Janis is a retail sales associate at Canada's Home Store. She has not been meeting her sales

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Janis is a retail sales associate at Canada's Home Store. She has not been meeting her sales targets and recently got into an argument with a customer over returns of products which were eligible for replacement but not a refund under the store's return policy. Janis used her training to listen empathetically and diffuse the customer's growing frustration. It did not help, and the customer demanded to see the manager. The manager addressed the customer's complaint, but his actions also seemed to have fanned the flames of conflict with Janis.

Canada's Home Store

Canada's Home Store (CHS) carries quality home furnishings at competitive prices. The retail chain features an extensive selection of kitchen, bath, and home appliances and products. Competition from online retailers has put tremendous pressure on 'brick and mortar' establishments like CHS. One competitive advantage that CHS strives to leverage is direct, face-to-face contact with customers. Managing customer experiences and building trust is a core competency for the front-line retail staff at CHS.

The chain store works hard to distinguish itself from the 'big box' competitors. To stay competitive with online retailers, CHS focuses on customer relations and carefully tracks customer feedback. CHS invests time and resources into training and developing its front-line salesforce. Much of this training is devoted to the 'customer journey,' and strives to enhance the listening and interpersonal skills of the workforce. Not surprisingly, most of this training is sales-focused, and CHS employees receive little training in conflict management.

1The organizations and people described in this case are fictional and meant for instructional purposes only.

Retail work and commission-based salaries

Working in retail can be a stressful job. Stress on sales associates is exacerbated by having pay dependent on sales, which also can make customers distrustful. CHS provides sales agents with a minimal base salary that can be enhanced with commission-based bonuses. This compensation scheme holds the promise of some very positive payouts, but most CHS retail workers earn modest salaries. Their earnings are better than working at Tim Horton's or the Dollar Store, but not by much.

Scheduling often adds to the stress of the retail workforce. Given the commission-based nature of compensation, getting stuck on a dead shift with low customer traffic also means no sales and no bonuses. Last year, CHS adopted a 'just-in-time' staffing model, ostensibly to improve staffing and make sure staffing was responsive to customer traffic. For retail workers, the new staffing model generally makes them feel more precarious and less certain about when they will be working or what their earnings will be paycheque to paycheque.

During an audit of one of the flagship stores last year, CHS uncovered a scheme by store employees to artificially boost sales. Retail workers would have friends or family members come to the store and make a large purchase. The sales agent would collect the commission, and their friend would return the merchandise to the store for a refund. The investigation resulted in nearly forty terminations, including a senior regional sales manager. CHS instituted two rules to ensure this practice could not happen again. First, sales from commissions would be lost if the customer returned the products. Second, customers could return items for store credit but could not obtain a cash refund. The new rules have created frustrations for both staff and customers.

Unhappy customers and the 'Returns Policy'

This was the third time in two days that a customer came to the store to return a SMART home appliance bundle. For the past month, CHS has heavily pushed sales of the new products, offering discounts to customers and incentives to sales associates. Earlier this week, a consumer watchdog agency issued an emergency alert that these particular products had a serious security vulnerability. The SMART home products allowed hackers and identity thieves a backdoor portal to gain access to customer information and even take remote control of the devices.

Janis has been careful to explain the new returns policies to customers, especially for the SMART home appliances and televisions. Sometimes people do not really understand that SMART appliances still require human interventions like programming and regular software maintenance. CHS corporate and Janis' store manager have not yet issued any directives to sales associates as to how to handle the growing flood of returns. Without any change in the returns policy, Janis and her fellow retail workers have had to stick to the corporate script - in store credit, but no refunds, no exceptions.

Key stakeholders

Janis Kravchenkohas worked at CHS for the past five years. Janis has nearly 20 years of retail sales experience and genuinely enjoys helping people find products that will make their house a comfortable home. Janis was recruited to CHS from one of their competitors with the promise of a higher salary from commission sales and career advancement opportunities. Neither promise has worked out quite as well as she expected. CHS growth and advancement opportunities have slowed because of competitive pressures from online retail platforms. Commissions from sales has also been disappointing. Not only has her salary been disappointing, but Janis has not been meeting her sales targets. The store manager,

Brad Reid, has called Janis into his office for a 'performance huddle' twice in the past six months. When Janis pointed out that no one in her area had been meeting the sales targets, Brad was quite firm, "Other stores are hitting these targets and corporate is very concerned about the viability of this location if we can't meet those targets." Janis felt like he told her to 'try harder' but refused to consider her marketing and promotion ideas. The new rules that CHS imposed to prevent sales agents from gaming the commission system has decreased her earnings and increased customer dissatisfaction. Even when customers only have received store credit, not a cash refund, the sales associate has lost their commission. When retail workers have told customers trying to return a product that they could only get store credit, abuse from angry customers quickly became a significant source of stress for the sales team.

