Case Study #2

Holidays are “Party Time”

Stacy has been a VP for 20 years in the Government Relations department at NYU Langone Medical Center. In addition to working at NYU she is a volunteer EMT at Harlem Hospital. She is consistently in the Amsterdam News because of her community activity and is always an honorary Marshall for Harlem Week festivities. Stacy has a stellar attendance record never missing a day in 20 years and has been commended for her outstanding work ethic. She formerly served as a Shop Steward, Chief Shop Steward and Organizer for the union. She earned a college degree at the National Labor College/George Meany Center of Labor Studies. She also earned a Master’s degree in Labor Studies from Cornell University School of Industrial and Labor Relations. Because she worked for the union and now works in management she is highly respected by both labor and management.

During the holidays in December Stacy made the rounds at various parties at the hospital, City Hall and Albany. She has been known to like her beverage of choice. At each stop Stacy engaged in pulling a few folks aside to tell racial jokes. She has just gone through a nasty divorce with her ex-husband. Stacy has already announced that she cannot wait until the Labor Day festivities in September because she is really going to have a blast telling her jokes. She said she is considering attending an open microphone comedy audition at Caroline’s because she knows the manager.

A recently hired college graduate named Jill has decided that she wants to stop the distasteful behavior she witnessed during the holiday season 4 months ago and if Stacy continues her behavior Jill said she is going to quit.

You are the SVP of Operations and you have had some health challenges since the beginning of the year. You are now back to work and still take Fridays off to seek medical treatment for your health situation. You just returned back to work full time this week and you hear about the aforementioned issue.

What is you strategy for proceeding? What potential impact can this matter have if Stacy’s behavior continues?

Case Study #2: Holidays are “Party Time”

While it is essential to do the work you like, doing it in the place that makes you happy is even more important. Maintaining a good work environment is crucial for any organization. Being a leader also means to create an environment where people feel good about themselves and are empowered to do their best work.
In the case at hand, Stacy’s behavior seems to affect the NYU Langone Medical Center workplace. Indeed, her new passion, telling racial jokes, is not appreciated by everybody. Jill, a recently hired college graduate, is even about to quit if Stacy continues her behavior.
As the SVP of Operations, I believe such a situation requires an immediate action for anything that affects the quality of the workplace must be addressed timely.
However, as I just returned back to work after some health challenges, I would need a little time to accommodate to the situation. Just having heard about it is not sufficient to me to jump into it. It is wiser to get to know better the all issue by conducting for instance a preliminary investigation so to assess its nature and extent. This step would be crucial in solving the problem. It would determine for instance within whose area of responsibility the case falls. In our organization, there might be other people designated to handle this kind of situation. In case those persons work under my direct supervision I would trust them and let them take their responsibility first, and then I would decide how and when to step in depending on the outcome of their action In the meantime, based on what I have heard, I do believe that Stacy must have some emotional issues as a result of her recent divorce. Otherwise how to explain such a sudden behavioral change! Indeed, it is surprising that someone with such a tremendous professional and academic track record could behave this way. Also, the fact that she has been holding the same position for 20 years could reflect a frustration. Therefore, chances are the NYU Langone Medical Center might be dealing with a troubled employee case.
Telling racial jokes to her co-workers must be just a mean for Stacy to escape her deep emotional pain and her frustration. For someone with such a sound experience with both labor and management, Stacy should know that when it comes to workplace humor, what you may think is funny could be offensive to someone else. People have different sensitivity to some subjects. For instance anything related to sex, race and religion in the workplace could be serious source of conflict.
Therefore, it seems clear to meet that, on the one hand, Stacy simply succumbed to such emotional outburst because it is what relieves her stress or even her depression. On the other hand, Jill’s reaction is totally understandable.
However, like I mentioned previously this assessment must be validated by a close investigation in order to make sure the steps we will be taking address effectively the issue rather than worsening it. A well done diagnostic will definitely indicate the appropriate medicine as identifying a troubled employee may not be easy. Assuming my diagnostic is validated, my strategy will be based on the principle that a leader should be prepared to help his employee not only professionally but also, sometimes personally. Therefore I would take the following actions:
1. I would have a preliminary and private conversation with Stacy in order to show her my sympathy and offer her my assistance to overcome her emotional issue. This conversation would lead her to express her feelings. I would make sure the conversation remains confidential so to preserve her privacy.

2. I would then refer Stacy to a counseling program, preferably an outside specialist. Given Stacy’s outstanding record at the hospital, I would make any necessary arrangements so that our institution covers any therapists, psychiatrists or other related programs’ expenses. I would make sure to share that information with her in order to prove we are behind her.

3. In the meantime, the best thing to do would be to keep Stacy away from work until she overcome her emotional state and be ready to interact with the work environment decently.

4. Once Stacy away, I would approach Jill for another private conversation. I would try to explain her that I do understand her concern and how sorry I am. I would simply ask her to trust our organization in solving the issue and avoid making it personal and trying to address it her way. Without going into details in order to avoid exposing Stacy’s privacy, I would explain Jill how exceptional worker is Stacy and that her behavior is unusual. Jill should understand that Stacy must have some personal issues affecting her behavior.
Besides the steps above, I would also take this opportunity to recommend our HR department to check whether our institution has any policy or handbook addressing pejoratives jokes. Stacy’s case should give us a chance to anticipate other similar issues by educating our employees on specific matters that could create an unpleasant work atmosphere. Ignoring Stacy’s case or failing to address it properly would cause not only a negative work environment but also lot of damages such as:
1. From an individual standpoint, Stacy could fall deeper in her emotional distress which might cause her performance to decline and affect her decision making and judgment.

2. A personal conflict between Stacy and Jill is also a possible and even a predictable scenario.

3. Jill might not be the only person affected by Stacy’s improper jokes. It is possible that other people suffer from Stacy’s behavior but can’t or don’t want to speak up. For instance, those who are under Stacy’s direct supervision might want to be cautious. They must simply be afraid. The point is, this bad atmosphere could worsen and affect the hospital functioning. That would be dangerous as the most important stockholders in such environment are the patients. It is all about their lives.

Sometimes, employees do not leave their personal problem at home when they come to work. Those problems could easily become the organization’s problem for they could affect not only the employee’s job performance, but also the work environment. Dealing with trouble employees and an unpleasant work environment should be part of leaders’ set of skills and know how.