Reference no: EM132202564

Mary Jones was the new manager of the Malden branch of Central City Bank. When Mary arrived at the Malden branch office, it was experiencing low morale and low productivity. One of the difficulties was that the Malden branch office served an informal training center for all young new Central City Bank managers. This meant that once the new managers became competent and good at managing, they left the Malden branch office to be managers at other Central City branch offices and another group of new, inexperienced managers came in to the Malden branch office be trained. This practice was demoralizing to the employees (tellers and other staff members) because they felt that they spent all their time training others with no rewards for them. During her first few weeks on the job, Mary got to know her employees at the Malden branch quite well. She reviewed each employee’s performance records and spoke to each about their career aspirations. She learned that some employees had no career aspirations while others were eager to “advance and go somewhere in the organization.” She also learned that some employees were “discouraged” and no longer motivated because they felt that their time and effort in helping to train new managers was not recognized or valued. When Mary finished interviewing the employees, she searched for a “unique” vision that would serve both the Malden branch office and enable it to provide better customer service—and at the same time motivate and reward the Malden branch tellers and staff for all their hard work training new Central City Bank managers. She came up with the following vision: “Our Malden branch bank will be the best at developing managerial talent for Central City Bank and, at the same time, be the best at offering quality customer care service.” From this vision, Mary implemented a number of programs to meet her strategic vision. First, she met with the Central City Bank’s central training department and negotiated space for her Malden branch employees who wanted to acquire additional skills for advancement. Next, she spoke with the Central City Bank HR department and convinced them to inform her about job openings that employees in her Malden branch office might be interested in and qualified for. She also built in reward systems into the appraisal process so that those employees who did not want to advance or change jobs would still be acknowledged and rewarded for their contributions to training new managers. She also instituted cross-training to provide greater customer service efficiency. Mary’s vision for the branch office and the changes she implemented were widely accepted. Employees felt motivated to work even harder, there was much more job satisfaction, and morale increased. Employees felt proud to be part of the Malden branch and proud of helping Central City Bank develop good managers. Many employees came to admire Mary. She inspired them and served as a role model. Some of the employees who had been at the Malden branch bank the longest enrolled in the training classes, learned new skills, and applied for and received higher positions in other Central City Bank offices. The enthusiasm and new team spirit carried over into the treatment of customers which resulted in even faster and better customer service. In fact, the Malden branch office won the Central City Bank award for the best branch office of the year.

Question 1: Where do we place Mary on Marc Leyland's Managerial Grid?