TEAM 9 CASE STUDY

Douglas Collins
 Background

The case study “Differing Perceptions at Hi-Style Limited” focuses around Rachna

Chauduri, chief designer at Hi-Style Limited. The company Hi-Style limited is a high-end

designer clothes manufacturer for women. Rachna is very experienced having received an M.Se

in Textile Engineering with a specialization in fashion designing, completing a 6 month fashion

designing course in the U.S, and completed an internship with Hi-Style all before joining the

company. She impressed the management during her internship and was offered a job.

She joined a team of designers who were led by a man named Ajit Sinha. Ajit took a

liking to Rachna and was also a fellow alumni of her institution. He was impressed with her

thesis work on weaves in rural India and had even started a successful unique brand called

‘Weaves’, which its purpose was to provide fashion to the contemporary Indian woman. He

formed a design team for the brand, which included the best the company had to offer. The team

consisted of Deepa Mehta, Shilpa Rao, and Sandhya Joshi. All of the team members are very

distinct and have their own strengths and weaknesses. Rachna was aware there would be some

resistance when joining the team, but she had high hopes that she could make it work. Deepa and

Sandhya immediately resented Rachna, who had taken the place of Sharma when she quit. Both

the women were very close to Sharma and were upset when she left due to creative differences

between her and Ajit; however, they were not vocal about it.

Over a year has passed and nothing has changed. Rachna’s relationship with Ajit and

Shilpa was good but she was still treated with hostility from Sandhya and Deepa. They never

support any of her decisions and would often times be rude to her. This behavior was affecting

the work environment. Rachna took to avoiding the two and spending more time with Shilpa. At
some point Ajit called the team together to discuss their future design project for next season.

Ajit decided to make Rachna chief designer, which Deepa and Sandhya had great disdain for.

Deepa was especially upset and went up to Ajit personally to voice her disproval.

The overall atmosphere in the office wasn’t good. The behavior between the team

members created many problems. Eventually productivity would decline and the deadline for the

designs was rapidly approaching. Deepa turns to the HR Manager Ananya Shetty to help resolve

the issues within the team.

Problem Identification

This case has multiple problems littered throughout it. The first major problem was the

lack of communication and inability to resolve conflict between the team members. Initially

when Rachna entered the company she was immediately disliked by Deepa and Sandhya,

specifically for replacing Sharma, of whom they were real fond of. Deepa and Sandhya were also

upset of the circumstances of Sharma’s resignation, which was due to many creative differences

with Ajit. They were not vocal about this issue which was the first instance of poor

communication. There are multiple instances where the problems the team members were having

with each other, were simply not appropriately addressed. Rachna has been dealing with this

hostile environment for a year and a half and she never confided to Ajit or anyone about the

problems she was facing. Instead, she tried to avoid them as much as she could. Communication

is key for team cohesiveness and if the team members can’t communicate the problems they are

facing, whether it’s with each other or with the work, they will not be able to complete their

organizational goals.
 Another big problem is Ajit, who has made some critical errors and is not managing his

team effectively. The first mistake he made was adding a new member to the team without first

consenting those already a part of it. Though Deepa and Sandhya didn’t voice their opinions on

Sharma leaving, he should have been aware there could be mixed emotions among the team. Ajit

also displayed poor communication skills and lack of empathy during his conversation with

Deepa. She was accusing him of playing favorites with Rachna and that there are more qualified

candidates for the chief designer position. Instead of addressing the problem and diffusing the

situation, he simply dismisses the thought, lets her know he has a lot of work to do and expects

full support. This circles back to the simple lack of communication in the office, which in the

long run can lead to many problems.

