Thomas Motor Company

John Thomas is the Managing Director of the Thomas MotorCompany. He succeeded to the position of Managing Director afterhis father Martin Thomas died four years ago.  MartinThomas was the founder of the Thomas Motor Company.  Hestarted off as an apprentice mechanic in a suburban area ofMelbourne when he was only eighteen working as an assistant to FredLuthans, proprietor of Luthans Automotive Repairs. Martin learntall he knew about vehicle mechanics from him. He was a keen andenthusiastic learner and Luthans liked people like that. He saw alot of potential in Martin and once remarked to a fellow workerafter Martin completed a job in record time, “That kid is going tobe someone someday. By the age of twenty-one, Martin had become oneof the fastest and most skilful mechanics that Luthans had evertaught.

Five years later, Martin left Luthans Automotive Repairs andopened up his own garage in Geelong, a city 70kms west ofMelbourne. With his natural knack for vehicle mechanics, Martin’ssmall business prospered, expanded and grew into the well-knownThomas Motor Company of today.

It had been taken for granted that John Thomas would one daysucceed his father Martin as Managing Director of the Thomas MotorCompany.  Martin was conscious of this and he wantedyoung John to have a solid background in vehicle mechanics and senthim off to automotive technical school. He did not want John to betaking on a job which would be beyond his capabilities when he tookover the business.

The company’s office where John Thomas was located was based indowntown Geelong, but the workshop was situated some kilometresaway in an industrial estate on the outskirts of town. Working inthe workshop were the five mechanics employed in the business.Steve Robbins, aged forty-five, the Foreman in charge of theworkshop, was a veteran at the Thomas Motor Company. He had beenMartin’s long-time friend and had been with the Thomas MotorCompany since the day it was formed. He was the most experiencedand skilled worker there.

Robbins basically did some administrative work besides the usualrepair tasks at the workshop. He was the one who sorted out thework of the other mechanics, although there was no formal jobdescription for his job. Robbins was an informal sort of leader. Hewould often join in the fun with the others and treated them as hisequal. Everyone at the workshop was a member of a closely knitgroup and there was little need for Robbins to keep them in line.The atmosphere suited him extremely well.

Bob Johnson, aged thirty-four, was the next most senior mechanicon the floor. He had been with the company for the last fifteenyears, and in many ways was considered a veteran too. Like ForemanRobbins, he was fast and very competent in his job.

Dik Kelly, aged thirty, had been with the company for the lastten years. He was just as skilful as both Robbins and Johnson butlacked the years of experience which made the other two menfaster.

Jim Richards, aged twenty-one, was the only apprentice in theworkshop. The workshop was at the moment short of one mechanic. Thelast one, Dave Hines, had left for Melbourne, preferring theglamour of a bigger city. His unexpected departure left theworkshop one man short. As mechanics were not easy to come by,Robbins decided to train a mechanic himself. Richards theApprentice, therefore, was supposed to learn, while helping eitherRobbins, Johnson or Kelly. He had been in the workshop for the lastyear.

Finally, there was Ralph Turner, aged thirty-six, and a newcomerto the workshop. Hired just three months ago, Turner had beenworking for his father at the Turner Trucking Company’s Workshop.The Turner Workshop had initially handled their own trucks and sometrucks from other firms. Lately, however, the Turner TruckingCompany contracts with several firms had expired. The firms refusedto enter into new contracts. Soon Turner found that the Workshopsection of his business was, in fact, operating at a loss. This wasdue to the fact that they were only servicing their own trucksfixing and maintaining the reduced Turner Truck Fleet. Eventually,Turner senior decided to close down the Workshop part of thebusiness and signed a contract with Thomas Motor Company to servicehis remaining trucks. This, however, left young Ralph Turnerwithout a job. Turner thus approached Robbins and asked him ifthere was a vacancy for a mechanic in his workshop. As Richards wasstill a novice, and since the workshop really needed anothermechanic, Robbins the Foreman agreed and Ralph Turner washired.

In the beginning, Robbins has told Turner about the way in whichthings were done around the place. Turner seemed very understandingand accommodating. He seemed quite happy and enthusiastic about hisnewly found job. This was despite the fact that he was the secondlowest paid worker there. The pay was calculated by computer, basedon both seniority and skill. Turner, of course, lost out onseniority, but he appeared not to mind this. Robbins thought thatit was probably because he felt lucky to even have a job.

