And the hits keep coming....

In class last Thursday, October 13th for those of us time challenged people, Dr. Rhom was driving home the point of the mid-term set for this coming Tuesday, October 18th.  I will readily admit the material is dry, unstimulated, and repeated information from earlier course work or my own independent reading... be that as it may, there is the occasional nugget of information to be found when you go digging for it.  I'm just not sure that I really want to subject myself to three hours of reading to find said nuggets.  Yeah, three hours of reading that's what it will take for me to reread the book from cover to cover.  It is not all that long, just not presenting information in a really relevant way for my cognitive processing.

An example from page 32...
   "In reality, Greta didn't give in to her raging desire to defend herself.  After being accused of not following her own advice, at first she looked surprised, embarrassed, and maybe even a little upset.  Then she took a deep breath and said: "You know what?  We need to talk about this.  I'm glad you asked the question.  It'll give us a chance to discuss what's really going on."

At this point in the book Greta is trying to make some cost cutting changes to the organization.  One of those changes included a remodeled office that she will work out of, but that will also be used by marketing to help boost the company image and improve client confidence.  She came under attack by some of her department heads during a meeting she had called to address the resistance to the underlying cuts to other departments.

My problem with this excerpt is:

1. Greta is a rather astute CEO, she was brought in to the company to help get the costs and other expenses under control.  Much like Alan Mullany at Ford Motor Company.

2. If she is so astute, why is it that a project like this was not announced to the company as a whole as part of a new marketing campaign?  She knows that you need to spend money to make money that was part of the reasoning of allowing the expediture.

3.  Why does she not have a projected budget for the office?  Was there not a timeline to go along with this project?  Was a project manager not assigned?  All things that Greta would most likely had done in reality.  Nobody gets to be CEO and stay a CEO who does not manage potential crisises like this better.

Over all I thought Greta was a poor example of "crucial conversations".