Lisa Benton Case Summary

In my opinion, the Lisa Benton case study is really not that important (sorry).
The major point is boss-subordinate relationships and, by extensions, interpersonal
relationships period. Regardless, the story is kind of interesting (and not because it
was the only case study in which major characters were more than likely getting it
on). The summary is as follows: while Lisa Benton she attended Harvard Business
School, worked as the first female manager for Right-Away stores, a company
where she won accolades for her roll-up-your sleeves approach and charmed the
president, Scott Kingston, so much that he offered her a full-time job at RightAway stores after she graduated. However, she was also offered a job at
Houseworlds Care Division, appealing because of its classical and famous
excellent marketing training. She chose to turn down the higher salary and a bigger
position partly because of her worries of taking on too much responsibility and
partly because of Right-Aways rundown warehouse and lack of other female
manager and, instead, joined Houseworld. At Houseworld, she was charmed by the
friendly and professional people she met initially but ended up under Deborah
Linton, who immediately made it clear she was biased against Harvard MBAs. The
friendly people she had met didnt remember her name, she felt the reception from
her boss was cool and disinterested, and, to make matters worse, her Associate
Product Manager, Ron Scoville, was condescending. She was also working on a
product, Pure & Fresh, she felt was unnecessary. What follows in the case study is
a series of run-ins and experiences with Scoville and Linton, where pretty much
each time Benton feels overshadowed, overwhelmed, and unwanted. This leads to
the end of the case study, where she considers calling back Right-Away Stores
President Kingston and telling she made a mistake.
The point of the whole case is, ultimately, the personalities. Linton, Bentons
boss, obviously has an inferiority complex. She never understands Benton and is
definitely inexperienced in managing people. She seems overwhelmed,
overworked, and may or may not (Im voted definitely) is doing the hanky-panky
with Scoville. Scoville, Bentons coworker, is even less of a people person. Hes
difficult to work with and, unlike Linton, has what could best be called a
superiority complex. His ego, frustration with not being promoted, and bizarre
misfit status at the company comes together to annoy (and confuse) the heck out of
Benton. Finally, Benton herself seems to have a clip on her shoulder. She has
higher expectations for the job than she should have had and clearly has trouble

asserting herself. She never conveys her potential and is overtly defensive. Finally,
she also seems like shes trying too hard to please people and be liked by them.
In the end (though not in the case study), Scoville and Linton ended up leaving
and Benton got the position of Product Manager a full 9 months earlier than is
usual. She had the potential, then. So? It would have been best if she had managed
upward, assuming responsibility for her own career and development. She should
probably have handled Linton differently, understand what she wanted, what
pressures existed, and what the stakes were. Ultimately, a boss is in many ways
dependent on his or her subordinate- for the knowledge he/she delivers, as a source
of information, and as a sounding board. If the subordinate realizes his or her
sources of power, having skills that are tough to replace, specialized knowledge or
information, and centrality to the organization, etc, then the subordinate should
be able to build a partnership with his or her boss. (This is all, for the most,
adapted from Agers slides in class).