Discussion Questions

Week 4 Discussion Questions:

Trust and Interpersonal Relationships and Identifying Issues.

Jimmy Littlejohn

Professor Linda Kulka

Management 521

June 23, 2010

Trust and interpersonal relationships:

I think that when working in teams, initial trust is assumed since we all have the same goal. The goal gives the team an initial drive. As the team works together, the team may have to earn each other’s trust due to shortcomings of an individual member. This can be a result of lack of competence-based trust defined as trust where basically one party considering another party in the team not up to standards (Atkinson and Butcher 2003). Parties within a team do not necessarily need to like one another, but they do tend to build trust over time by past actions and meeting deadlines or high level competence-based trust (Atkinson & Butcher 2003). Trust is both assumed and earned when working in teams. I think that teams not only assume trust from the stand point that we all have a similar goal when working on a project, but also we earn trust when we follow through, meet deadlines, and consistently perform above standards. Earned trust can be lost for failure to comply in any part of a project by any team member.

Identifying Issues:

An issue is defined a few different ways. In the case of Kudler foods or any type of grocery retail business, an issue is most closely defined as a point or matter of discussion that has not escalated to the point, but may be the cause of a problem. In this case a problem will be an issue that has not been controlled or a combination of issues that have needed attention and have escalated into a problem.

A few of the issues with Kudler are as follows:

1. Kathy Kudler is the only person controlling buying for all three stores. This is cost effective for the company, but the issue is the “what if”. What happens if she is sick? What if she...