The last problem I want to identify is the team composition. This team is small and the

tasks they preform have high interdependence. When creating the team, it is important to make

sure that the people involved are able and willing to work in a team environment. Deepa may not

be the root of all the problems, but she definitely lacks the competencies of an effective team

member. Sandhya also was creating conflict, but upon reviewing the case, Deepa seems to be the

primary instigator. There is an old saying, “One bad apple spoils the barrel” which applies to

teams; one team member who lacks the necessary teamwork competencies may undermine the

dynamics of the entire team. There also seems to be a great lack of emotional intelligence with

all the team members. Emotional intelligence is the ability to perceive and express emotions and

to regulate emotions in oneself and in others. It is a key factor involved in an organization’s

effectiveness. Everyone involved in this case is lacking in certain dimensions that pertain to

emotional intelligence.
 Causes of Problems

The first problem I identified in the case was the lack of effective communication and

conflict resolution in the organization. When the work is heavily interdependent, frequent,

timely, and accurate communication remains the primary means through which employees and

work units effectively synchronize their work. Not being able to mitigate conflict will undermine

organizational effectiveness. There are multiple instances in this case where multiple people

failed to communicate conflict that was going on in the workplace. The first occurred when

Sharma had quit the team due to not being able to work with Ajit. Deepa and Sandhya were close

with her and were upset about her leave. They did not vocalize their frustrations to Ajit or

anyone, so this conflict went unresolved. Another instance occurred after Rachna arrived at the

company. She was instantly resented by Deepa and Sandhya, yet she could never communicate

to Ajit or anyone about the problems she was having. This is very serious as the problems won’t

just go away, they will get worst. There is obviously poor conflict management within the

organization. The type of conflict most prevalent in this team is relationship conflict. Nowhere in

the case is there an instance of task-related conflict. Deepa and Sandhya resented Rachna for

taking Sharma’s place, her advancement in her career, and believing Ajit was playing favorites

when he chose her to be the Chief Designer of the new collection. For example, when Deepa

when to discuss the decision with Ajit she said, “Sometimes I wonder if you favor her a little too

much because she is from the same institute that you studied from?” Ajit simply dismisses this as

a childish accusation and the conflict never gets resolved.

 Ajit himself is another big problem with this team, simply because he is not managing

them effectively and fulfilling his role as a leader. Ajit is obviously a good designer, having

started a successful brand that had 15 stores and a total of 50 touch points across 10 cities.

Throughout the case however, he has failed multiple times in keeping his team functional and

effective. Ajit is the leader of the group and leadership is comprised of two key components.

First, leaders motivate others through persuasion and other influence tactics. They use their

communication skills, rewards, and other resources to energize the collective to achieve

challenging objectives. Second, leaders are enablers, who must allocate resources and alter

communication patterns so their team can accomplish its goals. Ajit has not met these

components and doesn’t possess some of the competencies a leader must possess in order to be

effective. The case doesn’t go into too much detail on why Sharma initially quit, other than

saying she had creative differences with Ajit. However, if your employee quit because they felt

their autonomy was being stifled, you failed as a leader. Ajit also did not take in consideration

the effect of Sharma leaving on the rest of the team. Though they were not vocal about it, it’s

important for a leader to be aware of any future conflict that may arise from something like a

team member leaving or even one entering. When Rachna entered the group she was

immediately resented by Deepa and Sandhya. At no point did Ajit try and bring both parties

together to try and resolve any problems they had with each other. Gregory P. Smith is a leading

authority on talent management, leadership development and employee engagement. He wrote

the article “Ignoring conflict can be disastrous”, for the Orlando Business Journal. In that article

he wrote, “Conflict in the workplace is a painful reality. The goal is to recognize friction and

tension and deal with it before it escalates into a major problem. One point is clear -- conflict

does not magically go away if ignored.” Ajit initially failed to recognize and act on the friction
that was occurring between his team members. Smith also wrote, “Managers who exhibit

favoritism toward one or more employees set themselves up for problems with the "non-

favored."” This quote applies directly to this case. Though Ajit claims he is being fair with

everyone, it doesn’t appear so with some of the others. If this stigma isn’t resolved, employees

are going to start communicating through the grapevine and further conflict will arise in the

future.

