Barb Cooper is the leader of a team of 15 high performing consultants at a Marke

Question

Barb Cooper is the leader of a team of 15 high performing consultants at a Marketing Consulting firm. A member of her team, Ted Collins, comes into her office one morning looking red-eyed and unshaven and informs Barb that he is starting to feel at the breaking point of stress he has been experiencing. "Barb, I've been working 16 hours a day now, 6 days a week for almost two months on this project. With our new baby, an ill family member staying with us, and my wife trying to finish her degree, I'm on the verge of a nervous breakdown. I'm exhausted. I'm worried that the quality of the work is suffering. And my wife is threatening to leave me if things don't change. I don't know what to do." Barb looks at Ted and shrugs. "Ted, I'm sorry you are so overwhelmed. But I'm not sure what to tell you. I can give you whatever guidance and structure you need on your project, but it's not my role to help you manage your stress...you need to figure that part out for yourself. You took this job knowing it would involve long hours. It's the nature of consulting. We all do it. There is not a day out of the year when I'm not working. I brought my Blackberry to the beach with me last summer. I came into the office on Christmas Day. We are all lucky to have a job in this economy." •

What do you think about Barb's response to Ted? Explain your response thoroughly.

Explanation / Answer

Ted is suffering from Job stress, as he is not able to find a work life balance. Work life balance and job stress are major challenges in today’s environment, and to add to the woes, there’s job insecurity as well. The unfortunate part of the story is that just like Barb Cooper, less than 1/3rd of the managers recognize and take any action to address these issues.

Barb should not brush aside the job stress issue brought to light by TED. Economic depression should not be the reason for a manager not to address a serious productivity issue such as job stress and work-life balance. Many employers have employee assistance programs that apply a holistic approach to address the quality of work-life issues.

I think Barb Cooper should have given a sincere and empathetic hearing to Ted’s problem, and should have provided him the guidance about some of the measures that can be used to address it. Some of the measures could be

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