Case Study of Leadership Change Management at House, Hearth & Home

This case study examines the leadership challenges faced by Mark Coglin, the owner and general manager of House, Hearth and Home, a large retail establishment. Coglin grapples with the decision of whether Wesley Simpson, the long-time yard manager, is still the right person for the job amidst increasing competition and customer service demands. The hiring of Dan Boyd, Coglin's friend, as an assistant yard manager leads to improved organizational performance, creating a dilemma for Coglin regarding Simpson's future role and whether Boyd should be promoted despite his short tenure. The analysis identifies the root cause of the problems as increased competition and a lack of employee motivation, culminating in a problem statement that questions Boyd's suitability for the yard manager position based on his leadership qualities compared to Simpson. The report concludes that Boyd should be considered for the yard manager position, with Simpson potentially transitioning to another role within the organization.

Running head: MANAGING LEADERSHIP CHANGE
Managing Leadership Change
Name of the Student:
Name of the University:
Author Note:

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Executive Summary
The objective of the report is to assess the scenario of large retail establishment, House, Hearth
and Home .This paper assesses the situations at House, Hearth and Home, summarizes the facts,
identifies the symptoms and the critical interferences ,The paper outlines the assumptions from
the case scenario. The paper also identifies the root cause of the problems and clearly states the
problem statement considering the long-term perspectives and pertaining to the four rules of
thumbs.

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Table of Contents
Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................1
Situation Analysis............................................................................................................................3
Problem Statement...........................................................................................................................4
References........................................................................................................................................5

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Situation Analysis
Mark Coglin was the owner and the General Manager of the large retail establishment
firm, House, Hearth and Home. The hardware, furniture and building centre, House, Hearth and
Home, relied on providing superior customer service. Wesley Simpson was the long-term yard
manager of the firm. Mark Coglin decided to hire Dan Boyd, his friend as an assistant to the yard
manager, in order to aid him in operations of the firm.
Earlier, it was an easy task to run the operations of the yard but owing to the issues of
economic turndown, increased competition, pressure to meet customer needs, it had become
necessary to engage all the employees, not just managers to help to achieve organizational goals
(DuBrin, 2013). Comprehending the situation and analyzing the source of problem, Coglin
decided to hire his friend, Dan Boyd as an assistant to the yard manager, Simpson. Coglin was
apprehensive about his decision fearing some employees may question his decision for showing
biasness to his friend and offering him such responsible position. However it was noticed that the
after the appointment of Boyd, there was a development in the employees and there was an
improvement in the performance of the organization. There were also signs of customer
satisfactions, which was evident when their most hard-to-please customer, Graham praised their
organization’s efforts and services. After this improving situation of their organization, Coglin
was in a new dilemma, whether his long serving loyal employee Simpson still apt for the post of
yard manager and if not what would be the future of Simpson in the organization. The other issue
which troubled Coglin was that ,it was noted that Boyd had all the attributes of an effective
leader ,which was not present in Simpson, so whether it would be justified to give Boyd the
promotion after this short tenure in the organization (Malik, 2013) .

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From the above case analysis, it can be surmised that Coglin, being the owner of the
organization took the apt decision as a leader to hire Boyd for aiding the operations of the yard to
solve the issue of the firm. Though it seemed a risky decision, he proved to be an effective leader
as his gamble to hire Boyd turned out to be fruitful as his organization showed drastically and
unexpectedly improved performance, which solved the growing issues of customer
dissatisfaction. However, considering the present scenario Boyd should be placed as the yard
manager and Simpson should be engaged in some other department of operations.
Problem Statement
The root cause of the problems in House, Hearth and Home, which lead to the problem of
economy turndown and the need to maintain customer satisfaction, was emergence of
competitors in market and employees lacking motivation (Hill & Brierley, 2017). Considering
the stiff competition from other giant firms, it was necessary for every employees of the firm to
be more committed to meet organizational goals. However, the yard manger, Simpson was
incapable to motivate the employees so that would ensure that no orders were delayed and led to
customer dissatisfaction (Szwabowski et al., 2016).
Analyzing the situation, the problem statement complying with the four rules of thumb
and considering long-term perspective is –
Is the newly appointed employee apt for the designation of yard manager of the firm in the future
considering his better leadership qualities of influencing, relationship building, strategic thinking
and execution, in comparison to the present manager?

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References
DuBrin, A. J. (2013). Fundamentals of organizational behavior: An applied perspective.
Elsevier.
Hill, N., & Brierley, J. (2017). How to measure customer satisfaction. Routledge.
Malik, S. H. (2013). Relationship between Leader Behaviors and Employees' Job Satisfaction: A
Path-Goal Approach. Pakistan Journal of Commerce & Social Sciences, 7(1).
Szwabowski, S. J., Filev, D. P., Lu, J., Tseng, F., & Prakah-Asante, K. O. (2016). U.S. Patent
No. 9,333,975. Washington, DC: U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.