You are a supervisor in Elegant Garments Manufacturing . Employees have fallen i
ID: 324907 • Letter: Y
Question
You are a supervisor in Elegant Garments Manufacturing. Employees have fallen into the habit of
coming to work, signing in and then going to breakfast, at least ½ to ¾ of an hour is lost per
employee. Most of the employees get to work by public transportation and do not have time to
get breakfast before leaving home. As supervisors you are all under a good deal of pressure
from the business owners to do something about it. Privately you all acknowledged the
organization has a real problem, but in fact nothing has been done about it.
Rather, you all schedule yourselves in your offices during the first hour of the day, under the
guise of using that hour for planning the next day’s work. Each supervisor intuitively sensed
that to take action would be unpopular, and would bring criticism from both supervisory
colleagues and from employees for trying to win points with management.
The situation is further complicated by the fact that some employees have work-related
justification for being away from their primary work area and in contact with employees
in different sections.
Fifteen supervisors report to three managers. A group of you get together and decided to
look at the problem, as morale seems to be affected and production figures are beginning to
dip and that might affect
the annual bonus payment plan.
Instructions:
prepare a plan to correct the issue. The plan should include an agenda for the meeting with EITHER the employees or the supervisors, and consider how to respond to three questions and objections attendees might pose
Explanation / Answer
Deliverables: Draft a corrective course of action for employees taking long breaks for breakfast.
The first step in solving the issue is identifying the problem which is causing the dip in production which has been already in this case.
There need to be two sets of meeting for addressing the issue :
Discussion Point and Agenda for Supervisor Meeting
Agenda for Employee Meeting
Questions which might be raised in the meetings are:-
Why does the company want to monitor break as it would lead to lack of freedom?
Answer – Legitimate breaks would not be questioned and habitual offenders would be penalized.
How would the new system affect them monetarily and their appraisal rating?
Answer – There would be no changes in the existing structure and people who meet targets would be paid salary and bonus accordingly.
How will the company provide breakfast in the office?
Answer – A separate cafeteria for breakfast would be provided and a card with a specified limit for standard food would be provided to each employee.
After the changes are accepted after the meeting the Kurt Lewin Method of UnFreeze - Change - Freeze should be adopted to make sure that the change is effective and gives the desired result.
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