The Management Training Tool Kit

143

American Management Association / www.amanet.org

Case 29: A “No” in the Field

Case Discussion:

A “No” in the Field

Summary

Marjorie Brown supervised fi ve administrative assistants in a transportation and housing services

nonprofi t organization. One of her employees was Valerie Lucas, a long-time employee with the

organization. For the past few years, Valerie had been a marginal employee and often involved

in various disciplinary proceedings. She would continually come to work late and argued with

employees. She did an acceptable, but seldom outstanding, job.

On this day, some problems with bus scheduling required Marjorie to ask for Valerie’s help. It

was shortly before lunch, but there were a number of clients waiting for this problem to be ...