SITUATION
Alex Sander is a young and promising product manager in the Toiletries Division of Landon Care Products Inc. Over the past year, he has successfully rebranded two of Landon’s skin care products in the United States. Alex has created a winning enviornment at the Toiletries Division by applying very high standards to everyone, and often pushing his staff to the limits. A recent 360 degree review has revealed that Alex’s strong drive to succeed has come at a cost, as his staff are highly disenchanted by his iron-fisted ways. (Alex has since discounted the importance of the these findings.)

Sam Glass, Alex’s direct manager, is one of the three Product Group supervisors and is coordinating the 360 degree Performance/Feedback
Management has currently gathered opinions of Alex’s strengths and weaknesses from his superiors, peers and subordinates. What is outstanding is an agreed action plan with Alex on ways to reduce his weaknesses. The second area of managing performance is the provision of ongoing feedback (i.e. monitoring), which will help Alex improve at a faster rate. The third area of managing performance is coaching, an aspect which “follows from effective performance assessment, appraisal, and action plan for improvement.”

There are risks involved in managing Alex’s performance. If the process is performed skillfully and Alex takes it well, it will be a win-win situation. Alex will benefit personally and professionally by becoming less abrasive, while the firm will successfully lift staff morale from current levels. On the other hand, with reference to Conducting a Performance Appraisal Interview (Beer 1997, p.4), major conflicts can arise during performance appraisal interviews between Alex and his organisation as long as Alex seeks to receive important rewards from his hard work and wants to maintain his self-image. Firstly, Sam Glass might feel uncomfortable giving specific and negative feedback to Alex, as he probably has not received proper training to handle “interpersonally difficult situations that are likely to arise when feedback is negative”. This might result in a slipshod effort in communicating Alex’s flaws, and Alex might emerge from the appraisal