finished their shift just a few minutes ago and the stock room was tip top. The guys had to transport heavy boxes downstairs into the sales floor, at 2:00 AM they started to carry the big heavy boxes filled with clothing items to the elevator; three loads of four heavy boxes each load. The boxes were on the sales floor and the driver was on the way to come pick them up, to then transport them to another ZARA location. Jazmine came downstairs and opened one box and saw that the sections were mixed (trafaluc, women’s and basic-which are the three sections of the ZARA women’s brand). She told them that she did not authorize these boxes to be brought downstairs yet and that she wants everything to be brought back into the stock room and to be put into boxes divided by sections. The guys explained to her that even though they do divide the boxes by section always, during sales season this was not necessary and that the items belonged into the boxes all together as they were all sale items. They argued back and forth for a couple of minutes and when they realized that she was not going to change her mind they took the boxes back to the stockroom and started repacking. It was horror and it took forever since Gina and Erica were not there anymore. It was sales season the shifts were already long, on their way home Simon and Christopher were exhausted and outside it was cold. They arrived home around 5:00 AM that night.

Simon had enough and on his next shift told Jazmin that the previous team leader would hands-on help out as much as she could, while you never really help out in anything, only like to oversee and delegate us, making us feel uncomfortable and monitored in every step at work. In addition, he told her that she was unfair and the other night waited until the last minute to tell them that she wants the sales clothing packed into boxes by section. Jazmine simply responded that if they were smart enough they would not start packing without asking for instructions first. Simon did not respond back he simply couldn’t believe his ears, the atmosphere during the whole day turned dull, other than the music playing there was no chit chatting or any silly jokes being played among the team members and everyone seemed so relieved when the shift was over.

The next day Simon went on lunch break with Gina and told her, that he and Christopher talked to Kathy about the incident, and that he wasn’t happy about Kathy’s response, as she told him Jazmine probably did not mean any harm but simply wanted the job to be done in a certain way. To the comment that she labeled them as not smart enough Kathy did not give any particular reaction and pretended as if she didn’t hear Simon.

As time went on Jazmine showed favoritism toward Erica as they shared the same taste in shoes and would constantly check out the newest trends being shipped into the store every second Thursday of the month. This was the smallest problem to the team as they could care less,  however, Erica faced Jazmine and told her that she didn’t agree with her management style and hated to be micromanaged.  *mention an incident that happened between Erica and Jazmine changed her behavior toward Erica and started cutting her hours occasionally. 

Four-five months into Jazmine employment the team members started to dislike her so much that 80% of their lunch break discussions would consist of their current work situation. All four of the members agreed that they had experienced bullying from her in more than one occasion, and at this point it was crystal clear to the team members that Jazmine was a toxic manager, pushing them around verbally, micromanaging to the last detail she wanted to be in control over every decision and distrusted the team member’s capabilities to the extreme. They decided to escalate the issue to Kathy once again but this time as a team. The meeting happened but weeks and weeks went by after the meeting and no positive changes were occurring. 

Slowly but surely Jazmine’s behavior started to negatively affect employee performance. First, a drop in employee engagement became visible followed by an increase in absenteeism. In a conversation, Christopher revealed to his colleague Gina that the current work environment is affecting his emotional well-being, therefore he had been continuously looking for a new job in the last couple of weeks, he became the first one to leave the team. Christopher left the company in bad terms, as he told Kathy that before Jazmine got transferred to their location he enjoyed work and that ever since Jazmin started to work there everything changed for the worse. Christopher blamed Kathy for showing a lack of involvement, even though the team members had complained about the current situation several times. Gina however had been with the company for several years and was reluctant to quit as she was getting paid well and enjoyed the quietness of the stockroom, not having to directly interact with customers, however unbearable the situation was to her she continued working hard and was trying to remain patient in hopes that Kathy would finally take control over the situation. Erica started requesting days off frequently or being absent from work altogether, which was not typical for her. Having been with the team for a period of two years, her team members could sense the change in her behavior. Even on the days that she would be present at work she put minimum effort into completing her tasks, checking and posting instead on her social media. The team members started to feel irritated as they would have to finish her tasks on top of their own workload. Not having yet found a replacement for Christopher, Erica’s behavior led to conflict arising between team members, especially in between Gina and Erica. Simon made it clear to the team that he was not going to take on anyone else's workload any longer, yet he was trying to keep engaged with his own tasks at least and would spend much time furiously trying to confront Jazmin, unsuccessfully. Gina felt as if she had no choice other than to take over all the workload and started to experience burnout signs. The team was in a hopeless situation and every other day at work seemed like another dreadful never-ending day.

Stress 

Role Conflict as a Stressor (Kahn)

Types of Role Conflict

1.      Intra-Sender: contradictory pressure from one person (boss wants you to work on 2 projects at the same time)

2.      Intra-Sender: contradictory pressure from two or more people

3.      Inter-Role: occupy many roles in life and sometimes conflict with each other (student+daughter)

4.      Person-Role: conflict between personal need and values vs. demand of jobs (boss tells you to sell drugs)

The Balancing act-at work and at home

By Quick, Henley, Quick

Work-Home-Self (3 circles overlap)

Effects of Work-Family Conflict

1.      On Self

●       Low job satisfaction & Low life satisfaction

●       Psychological distress & Negative health consequence

●       Depression & Alcohol use

●       Low organizational commitment

●       Intention to quit & Turnover

2.      On Family

●       Family performance suffers & Low marital satisfaction

●       Divorce & Family Strife

●       Work family conflict experienced by partner (dual career couples)

