Treadway Case Essay Example

Treadway Case Essay Example Treadway Case Paper Treadway Case Paper The Treadway Tire Company Brief Case Analysis Consuela Jack EDD 8100 Foundations of Educational Leadership and Management 101 Laurel Springs Dr. McDonough, GA 30253 Telephone: (404) 944-1186 Email: [emailprotected] net Instructor: Dan Wait, Ed. D Introduction The Treadway Tire Company: Job Dissatisfaction and High Turnover at the Lima Tire Plant is a brief case written by co-authors Skinner and Beckham. The case generally pertains to issues dealing with morale problems and high position turnover among those that hold the position of foreman. In this case, Ashley Wall is the Director of Human Resources charged with finding solutions to the issues within the Lima Tire Plant. Since Ashley Wall works for the Lima Tire Plant, she will have to face some political issues in regards to managing the action research project as an insider. A written replication of the key issues, contextual lens, and power relationships will offer more understanding of Ashley Wall’s charge to uncover solutions to the issues that the Lima Tire Company was facing. Key Issues There are several issues within the Treadway Lima Tire plant. The first issue deals with the morale of the employees especially those that serve as foremen. Morale is low due to the way the foremen are treated by their superiors and the lack of respect that they receive from their unionized workers. â€Å"An employee satisfaction survey conducted in August 2007 and exit interviews of departing foremen revealed solid discontent in the plant and highlighted concerns about the line-foremen position† (Skinner and Beckham, 2008, pg. 4). The foremen in the company are few in number with approximately twenty hourly unionized employees that they have to manage, as well as other duties as prescribed. Both foreman and the hourly employees are treated disrespectfully due to the constraints of the perspective positions. The foremen have a great deal of responsibilities that must be completed at the end of every 12 hour shift that they work. Production of tires is a key responsibility for the foreman; they must make sure that the employees working under their management are on time and present to make production goals/deadlines. Another issue combines hiring and the lack of training that the foremen receive before being internally promoted, externally hired, or transferred from another Treadway Tire plant into the positions of foremen. Those that are unionized hourly employees promoted to foreman lack college training and job embedded training. The line-foremen positions were â€Å"available when jobs were posted on the bulletin boards in the plant and the internet† (2008, pg. 5). The external hires are young college grads with book knowledge, but very little skill training. Both internally hired and externally hired are made to go through strenuous and grueling interviews before being deemed the right person(s) for the job. The fact that little training is offered and a sink or swim mentality is maintained by those that supervise the foremen leads to more communication issues. The communication issues caused ineffective and belittling discourse between the general supervisors and the foremen and the unionized workers. Contextual Lens Economic factors play a major role in the issues that Lima Tire Plant faces, but growth, change, performance, and training holds to a greater cause for the issues addressed. The temporal perspective is the direction Ashley Wall may want to focus on when she considers analyzing the issues of morale, hiring, and training. In reading the case, this seems to be the direction to go in, but budget constraints leave little or no room for effective on the job training to occur. â€Å"Reading through her personnel files, Ashley Wall knew the problem of turnover in the foreman position- affecting a third of the salaried work force- was a complicated issue for Lima management to address† (2008, pg. 6) Realizing that the plant was not effectively training new managers was a major cause of the conditions or issues within the plant. Power Relationships According to the Coghlan and Brannick (2010) text, â€Å"Clearly any form f research in any organization has its political dynamics. Political forces can undermine research endeavours and block planned change. Gaining access, using data, disseminating and publishing reports are intensely political acts† (pg. 127). Ashley Wall may have to use extreme caution as she plans the action research project of discovering a solution for dissatisfaction and high turnover in the company. There are ten key power relationship that Ashley Wall will have to consider as she proceeds on with the in depth inquiry process at the Lima Tire Plant. Since, Ashley Wall was given the charge to delve in to this process by the plant manager Bellingham, she has already gained her relationship with her sponsor. The relationships that will be more challenging throughout this process will be the relationships between the interdepartmental, executives and organizational members, and executives and higher management. All three of these relationships deal with company employees communicating with each other and that has been part of the issues. Will there be anonymity through out this process? It will be quite difficult, but Ashley will have to keep all stakeholders in this process aware of what is at stake for the future of the Lima Tire Plant. Gaps or Unanswered Questions An unanswered question that plagues is the fact that Bellingham knows that part of the major issue is that more effective training needs to take place, but because of budget issues he can not allow the training to take place. What is he truly thinking and how does Ashley Wall convince Bellingham to make a way in the budget for foremen training? Conclusion The central concerns, in the Lima Tire Plant stem from many different sources, which are all related. Effective communication, formal training, and economic factors all play a role in the key issues. Coghlan argues the question, â€Å"Given that doing insider research seems to be so complex and can be fraught with danger, wouldn’t it be better to advise people not to select this approach†¦Ã¢â‚¬  (2007, pg. 5). The answer, absolutely; action research in the case of the Lima Tire Plant will bring about collaboration of the manager/researcher and those directly impacted by the outcomes and reflections. References Coghlan, D (2007). Editorial: insider action research. Action Research, 5, 5-10. doi: 10. 1177/1476750307072872 Coghlan, D. , Brannick, T. (2010). Doing action research in your own organization (3rd ed. ). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. ISBN: 9781848602168. Skinner, W. , Beckham, B. (2008, June). The Treadway tire company: Job dissatisfaction and high turnover at the Lima tire plant. Retrieved from Harvard Business Publishing Web site: http://custom. hbsp. harvard. edu/b01/en/implicit/p. jhtml? login=CAPE042409Spid=2189