You are P.T. Smyrter, a management consultant specializing in intercultural training. You have been called in by the President, Jarice Clawson, to provide assistance to Robo-Works, a Boston-based manufacturer of sophisticated robots used in a variety of industrial uses, including performing delicate soldering on computer boards. Robo-Works recently sold several robots to two companies, one in Japan and one in Egypt. As part of the sales contract, Robo-Works agreed to provide 10-weeks of training for installers and operators of those two clients respectively, but almost as soon as the training had begun, serious problems surfaced.
Your first task is to uncover the nature of the problems and resolve them as quickly as possible before the damage to the two sets of business relationships is irreparable, and second, to plot a course of action for Robo-Works' management so the problems don't reoccur with other customers in the future. So far, you have gathered the following information ...
Robo-Works scheduled both groups' training sessions at its Boston headquarters, where its model set-up and assembly line is located. During the first half of the training, the trainees were to be instructed on installing, operating, and maintaining robots that were essentially similar to the ones they had purchased, although the training robots were slightly older models. When the custom models they had actually ordered were assembled, the trainees would complete their training on the new ones, a changeover which was to occur at the five-week mark.
Robo-Works has served hundreds of U.S. customers, but the new customers were the first from outside the United States. Jane Carderra, Robo-Works' chief engineer, was assigned to schedule the training sessions for employees from the two companies, and to train the Egyptian group; her colleague Bob Clark was assigned to train the Japanese group. Although Carderra had never traveled to either country and didn't speak Japanese or Arabic, she had looked forward to working with the new customers. She had been told that they all spoke some English and were hard workers. The Japanese company sent five men and five women trainees The Egyptian company sent ten men, and each group had a training contact, or "cultural liason," who could interpret at a high level of competence, and with whom Carderra was supposed to coordinate training and resolve problems.
Carderra had decided to schedule both groups in Monday through Friday classes from 9 AM to 12 PM and 1 PM to 5 PM, but almost immediately the Egyptian training contact somewhat angrily refused to announce the schedule to that group, so they were, after some tense discussion, re-scheduled for 9-2 Monday through Thursday and 9-2 on Saturday, which made Carderra none too happy, since she had not contracted to work on weekends. To make matters worse, on the first day the Egyptian trainees did not respond to Carderra's teaching: when she began to direct them on a preliminary installation procedure, they waited until her assistant, Bill Wilson led them through the process; in addition, they would not ask her questions, but rather directed their questions to Bill. At the end of the day, she was very frustrated.
In the meantime, Bob Clark thought that the training session with the Japanese group went okay, but he was frustrated by the number of requests he got at the end of the day from the Japanese trainees for information about places to eat in Boston, places to go for entertainment, doctors to see, transportation advice, and for other personal information that kept him late and that he didn't think was was part of his job as a trainer. That evening, after a brief phone call, Carderra and Clark decided to switch groups, and the next day the sessions went much better.
For a while, training proceeded fairly smoothly, but like Bob Clark, Carderra became increasingly frustrated by requests from the Japanese trainees for personal assistance after training session hours. She wanted to leave for her own lunch right at noon, rather than answering questions, and she wanted to leave for home at the end of the day, since she had a long commute, but this was increasingly impossible: sometimes the trainees even asked her to settle disputes among their group members, a task for which she felt unequipped. During the third week, one of the Japanese employees complained to Carderra that he felt that it would have been better to train with robots that were exactly the same as the ones they had purchased, but when she explained that a switchover would soon occur, his face got red and he did not participate further. The next week, Robo-Works' management told Carderra that the Japanese group had expressed that there were problems with the training.
