Question

Case 3

You work for Salesforce, a large company specializing in customer management and success. Salesforce is proactive in their annual review process, seeking feedback in a 360 degree model, with supervisors, supervisees, and peers completing evaluations for each member of the department. You are the team lead for a team of 5 members. You are responsible to evaluate your five team members and collect peer evaluative information from your five team members. After reviewing the evaluations and data, you meet with each team member individually to discuss their evaluation, provide feedback, and create a plan to help the individual achieve their goals and the company’s expectations.

Of your team of five, four identify as men (Tom, George, Jeff, and Bill) and one identifies as a woman (Meredith). You note when reviewing the feedback that there are significant differences in the peer evaluative feedback for Meredith, the only female team member, from the male team members. Specifically, quotes from the peer evaluation include:
Meredith often keeps to herself, not engaging in socializing at work and never joining our team for after work drinks. If she wants to be successful at this company, she cannot expect just to ‘punch in and out’.
When Meredith presents her ideas, she comes across aggressively, inserting her opinions without seeking input from the group.
Meredith is organized and efficient. When we assign her tasks, she gets them done quickly, but often has an attitude about doing the work.
Meredith is a great team member. She certainly has the skills and knowledge to continue in this role for her career and it will have great flexibility when she has kids and can’t work full time.

From Meredith’s self-evaluation, she notes that she feels disconnected with the team as the only female. Her team members have inside jokes based on their after work socializing, seem dismissive of her ideas, and she feels that she is often accepting administrative tasks on the part of the team, such as note taking and organizing, rather than lead roles.

Meredith discussed her goals of moving up within the Salesforce organization with a goal of being an executive. She is currently in an MBA program with a concentration in leadership. She is frustrated in her current role given the lack of connection with her team members as well as the perceived inability to prove herself as a competent member of the team with leadership potential.

Case Questions:
What will your leadership style approach be to Meredith? Why?
What will your initial talking points be as you prepare for your individual meeting with Meredith?
What resources or advice will you recommend to Meredith as she seeks a leadership role within the company?
What gender stereotypes or assumptions do you hear in the peer evaluative comments? What can you do to support Meredith and your team?
What will you do now that you better understand the dynamics of your team? In what ways can you intentionally build your team? Consider Tuckman’s Model of Group Dynamics.

Answer 1

Q) What will your leadership style approach be to Meredith? Why?

Ans: My leadership style approach to Meredith would be behavioral way. I would choose behavioral leadership approach because it helps me in understanding the problem and further motivate Meredith to participate in group activities. I would also follow laissez faire leadership style to allow Meredith to work more actively on tasks given and be more productive. Trait based behavioral leadership would allow me in finding out behavioral differences that are stopping Meredith to interact with the group and participate actively in group activities.

Q) What will your initial talking points be as you prepare for your individual meeting with Meredith?

Ans: My initial talking points for preparing for an individual meeting with Meredith are:

• Understand the career goals and objectives of Meredith
• Explain what are the traits needed for achieving career enhancement for Meredith
• Analyze the behavioral differences that are inhibiting Meredith to interact with other persons and participate in group activities
• Motivate Meredith in collaborating with group while talking decisions and implementing them
• Elaborate Meredith regarding the traits and skills that are required for proving herself as competent member with great leadership potential
• Provide suitable career growth plan for Meredith and ask her to self-evaluate based on improvement achieved from time to time

Q) What resources or advice will you recommend to Meredith as she seeks a leadership role within the company?

Ans: I would recommend Meredith the following sources to seek a leadership role within the company:

• Leadership enhancement certification courses
• Group activities to build relationship with team members
• Conflict resolving ability

I would advise Meredith to inculcate the following habits to seek a leadership role

• Diversity of thought which can be achieved by interacting more with team members
• Trust from top level management based on capabilities to finish the tasks
• Expert advises, think tank perspectives on leadership abilities
• Knowledge and learnings from failure
• Judgement of tasks that are performed and instincts
• Inculcate wisdom that is inherent

Q) What gender stereotypes or assumptions do you hear in the peer evaluative comments? What can you do to support Meredith and your team?

Ans: The gender stereotypes I can hear in the peer evaluative comments are:

• Can’t mingle well
• Not social
• Unable to involve in decision making
• No flexibility in work hours

I can suggest the following activities to support Meredith and my team:

• Behavioral building activities
• Group activities which include all genders
• Simulation programs to make both genders work together

Q) What will you do now that you better understand the dynamics of your team? In what ways can you intentionally build your team? Consider Tuckman’s Model of Group Dynamics.

Ans: I would create a model based on Tuckman’s model of Group dynamics which help in understanding the group well and perform well as a team.

• Form the team and assign tasks to each individual which can be performed both individually and in groups
• Storming the team by taking individual feedback from all employees and asking them to provide pros and cons of other team members
• Call for individual one on one discussions with all the team members and explain them how goal can be achieved and the points of improvement based on peer experiences
• Timely review meetings and discuss with team members how the improvement is seen and ask their further action plan
• Success meet after completion of task or job and ask every individual feedback on their experiences with each team member and evaluating both feedbacks before task initiation and after task completion

I would intentionally build a team where there are few who are star performers, few who are motivational, few who have strong traits of a leader, few who can delegate the work, few who cab communicate well