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SCENARIO $1$ MANAGER ROLE:

You are a senior vice president of strategy at a large U$.$S$.$ power$-$systems company, and you have been seeking a new director of strategy and business management. You hired a $35-$year$-$old first$-$generation Indian executive from Americo, Inc., a small northeastern strategic business$-$development company. You have determined that this person would be a great addition to your leadership team because you have been very impressed by this person's knowledge of the competitive landscape, acute business$-$development skills from both strategic and practical perspectives, and consistent results. This person's ability to identify innovative approaches to your business and to challenge the way you've been doing business has exceeded your expectations. You see that this person has great determination and an admirable work ethic as evidenced by the willingness to put in long hours to get work done. It is no surprise that this person received an "Exceeds All" year$-$end performance rating.

As a developmental opportunity, you've asked this person to pull together and lead a cross$-$functional task force to propose an efficient re$-$org that would eliminate redundancies, identify role$-$redefinition opportunities, and increase employee engagement. This person took to the assignment with gusto. The task force would comprise five members of the current leadership team$-$essentially this person's peers. Those individuals were three of the regional sales managers, the director of marketing, and the director of the internal sales support desk.

While the task force was progressing, you found yourself monitoring your leadership team more than usual. You wanted to make sure your newest team member was getting along well, especially given the added responsibility of leading the task force. Your leadership team has a history together; they have survived numerous downsizing and organizational changes and have mastered the ability to operate in fire$-$drill mode, succeeding very well at short$-$term dynamic opportunities and responding enthusiastically at a moment's notice. As a result, they have developed camaraderie over the last few years.

So you didn't think it all that unusual early on when your newest team member was not always included in informal team activities$-$lunches in the cafeteria, intrateam happy hour e$-$mail invitations, and even some premeeting small talk at the weekly staff meetings. You figured that in time, this person would blend into the team more seamlessly. Indeed, you had hoped that the task force opportunity would help this person gain acceptance and respect through what you were certain would be excellent performance on the task force.

Late one afternoon, this person returned alone to the office after a lengthy task force meeting and seemed disturbed. The person sat down and immediately began returning calls and e$-$mails. This person's legendary work ethic of late hours was admirable, but this effort also seemed to be creating stress. You decided to stop by and see if everything was okay.

You begin...