Motor Parts Case Study

Background:

The case revolves around Bob Marvin, president of the Motor Parts Corporation (MPC), and his executive vice president, AL Shepherd, who held a key senior management position in the company. After Bob, Al had the most important job since most of the line functions reported directly to him. His job required a considerable amount of traveling which he was not able to do lately because of his wife’s illness. Al 's wife, Ruth, was suffering from a malignant brain tumor due to which he was spending more and more time away from work to be with her.

Issue:

As indicated from the case, Bob was extremely concerned about Al 's increasing absence from work and his excessive preoccupation with his wife 's illness. For the past few months, Al had been out of the office numerous times, cancelling important work meetings at the last minute in

There was a stark difference in the working styles of Bob and AL and how they handled their day to day work related problems. Bob generally paid a lot of attention to minor work details, and provided closer supervision to subordinates. On the other hand, AL believed in delegating work and preferred not to closely monitor the work of subordinates if they did their job adequately. He used to overlook the rules and regulations both for himself and others if the job was being done. This was the source of great frustration for Bob who believed in following rules and regulations for achieving better results.

As indicated from the case, when Bob found out about Al’s trip to Detroit, he got very upset as he did not know that Al was there to close the deal with Delta Corp. This example shows a lack of communication between Bob and Al. I believe its Al’s responsibility to make sure that all the important, critical information is known to Bob and to other senior