You are the Director of a large information management division at your company. Your staff consists of a Manager of Inventory Systems and a Manager of Order Processing Systems as well as a team administrators and programmers. You report directly to the VP of Operational Technology.

 

Your department is nearly three quarters of the way through the most important project you have been given since taking your post. Your division has been charged with creating an in-house system to replace the model you currently use, which is hosted on the server of a vendor. Recreating the system to include what your company needs without losing the current system capabilities is crucial.  Your entire department is spending at least a quarter of their time dedicated to this project.

As part of your expanding product lineup the company has begun to offer software solutions for products that have traditionally been available as hard goods. You were able to keep the costs down but now realize that the amount of support being given to customers has become quite costly.

Sean holds an important position in a your very busy office. He supervises a staff of approximately 30 employees who do a variety of things including some frontline service, phone support, records management, and others. Your office works with sensitive data that needs to be protected for legal compliance, and a smooth workflow between employees makes it all possible.  Making sure work gets done efficiently and records make it to their destinations is a key of the department, and thus everyone’s jobs.

Your fiscal year is coming to an end. Last year around this time you challenged your workforce to implement several new programs, step up their measurable service rating through increased positive responses in client surveys, and provided three tiers of goals to measure fiscal success.

You've just attended an eye opening seminar regarding the damaging effects of workplace bullying. The statistics shocked you. There was clear information regarding the effect on morale, productivity, and your business unit's bottom line. During the event, you could begin to feel a lump develop in your throat, as a supervisor of several employees in your department seemed to take shape in your mind as the perfect description of what an office bully looked like was laid out.