At about the same time, Bob Clark sent a memo to Robo-Works Vice President for Business Relations, George Brown. Clark, like Carderra, had been having problems, but of a different nature. In the memo to Brown he complained that he could not guarantee the quality of the training he was providing, because although the trainees demonstrated competence in operating the robots, attendance at the sessions had been poor. Trainees had on regular occasions made excuses for leaving and returning, based on either religious observance or family reasons, and thus had not completed parts of their written assignments. At times, trainees had handed in work for each other, and thus he felt he could not determine the competence of each individual trainee. He had told the group that he felt that there were some problems, and that they should not help each other with the written work. After he spoke to them they seemed genuinely upset and confused, but they continued to excuse themselves and hand in work for each other. He wrote the memo because he had grown increasingly upset that the Egyptian trainees were not taking the training seriously, and might return to their home site without adequate skills, for which inadequate training he felt he and Robo-Works might be held responsible later.
It was a combination of these incidents that had led Clawson to call you and ask for assistance. As part of your investigation of the root causes of the problem, you also collected copies of the original letters and memos sent between Robo-Works and the two companies, in which the conditions for the training were set out. You next interviewed both the trainers and the trainees. From the trainers you learned that the Japanese trainees seldom asked questions in class, and did not talk to each other, but seemed to understand the lessons: they took copious notes and documented everything carefully. The Egyptian trainees talked among each other, seemed distracted, took few notes, and expressed that they were very concerned about translating what they had learned into adequate documentation for their co-workers when they returned to their home site.
In the interview with the Egyptian trainees, the spokesperson said, "We are genuinely sorry to have disappointed Mr. Clark. He has told us that some of our staff could use some more training. Of course that is possible. Most probably we will have to give them some additional assistance."
In the interview with the Japanese, which George Brown, upon request, also attended, the following exchange was recorded between the Japanese group's contact person, Mr. Otomo, and Mr. Brown:
Brown: I'd to bring up the problem of the trainer for your group. Otomo: What about the trainer? Brown: Well, I understand you are not pleased. I think we should find you a new instructor as soon as possible. Otomo: I wonder what the members of the group think. Brown: I had hoped to resolve it now. I would like your opinion. Otomo: Yes, we should get opinions before we decide. Brown: Good, so what do you say. Otomo: I couldn't really say at this point. I need to talk to the group.
You also found the following memo especially helpful:
No. 1356
Date: 10/2/1360
Okesh Limited -- Producer of Various Computer Peripherals
Address -- Cairo-Behan Street No. 140-mailbox #273
Telephone 346960 Fax 4145711
Robo-Works Corporation -- Robot Supplier
Mr. Brown -- Vice President of Robo-Works Corporation
Since our previous telephone conversation I wish to inform you that we have selected ten of our very best of engineers to attend the training sessions. They all speak, read, and write in both Arabic and French, and all speak English fairly well. They are diligent and loyal and are of high status in our company. We are pleased and proud to send them to you and hope you will find them exemplary in every way. We do sincerely hope, also, that they will be provided with high-quality documentation in Arabic to use to train their associates at Okesh, as they have been honored to do so on their return. In addition, please send a copy of your training materials to me in advance, so all relevant parties can become somewhat accustomed to them before the training begins.
Sincerely, President of Okesh Corporation
You discovered that indeed the advance materials had been sent, in English, but that no documentation had yet been prepared to send back with the trainees. It turns out that the contents of the memo had originally been relayed to Mr. Brown orally by the agreed-upon Egyptian training contact, and later the written copy had been received by Brown's secretary and filed. Brown, however, had determined that the memo asked for documentation that was not specified in the original contract with the Egyptian clients, and he consequently had not followed up on their requests.
Assuming that you are P.T. Smyrter, based on the information that you abstract from this case, as well as on your knowledge as management professionals, and on your readings as management students, determine what Robo-Works' (several!) problems were in this situation, and articulate a strategy that will help Robo-Works interact more successfully with international business clients in the future. Remember that not all information in a business case is relevant to the problem or set of problems which you identify as critical to address in your report.
Keep in mind that this is a case in which communication problems figure prominently; thus your response needs to address the communication aspects specifically, and it also needs to demonstrate that you have read and conducted research.
Good Luck!!
Updated 4-23-97 EdC
Last Updated 10-22-98 EdC
Copyright (c) 1996 Linda M. LaDuc