The last problem I identified was the team composition. Deepa, Shilpa, and Sandhya

were all given a brief bio in the case, which included a short personality description. Deepa is

brilliant but she is arrogant and short tempered. Shilpa is an introvert and hardworking. Sandhya

is the oldest and has much experience in the field. This team is very diverse, which can be a good

thing, but in this case it hinders the group. When Sharma left the team and Rachna entered, the

team suffered from process losses; which is the resources expended towards team development

and maintenance rather than the task. Team performance suffers when adding members because

those employees need to learn how to coordinate with other team members and how the team

generally operates. The team wasn’t able to cope and Rachna never properly assimilated into the

group. The team members all suffered from lack of emotional intelligence as well. Deepa and

Sandhya would never support Rachna decisions and always have something sarcastic to say

about her designs. This shows a lack of emotional dissonance from Deepa and Sandhya, because

they expressed how they personally feel towards Rachna, rather than be professional in the work

place. Ajit also showed an inability of managing emotions in the workplace. There are four

dimensions to emotional intelligence. There is awareness of own emotions, management of own

emotions, awareness of other’s emotions, and management of other’s emotions. Managing other

people’s emotions requires great emotional intelligence because it requires the awareness of our
own and others’ emotions. If Ajit was to diffuse and conflict between his team, he needs to

understand how his team is feeling, as well as keeping his own emotions in check.

Recommendations

Ineffective communication and conflict resolution can be improved over time. There are

a couple tips provided by Sandra Wiley, an industry expert in HR. In her article “Ten Tips for

Improving Your Team Communication”, she listed out a couple of tips that Ajit could possibly

implement to improve the communication amongst his team. She wrote, “Encourage employees

to come to you by creating a safe environment in which they feel comfortable voicing their

frustrations both honestly and openly.” This policy could have really helped Rachna during the

beginning of her employment; when she was experiencing trouble with Deepa and Sandhya.

Another tip Wiley gave was, “To prevent small conflicts from exploding into major crises, deal

with disputes right away.” When Rachna first joined the team, Deepa and Sandhya did not like

her for taking Sharma’s place. This conflict continued and festered for over a year and a half.

Either Ajit or the companies HR department need to resolve these disputes right away; in order

to prevent situations like the one occurring with this case. Third-party conflict resolution should

also be utilized. Due to the conflict having occurred for so long and the strong feelings

associated with it, an arbitration would be the best form of conflict resolution. Someone

experienced from HR should be the arbitrator, due to Ajit being too close to the team members.

The process would be in control of the employees but ultimately the decision would lie with the

arbitrator. This would help Deepa, Sandhya, Rachna, and Shilpa lay everything out on the table

and possibly settle their disputes.

 Ajit’s problems can be solved simply through training and education. He doesn’t have

certain skills that a leader needs to enable his team to be as effective as possible. The article

“Improving Leadership Training Effectiveness through Action Learning Program”, is a case

study on how Action Learning Program can improve leadership training. Hi-Style can implement

this program so Ajit and other managers are able to overcome the challenges they will face.

Action learning is a process where people learn and work simultaneously by handling practical

issues and solving the problems through applying theory and knowledge they obtained from the

learning. The program is divided into 2 sessions and typically takes a couple of months. The

downside of this plan is high costs that may occur from additional classes or coaching.

The last problem involving the team and each individual’s characteristics, is a lot harder

to solve. If the organization goes through the first 2 set of recommendations however, I believe

this problem wouldn’t be an issue. You can’t change someone’s personality but you can help

improve behavior and manage emotions in the workplace. These would be improved through

better communication, conflict resolution practices, and better management.

 Works Cited

McShane, Steven; Von Glinow, Mary (2013-01-01). M: Organizational Behavior, 2nd edition
(Page 70, 72, 135, 206). McGraw-Hill Higher Education -A. Kindle Edition.
Smith, G. P. (1999). Ignoring conflict can be disastrous. Orlando Business Journal, 16(5), 39.
Retrieved from
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Wiley, S. (2012). Ten tips for improving your team communication. CPA Practice Management
Forum, 8(12), 8-10. Retrieved from
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Harjo, E. B., Riyanto, Y., & Riyanto, A. (2013). Improving leadership training effectiveness
through action learning program. Paper presented at the 498-506. Retrieved from
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