Read through the mini case study and the emails, and then answer:

1- What is the problem from Jack's point of view?

2- How well do you think Jack understands the reasons for Akash's behavior? What other cultural, personality, and business reasons could there be?

3- What is Jack's proposal to 'solve' the problem? What other solutions could there be?

Mini case context Jack is a financial controller based in New York. He has asked Akash, a colleague in India, several times over the last ten days to email him some local budget figures which are needed to create a central report. However, despite a recent phone call from Akash promising to send the report the next day, Jack has not received any budget figures. He decides to send this email about the problem to two colleagues with experience of working in India.Hi How goes it? Hope you're busy. Look, sorry to trouble you but I have a bit of a challenge with Akash in Bangalore. I keep requesting figures, getting a promise to deliver, but then I never get anything. To be honest, I'm getting annoyed because this whole style of promising and then not delivering is just unprofessional. I'm also worried because I need the figures for my own report in the next week - if I don't get that, I'll miss one of my key targets. I'm thinking of escalating the problem and writing a very direct email to Akash's boss and copying in my boss. What do you think? Any advice would be much appreciated! Best regards JackEmail 1 Hi Jack Sorry to hear about the problems. Not sure what is going on. I heard that quite a few managers in the local operation in India are unhappy about the new centralised reporting system. This might explain the delay in getting figures to you. Seems like they feel you're checking up on them! Not sure about the escalation idea. What kind of relationship do you have with Akash and his manager? You haven't visited them yet, have you? I think you should probably get across there and do some relationship building. All this asking for figures by email can come across as pretty disrespectful sometimes. Be careful just relying on mail. If you want to talk more about it, give me a call! PiotrEmail 2 Dear Jack I had a similar problem last year. Kept asking for information but never got anything. The problem was actually IT. They couldn't get the figures out of the system for some reason. And they didn't want to tell me because they didn't want to say no to me ... so they said yes all the time and never delivered. It's actually a cultural thing. To get things moving, you could ask your boss to speak to the local boss in India. Probably best handled at that level as you may not have the authority to speak to high-level management. It can be very hierarchical there, as you know. Sorry I can't be more helpful. Good luck! Cheers Javed