Zola is a talented and bright engineer who was recently promoted into a junior production manager position. He was rapidly promoted into this role after working for a year as continuous improvement specialist. His performance on a General Mental Ability test placed him as above average. Despite his obvious talent, he is not doing too well in his new role. Devon, his manager, is frustrated with him. Zola takes forever to complete the tasks that Devon delegates to him. Zola never seems to be satisfied with his own work and re - works it repeatedly. This is creating bottlenecks, as is his reluctance to delegate tasks to his reports. He has been heard complaining that their work is not up to his standard. Output on his line has reduced by 8% since he has taken over.

The ANB Banking Group's Board of Directors is a tightly knit, cohesive group. An assessment shows that all 8 members achieved high scores on the group dependent scale. As could be expected from a group like this they displayed many of the characteristics of group think such as the illusion of invulnerability, rationalization, stereotyped views, pressure on dissent, self censorship, the illusion of unanimity and mindguarding/information filtering. The CEO came up with the idea to introduce new banking products into the market that bordered on the exploitation of customers.

Even though some board members had misgivings about the unethical nature of these products, they remained silent. It was an unspoken rule not to the rock the boat, and no - one wanted to risk becoming alienated from the group. Reluctant to upset the group's cohesion, directors rationalized that this would be good for banking and customers, and that even though the CEO's proposal was risky, it would all work out.

ANB went ahead with its products but after a few years the banking ombudsman launched an investigation into ANB after many customer complaints. The ombudsman ruled that some of ANB's practices were unethical and that clients who had been unfairly treated be reimbursed. The ombudsman also imposed a fine of several million dollars on ANB as a punitive measure to discourage like practices in the banking industry.

Caleb has a degree in mechanical engineering. He has 6 years experience with a special interest in robotics. This is a scarce skill and cannot easily be replaced. Caleb's performance reviews have been great and he is well respected by his peers. His manager for the last 6 months is Daniel.

Daniel finds it very difficult to trust people and can be hypercritical. Caleb is currently working on a project looking into the automation of several plant processes with the aid of robotics. Despite Caleb's credentials, Daniel insists on managing Caleb closely. He expects Caleb to check in with him daily on his progress. He nit -picks Caleb's work and micro-edits it even though Caleb has been at pains to point out that everything is in draft stage.

In a nutshell, he is hyper-vigilant about the details of Caleb's work. Despite several chats with Daniel, he persists with managing Caleb in this way. A few months later, Caleb jumps at the chance to work for a competitor. The automation project grinds to halt until a suitable replacement can be found.