Reference no: EM133435818

Training Tom at Grandpa's Woodwork Shop 

Tom, the owner's grandson, was home from college for the summer. His grandfather owned a woodworking shop where they custom-built kitchen furniture. Tom's grandfather, named David, thought it would be a good for him to learn the business from the bottom up. So, David told Phil, one of his foremen, to put Tom to work on the production floor, Phil told the owner, "Great idea," but inwardly groaned and thought about where Tom would cause the least amount of damage.

            Feeling confident that Tom would ask his grandpa for a transfer to a different unit, no matter where he started, Phil decided he wouldn't waste his time training him. Although Phil normally trained his crew well, Tom was, as Phil would often say, "lazy" and "mostly useless". Looking around, Phil saw that Peter, the most senior guy on his crew, wasn't busy. So, he introduced Tom to Peter and told Peter to "just show Tom the ropes" and walked away.

            Peter told Tom to "watch me and let me know if you have questions" before proceeding to put together a beautiful, intricate kitchen table set. Tom tried to ask a few questions, but every time he did, Peter responded with, "it's easy; just watch closer." After twenty minutes, Peter completed his task and subsequently told Tom to "give it a try." Over the next hour, Tom repeated the task and, though it was eventually complete, Peter had lots of corrections to share. 

When Tom finished the task, Peter thought that he did a good enough job and set him to work at the empty station at the other end of the room. Along the way, Peter introduced him to the other five members of the crew. Tom went to work and was able to finish another kitchen table set within an hour. Over the course of the afternoon, the other members of the crew came over to offer their own advice on how to do things faster. Surprisingly, some of the advice contradicted what Peter had told him. Tom thanked them but didn't feel comfortable trying something different. Although he might be slow, he thought at least he was getting it done. 

The next day, the other people on the crew were friendly, but Tom wasn't offered any additional advice. By the end of the day, Tom was able to finish the task in 50 minutes, so he felt he was getting good at putting together the set. Each day for the rest of the week, he got a little faster. People remained friendly and he got to know the other people on the crew.

            A week later, Phil stopped the crew and said he was getting complaints that there was a quality problem. He looked over to see what everyone was doing and stopped when he saw Tom's latest finished kitchen set. Phil was not happy and asked out loud, "Who told you to do it this way?" The person at the station next to him said, "I told him not to do that," and went back to work. Phil then confronted Peter, who said, "I wouldn't have told him to do that. I showed him the right way and while he was slow, he seemed to get it." Exasperated, Phil walked away, but not before saying, "Show him again."

Please address the following:

1. Explain what happened in the case study. 

2. Discuss three problems with the training Tom received. 

3. These problems should all be clear and thoroughly explained. 

4. Identify and explain three strategies for improving the training Tom received. 

5. How does this case study relates to your own training experiences. Have they generally been good or bad? Does the case remind you of a particular training experience? How?