Career Crisis

Thomas Green’s position in the company is currently not optimistic. His relationship with Frank and Shannon is definitely less than ideal to say the least. Thomas does not agree with several items Frank tried to enforce upon him during their one-on-ones. Thomas has also projected his negative impression of Frank verbally in front of the team. After the initial meeting with Frank and the antagonizing emails to Shannon, Frank and Thomas’ relationship seemed to have reached the bottom. The disagreements between Frank and Thomas can be attributed to two major factors in their behavior. Both individuals’ approach to the situation are different as two of them currently fall into different quadrants of the matrix illustrating different behaviors to job dissatisfaction (Figure 1). Frank is not happy with what Thomas delivered and he has decided to discuss with Thomas in person, follows-up and then resorted into reporting to upper management. Thomas on the other hand, is more passive and seem to be committed in living in his world and keeping on doing things his own way. He has not reached out to anyone to try to change the problematic situation at hand.

Considering Thomas and Frank’s background, they are from different generations and their work style and approach on problem-solving differ greatly. The expectation Frank has on Greene and vice versa have contributed to the problematic situation right now. The baby-boomer generation which Davis belongs to is accustomed to handling things in organized controllable manner. Frank expects a controlled work environment where order can be maintained. Through orderliness, Frank can then pursue job satisfaction. The lack of order after Thomas’ arrival greatly affect Frank’s job satisfaction and management style. The generation Y in which Greene belongs to lives a fast-paced life and embraces diversity. This can be seen from Thomas’ last minute change to his itinerary when he left Orlando a day earlier than scheduled. In order to bridge this generation gap, Thomas and Frank need to work together to come up with a mutually agreed work-style that can satisfy both needs. They need to identify the level of details and order both can achieve to keep Frank happy while maintaining enough freedom and flexibility to keep Thomas motivated too.