Konigsbrau A.G is a corporation based in Greek, it produces premium beers, and its worldwide sales were estimated to 2.6 million US dollars. By the time its director was Mr. Wolfgang Keller, Konigsbrau was one of the companies that enjoyed recognition in the whole continent as it was the best managed and most profitable premium brewery. Keller decided to take a two weeks’ vacation, and, in that period, he had to decide on how he would deal with the vice president of the sales and marketing department, Dmitri Petrou. He had worked for two years in the company, and his performance was a concern to Keller, who felt that he needed to take action. In regards to performance management which mainly focuses on the outcomes, Keller had three options regarding action to be taken on Petrou (Platzer & Keller, 2019). The first was to fire Petrou, the second option was to help him improve his performance, and the third was to split the marketing and sales department to help recover Petrous incompetence.
Wolfgang Keller was a graduate of Harvard Business School; at the time, he was 34 years of age. In his managerial career, Keller experienced success, which prompted promotions to higher positions. When he worked in the food manufacturing industry at Konigsbrau brewers as a managing director, he was successful as the company’s profits improved immediately. His hands-on style of management brought success to the firm, which was suffering by the time; despite Keller having a successful pathway, he immediately realized that he lacked skills in leadership as compared to that of the commercial director, Dmitri Petrou. Petrou employed a polar management style that was opposite to that of Wolfgang Keller. Keller, whose primary focus was a success, felt that Petrou’s style lacked accountability, therefore, it would present a difficulty to his success at the Konigsbrau subsidiary (Platzer & Keller, 2019). Keller’s success as Konigsbrau involved a change of the marketing strategy, hiring top management staff, was restructuring the sales group, and opening the fourth brewery in Solanika.
His success prompted him to be among the favorites to take over Vorstand, which comprised a group of Corporate officers. Keller’s conflict with Petrou’s style of leadership exposed his lack of experience in administration. Petrou had a purpose of what he wanted to achieve, was more analytical in his style of management; therefore, he was deliberate in his actions and believed in delegating roles. On the other hand, Wolfgang Keller was action-oriented and a little bit impatient. He used his style of a hands-on approach when handling conflicts. In the end, it can be concluded that Keller lacked leadership skills and also the need to have a dysfunctional team. The lack of experience in Keller’s leadership was exposed while working with Petrou. The explosive exchanges with Petrou during management meetings attributed to poor leadership skills. If Keller had been lenient enough to apply the first rule of leadership, Petrou would have felt confident and even go ahead and study Keller’s leadership style, and the action would have improved his success as a leader (Platzer & Keller, 2019). Keller did not make a point of doing a case study on Petrou’s leadership style, and this was exposed in one of the executive meetings where Keller was a critic.
In the end, Keller must take time to learn to acknowledge Petrou’s belief. The exercise will not only cement their work relation but also build trust between them. Keller should also lay out the entire business plan to Petrou and make a point of including Petrou’s team in the exercise. Teams are critical to any organizational culture, regular team meetings get it aligned to the purpose, outcomes, and increase in accountability at an individual level. Petrou’s success on the completion of a budget made Keller miss an opportunity of improving on self-confidence. Petrou should also take his time to acknowledge changes initiated by Keller as it clear that Dmitri never suggested or brought solutions to the table. Complete success can only be realized if both Keller and Dmitri will exhibit emotional intelligence at all times.
Reference
Keller, B., & Platzer, H. (2019). Industrial Relations and European Integration [Adobe Digital Edition] (1st ed.).