The workshop opens at 8.00 am daily and the mechanics areassigned jobs by Robbins. At 10:00 am there is an unofficialcoffee-break where the entire crew would go across the street for acup of coffee. This is looked upon as a social gathering, where themen would get to know each other better. Being an unofficialcoffee-break, it is agreed that anyone who does not complete hisfirst job by 10:00 am has to forego his coffee-break for theday.

Now, Ralph Turner seemed to constantly miss his coffee breaks.Although skilful, he was not as fast as either, Johnson, Kelly orRobbins. During his first three weeks there, he only managed toattend one coffee-break.

By the end of the fourth week, trouble was brewing. Turner hadbecome quite alienated and dissatisfied with his job. He tried tohurry through his work so that he could make it to these socialgatherings. Also, he did not want to appear to be the slowestaround. His haste, however, led to one of the trucks which herepaired breaking down because of a faulty gasket.

Hearing about this, Robbins spoke to Turner in his usualmild-mannered fashion. He basically advised Turner to be morecareful with his work and to take his time. Turner acknowledgedthis with an unfriendly shrug of his shoulders.

Over the next few days, Turner’s dissatisfaction grew even moreas he tried to hurry his work, yet making an effort to be careful.Unfortunately, he still missed his coffee-breaks. At lunch, hechose not to associate with the rest of the crew and there waslittle communication between him and the others.

Soon, Turner began complaining about various things. He went upto Robbins and told him that the workshop was too dirty. So dirty,that he found it hard to work in it. Robbins tried to explain toTurner that they were understaffed at the moment and, besides,workshops were naturally dirty. Turner responded by saying, ‘It wasalways clean at my father’s workshop’. Not long after thatincident, Turner complained about the noise from the loudspeakers.The men had always worked with the radio on so that they could keepup with the football scores and the racing. Turner once shouted,“Turn off that thing! How’s a man supposed to work in this kind ofnoise?”

By this time the rest of the men had quite enough of Turner andhis temperamental behaviour. They ostracised Turner from theiractivities, which led him to believe that they were talking abouthim behind his back. One thing led to another, and things graduallywent from bad to worse. Turner started spying on the others whenthey worked on his father’s trucks and he also complained aboutApprentice Richards to Foreman Robbins. Turner told Robbins thatRichards was more concerned about going off for the coffee-breakand was not at all interested in his work or learning from the moreexperienced staff.

These two incidents led the others to dislike Turner even more.His spying on them implied his suspicions that they were not doingtheir work properly. This insulted the men.

Gradually, Turner became bolder about his suspicions andconstantly lurked around his father’s trucks. He insisted that he,and only he, should work on the Turner trucks. Robbins replied thatthis was quite impossible, as sometimes two or three Turner truckswere in at the same time. Turner’s reply was that he would work onas many of them as he possibly could.

As a result of all these commotions, Turner’s competence as amechanic fell drastically. He seemed to be more careless in hisjobs and paid little attention to work other than that on hisfathers’ trucks.

The final showdown came when one of the trucks which Turner hadworked on broke down again. This time the front axle wasdislocated. Turner had apparently not tightened the nuts properly.The accident could have been fatal if the driver had been drivingat a faster speed. To make matters worse, the truck belonged to thesame owner of the truck which had broken down before. Robbins theForeman got an ultimatum from the customer.

The following day, John Thomas paid an impromptu visit to theworkshop. There he met the staff and Robbins took the opportunityto tell John Thomas what had happened. Robbins mentioned thatTurner had reached the point where he would do more harm than goodto the company, but on the other hand, the Turner account was quitea large one. Firing Turner would mean losing the Turner account,and thus quite a substantial amount of business. But Robbinsquickly added, ‘If we don’t fire him, he may be the cause of uslosing even more accounts. I’d prefer to lose one account, largethough it may be, but still remain in business, rather than keepone substantial account and eventually go bankrupt’.

Question: What is the background of this case and identify theissues.

2. what are the key management and business or organizationalissue?

3. what theories are on change, on leadership, motivation and onplanning.

4. What are your objectives to save the company?

5. Implementation of action plans.