Kentwas proud of his promotion at the company he works for and bought the 82' SMART TV at CHS to celebrate. He bought the TV two weeks ago but decided to return it after he heard about the security warning (he also decided that spending the equivalent of one month's salary in his new position on a TV was probably not the best financial decision he had ever made). Luckily, he had kept the packaging and lugged the behemoth back to CHS to get a refund. "What do you mean I can't return the TV?" Kent asked Janis, the sales person. "There is a consumer alert that this device can be hacked and all my personal data stolen." Kent vaguely remembered the sales associate telling him that new CHS rules made sales final. Items could be returned for store credit but not a refund. That made sense if he just decided he didn't want the product, but the TV had a security defect that was not his fault. Kent was quickly becoming a loud, unhappy customer.

Everyday since the consumer alert, Brad Reid, the CHS store manager, saw his quarterly bonus shrink and his chance for promotion to regional manager sink. He was also becoming increasingly concerned that bad customer reviews could make this store location more vulnerable to closure. Rumours had been flying among store managers in the province that CHS was planning to close stores and shift to more online retailing. Brad was becoming increasingly frustrated with his own sales team. He was tired of hearing their complaints. His phone rang. Another angry customer was becoming more and more agitated and he had to go out onto the floor to address the situation himself. Rather than explain that Janis did not have the authority to approve a refund rather than a replacement, Brad apologized to the customer saying, "Well, our sales associates are worried about losing their commission, but please come back to my office and we can get this fixed for you." Janis just stared at Brad. As store manager, Brad had the authority to grant a refund but only did so in cases when the customer demanded to see the store manager.

Another performance reviews

After the customer left the store (with a full refund), Brad called Janis back to his office to discuss the encounter and her performance. "Janis, you really could have handled that situation better," Brad announced before she had a chance to sit down. "If he files a complaint on the corporate website or submits a negative review, it will be bad for this store." Janis was so angry she was speechless, but Brad did not notice how upset she was.

"This, combined with the other performance issues we have discussed, might force me to cut back on your shifts until you show some improvement," Brad continued. "I thought that you would improve your numbers with the SMART TV promotion, but all these returns are worse than not making the sales in the

first place." Through clenched teeth Janis asked, "What do you mean, 'all these returns'? You still have us promoting products that have security problems. How can I get blamed for these returns?"

"Let me explain," Brad began, but Janis cut him off. "I don't need you to mansplain anything to me. The rules say I can't authorize a refund, only store credit, so that's what I told the customer. Then he got more upset and started getting abusive. I have a right not to be abused and harassed at work. I called you in to help; I thought that was your job!" Janis was standing up and shouting now. "Wow, chill out Janis," Brad said, surprised, assuming that Janis was getting emotional over another performance review. "I am sure you will handle this type of situation better next time."

Janis turned, walked out of Brad's office, and slammed the door as she left.

Analyze the case and draft a report based on their analysis. Specifically, this will involve taking preliminary notes on the problem (defining the problem and analyzing the major causes or triggers, with consideration of the manager's conflict management approach and communication). Developing a resolution strategy and considerations for implementation of the action plan, including any possible risks, challenges, or possible negative reactions. Your draft report will include: (a) a problem analysis (problem definition and causal analysis), (b) a resolution strategy, and (c) considerations for challenges to implementation of the strategy and recommendations for how to mitigate these challenges.

Review your case, making notes on the following:

What do you see as the key problem? What outcomes of this problem are most concerning?
Analyze the triggers of the conflict. Identify each and describe how it contributes to the problem as you have defined it. Focus on what you see as the 2 most important triggers.
Describe the manager's approach to conflict. What were the strengths and weaknesses in their approach, and how might it be improved?
Analyze the manager's communication in the case. What were the strengths and weaknesses in their communication, and how might communication be improved?

Continue to work independently on your report, outlining and describing aresolution strategy.The resolution strategy should address the issue by improving outcomes, sustaining high performance, or both.

The resolution strategy should include the following components:

Goals based on the problem analysis - in other words, what outcomes will be improved through your proposed strategy?
An action plan for EACH of the two identified factors/triggers.
Realistic, specific and tangible steps.
A timeline, with short-term and longer-term steps.

Continue to work independently on your report, outlining and describing considerations forimplementation of the resolution strategy.The considerations and recommendations should take a wide variety of environmental factors/triggers into account, from various perspectives, and include the following components: