Treadway Case Study

Management and Organizational Theory

MGMT 631

Rodney Lee

September 11, 2014

Relationship between line foremen at Treadway’s Lima Plant and other groups within the plant: general supervisors and area manager, top management, the union, hourly workers, and each other.

The relationship between the Treadway’s Lima Plant foremen and other groups within the plant can only be described as insanity. One could easily say that insanity is repeating the same behavior over and over again and expecting a different result. The line foremen are required to work 12 hour shifts, solve a multitude of personnel, resource, and administrative issues and still meet daily production goals. Now add a union environment, no formal training for foremen, no chance of upward mobility, and a lack of communication between management (foremen, general supervisors and area managers), and you end up with a high turnover rate. According to the Plant manager, “Meeting performance goals is the most important duty of a line foreman.” This statement has caused the foreman to only focus on line metrics. Foremen have been threatened with poor performance reviews if production numbers are not met. This behavior has created a hostile work environment and isolated the foremen from the rest of the plant. They feel that their contributions are undervalued and their concerns ignored.

There is no formal training process in place to familiarize foremen with the different aspects of their role within the plant. There was a month-long rotational training program in place, but it was discontinued due to budget cuts in 2007. The foremen are neither familiar with key processes in the plant nor are they familiar with handling labor situations. A lot of the foremen are put on a line before they have the tools to be successful. They know less about their legal rights than the union workers. The general supervisors expect the foremen to sink or swim. According to Herb Adams, a general supervisor, he...