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Chet Craig is the Central Plant Manager of the Norris Company. He started as an expediter in the company's eastern plant and was quickly promoted to Production Supervisor in three years. After two years, he was promoted to Assistant to the Manager of the Eastern Plant. Five years later, Chet was transferred to the central plant as an Assistant, and after one month, was promoted to his current position.

Chet is an outgoing, friendly person who genuinely wants to do well in his job. He has many creative projects he is passionate about implementing. However, it appears Chet does not have enough time to attend to his own responsibilities. He is constantly attending to his subordinates, answering phone calls, and making decisions for other people. He has no time to devote to his own projects, and is being questioned by his superiors about the status of the projects which should be underway already.

After a typical day at work, Chet is questioning himself as an efficient executive. He has been busy all day, but has not accomplished anything significant. He performed his daily routine but all the projects he has been enthusiastically thinking about are no where close to being accomplished. As well, he feels that he is depriving his family and church of the time he should be devoting to them, he does not have time for recreation, and he is far from attaining his personal objectives.

Issues

It appears that Chet is afraid to lose control, which results in him taking a long time to tour the plant. During the daily tours, he should just be checking with the supervisors that everything is up and running - not get involved in deep conversations and attend to the small tasks that the employees are responsible for.

Chet is a legitimate and informal leader - his subordinates respect him and he helps them to solve problems. He retains control by knowing everything that is going on, which results in him mismanaging his time. Chet influences his subordinates through identification - he has charisma and he is popular among his peers. His leadership style is high task concern with high people concern. But the more a leader strives for popularity, the less effective he becomes as a task concern leader.

It appears that Chet wants to be friends with his subordinates, which results in him being less effective at accomplishing his tasks. Chet must learn to share his control by learning to trust his subordinates to make their own decisions. He must learn to manage his time effectively so he can get more of his own work completed in the workday.

What is Chet's job, as a manager? What should he be doing? What shouldn't he be doing?

As the Plant Manager, Chet's job description includes overseeing day to day operations, optimizing profitability of the plant, directing and coordinating production, analyzing and monitoring quality standards, ensuring the plant runs efficiently, and handling all the financial duties of the plant. Chet is also responsible for generating and implementing creative projects that will assist the plant to become cost-efficient and profitable, and conduct daily tours of the plant to ensure every department is operating efficiently.

As the manager, Chet should be accomplishing all his duties under his job description, as well as reporting to his superiors, reviewing production reports, and attending conferences with the executives of the company. However, Chet is doing much more than what is required of him; being highly interactive with all his subordinates and getting involved with their personal lives by having "heart to heart" conservations prevents Chet from accomplishing his duties. The employees in his plant are not empowered - everyone needs assurance from Chet for every decision that needs to be made, from the colour of dye to order to finding temporary storage space for a carload shipment.

Chet does not follow a clear, daily schedule; therefore he often gets caught up with all the small duties with his subordinates. Chet's unwillingness to say "no" to his subordinates results in overloading his work schedule. The concern is that Chet does not seem to mind; he wants to be there to reassure and assess every activity that is going on, yet he knows in the back of his mind that he has other, more important tasks to attend to.

Chet must manage his time more efficiently and have a detailed schedule every day that he must stick to. We also recommend Chet to implement "thinking time" by closing his office door, rescheduling drop in visitors, and asking Marilyn to hold his phone calls. More efficient time management would also mean not be touring the plant as frequently and be less available to his employees. This gives Chet time to work on his own projects without interruptions and having to constantly deal with every one else's concerns.

He must empower his staff to make their own decisions and feel comfortable without constant reassurance. Empowering the employees means training them to have the proper skill set, ensuring they feel confident in their work, and holding them accountable for accomplishing their duties. As well, proper task delegation to his subordinates will decrease the amount of time Chet spends attending to all the small tasks and answering simple questions. This will lead to higher, overall productivity.

What could the HR department do to improve Chet's effectiveness as a manager? What could be done to improve the effectiveness of the plant?

The Human Resources Department can become Chet's strategic partner by helping him to become an effective manager. The HR department must ensure all new hires fully understand their job descriptions, their tasks, and who to report to. All the current employees seem confused of what their responsibilities are and are completely reliant on Chet to make all the decisions. To solve this problem, Chet must implement workshops to redefine their job descriptions to ensure all employees understand their role and feel empowered in their positions. In addition, enforced, formal organizational procedures and rules, and personal communication with subordinates will increase the plant's effectiveness and productivity.

The HR Department and Chet must work together to demonstrate to the employees they are appreciated and how their work is assisting the company to become more profitable. When people feel a part of the change, they are more likely to continue the good work. We also recommend semi-annual performance appraisals after the change is implemented and have HR and Chet give constructive