Wendy Peterson Case Analysis

Wendy Peterson Case Analysis

Problem Statement:

Wendy Peterson, a very confident and educated woman, moved up in her company, AccountBack, quickly after graduating from college. She had a very strong and motivated personality. Peterson was placed in a leadership position as the vice president of sales, and was in charge account service teams. Her teams ranged from experienced AccountBack sales people to new hires with very little hands-on experience. Peterson conducted annual reviews with her team members. After feedback from her team members and annual reviews she conducts, Wendy found herself questioning her leadership skills, relationships with her team and the performance of certain team members, specifically Fred Wu.

Hypothesis 1: Wendy Peterson has different VABEs than her sales team, especially Fred Wu.

VABEs are described as a “personal set of values, assumptions, beliefs and expectations about the way the world should be” (Clawson 2001 pg. 11). Peterson’s team came from all types of backgrounds. “While four of the sales executives were AccountBack veterans, the others had been hiring within the last two years. Most had grown up in Houston or Dallas and attended private colleges in Texas or on the West Coast” (Hill 2013 pg.4). Peterson came from a similar background attending an ivy league school. However, she was the youngest vice president of sales that location ever had. She received some positive feedback from the team when she first started.

Even though she was much younger than the rest of her team that she led, her team members appreciated her initiatives to strengthen the team culture and performance. It took her team awhile to get used to get her personality and new initiatives in the office. However, other team members were not so open to them. One direct report stated, “Some of my colleagues felt, like I did, that Peterson was overzealous. Personally, I disliked her hands-on approach....One of my colleagues, an AccountBack ‘veteran,’ resisted her coaching and asked some touch questions our her initiatives. Peterson terminated him…” (pg. 4). The conflicting views caused the loss of a successful team member and a large client. However, this allowed for a new sale position on Peterson’s team, which later lead to the hiring of Fred Wu, who was perfect for her current goal of developing the Chinese Market.

Wu was older than Peterson, was born and raised in China where he attended school. He opened a successful printing company, later selling it. His printing company offered him many connections in China. Peterson was more concerned about receiving his connections than his lack of software sales experience. She was not able to connect with Wu from the beginning and had an uncomfortable relationship, even after his annual review.

Hypothesis 2: Wendy Peterson struggles with creating a strong team culture due to a difference in experience, age and VABEs.

Culture varies for each person and each organization. Every person has a different definition in their head. Clayton Christensen describes culture as: “observed behavioral regularities that occur when people interact, the norms that evolve in close working groups, the dominant values espoused by an organization, the philosophy that guides an organization’s policy toward employees and customers, the rules for getting along with other people in the organization, and the feeling or climate of a particular organization” (2006 pg.1). As we can see, the definition of culture is ever changing. AccountBack’s founders created a strong culture when it was opened in 1988. They had a culture where the founders “believed that a flat organization structure and collegial culture would minimize office politics, strengthen employee morale, and heighten company performance” (Hill 2013 pg. 2). Before being vice president of sales, Peterson was a junior-level sales executive and started to mold her own culture at the company.

She realized that her team was very disengaged and focused on changing the culture. She started by creating a volunteer mentoring program and then later added even more direction. Peterson stated, “I believe that changing the culture - by making my team closer and the office more collegial – would boost productivity and revenues” (2013 pg. 3). As mentioned earlier, Peterson’s team consisted of four experienced sales executives and others who had been hired within the last two years. She was determined to update the culture and motivate her team.

Hypothesis 3: Wendy Peterson struggles with task and relationship conflicts with one of her team members, Fred Wu.

Leaders try to avoid work conflicts; however, they seem to pop up occasionally. Edmondson and Smith touch on these topics in their Too Hot to Handle? How to Manage Relationship Conflict article. They state, “Task conflict is conceptualized as differences in opinion relating to work or business decisions, while relationship conflict pertains to personality differences and interpersonal tensions” (Edmondson 2006 pg. 6). As leaders learn more about their team members and their VABEs possible conflicts may arise; this is starting to show with Wendy Peterson and her newest team member, Fred Wu.

Hill’s case study starts with an introduction of Peterson conducting Wu’s annual review. He was a very strong team player and had many accomplishments, however Peterson was struggling to connect with him. “Wu’s review ended uncomfortably. Though, they’d worked together for a year, Peterson struggled to bridge the distance between Wu and herself” (Hill 2013 pg. 1). During the review, she stated her concerns and reminded him of where his focus should be at work. She was worried that he was spending too much time managing a client (which was not his job) instead of bringing in new business. He replied to her very confidently, that his Chinese connections were about to pay off and he was going to be the most successful sales executive, requiring him to need a personal assistant. This surprised Peterson because only senior executives had their own assistants. However, she told him she would consider his request.

After the uncomfortable review, Wu told Peterson that he received a competitive offer at another company, who approved his request for an assistant. She left questioning herself and his other opportunity. Was this issue unable to be solved at AccountBack and she would have to let him go? Or would see figure out a way to fit another assistant into the yearly budget? How will she overcome this conflict? Could she have received this kind of feedback sooner in the year before he received another offer? Peterson needed to think hard about her final decision.

It is also possible that Wu might be suffering from the paradox of excellence that might be causing a conflict between Peterson and himself. He is a high achiever and has been very successful. It seems like he does not want to budge and have his tasks match Peterson’s expectations. He is following his own road to success. Peterson will have to take this into account when completing his annual reviews if he decides to stay with the company.

Recommendations:

- Peterson, as a young leader,