●       Parenting problems

●       Juvenile delinquency & violence

●       Resentment by children toward parent

3.      On Organization 

●       Low job satisfaction

●       Low career satisfaction

●       Low performance & Absenteeism

●       Cost of replacing worker & Health care costs

Types of Work-Family Conflict

1.      Time based conflict

●       Consistently stays late at the office

●       Physically present with the family but mentally preoccupied with work

2.      Strain based conflict

●       strain from participation in one role makes a difficult to fulfill requirements of another

3.      Behavior based conflict

●       behaviors that are acceptable in the work domain are incompatible with the home domain

Sources of Work-Family Conflict

1.      Home demands

●       Maintaining the home

●       Child care

2.      Work demands

●       Role ambiguity & overload

●       Career & family stage

3.      Self imposed demands

●       Over achievement & workaholic

Amplifying the conflict

1.      Alcohol and other substances

2.      Sleep disturbances

3.      Travel

4.      Toxic corporate cultures

5.      Email paradox

Balancing Work and Family

I.                    Within the workplace 

1.      Time management

A.      Setting clear and reasonable

B.      Negotiating travel demands and meeting obligations

C.      Delegation of assignments when feasible

2.      Boundary Management

A.      Segmentation

B.      Integration

3.      Choosing career paths and job assignments with flexibility and autonomy

II.                  Within the Family 

1.      Support from spouse

2.      Communication within the family

3.      Spending quality time with the family

III.                Self Management 

1.      Self imposed expectations

2.      Reactions to role demands

A.      Seek support at work a& home

B.      Communication of individual needs

Organizational Actions to Reduce Work-Family Conflict

1.      Realistic Job Previews & Selection & training

2.      Employee Assistance Programs (EAP)

3.      Fitness and Wellness Programs & Offer on-site personal services

4.      Create a supportive climate

5.      Be sensitive to other role demands

6.      Job redesign & Sabbaticals

7.      Family friendly policies

Motivating Workers 

Hull’s Drive Theory (1943)

Motivation to

Satisfy Drive   

                                       Time

Hull (1952) – added acquired

Drives: fear & anxiety

Fear of Failure -> Fear of Success (more responsibility, expectations are higher)

Other Motivators

Competence Motive (White, 1959)

Affection Motive: someone care about you (Paternalism)

Need for Play (Roy) -> invented game to play

Activism Motive: excitement

Thanatos: death wise

McClelland’s Theory of Needs

1.      Need for Power: desire to control or attain superiority over others

Top Sales Managers       Bottle Sales Managers

80% high and low            10% high and low

Two faces of power

●       Positive (socialized power)

●       Negative (personal power)

2.      Need for Affiliation: desire to establish and maintain friendly relationships

The Urge to Achieve by McClelland (1966)

●       Desire to perform challenging tasks well

Need for Achievement 

●       Personal responsibility for outcomes

●       Moderate risk taking

●       Desires immediate feedback

●       Satisfaction from accomplishment

●       Preoccupation with the task

●       Excels in competitive situations

Thematic Apperception Test (TAT) -> helps determine whether you are driven by power, achievement, or affiliation

The Motivation Process

Motivation: A diagnostic Approach By Nadler & Lawler

Assumptions about the causes of behavior in organizations

1.      Behavior is determined by a combination of forces in the individual and forces in the environment

2.      People make decisions about their own behavior in organizations

A.      Membership behavior

B.      Amount of effort

3.      Different people have different types of needs, desires, and goals

4.      People make decisions among alternative plans of behavior based on their perceptions (expectancies) of the degree to which a given behavior will lead to desired outcomes

Expectancy Theory

A person’s motivation is a function of:

a.      Effort to performance expectancies

b.      Performance to outcome expectancies

c.       Perceived valence of outcomes

Implications for Managers

1.      Figure out what outcomes each employee values

2.      Determine what kinds of behavior you desire

3.      Make sure desired levels of performance are reachable

4.      Link desired outcomes to desired performances

5.      Analyze the total situation for conflicting expectancies

6.      Make sure changes in outcomes are large enough

7.      Check the system for its equity

8.      Improve the ability to perform the job

9.      Improve the effort performance expectancy

Inner Work Life: Understanding the subtext if Business Performance By Amabile & Kramer (2007)

Inner work Life: “…the emotions, perceptions, ad motivations that people experience as they react to and make sense of the events of their workdays…”

Inner Work Life Affects:

1.      Creativity

2.      Productivity

3.      Commitment

4.      Collegiality

High Performers have:

1.      More positive emotions

2.      Stronger intrinsic motivation

3.      More favorable perceptions of:

A.      Work

B.      Their team, leaders, organizations

Managerial actions to improve inner work life

1.      Enable progress

A.      Provide direct help

B.      Provide adequate resources and time

C.      React to successes and failures with a learning orientation (versus purely evaluative)

D.     Set clear goals (where the work is heading and why it matters)

2.      Manage with a human touch

A.      Praise when appropriate

B.      Work collaboratively with a subordinate as a peer

C.      Make things fun and relaxing

D.     Provide emotional support

On the folly of Rewarding A, while hoping for B By Kerr (1995)

Organizations reward undesired behavior and discourage desired behavior 

Causes

1.      Fascination with an “objective” criterion

2.      Overemphasis on highly visible behaviors

3.      Hypocrisy

4.      Emphasis on morality or equality rather than efficiency

Remedies

1.      Selection

2.      Training

3.      After the reward system