Mindy Martin was no longer speaking to Al Sharp. She had been wary
of him since her first day at Alton Products; he had always
seemed distant and aloof. She thought at first that he resented her
MBA degree, her fast rise in the company, or her sense of purpose
and ambition. But she was determined to get along with everyone in
the office, so she had taken him out to lunch, praised his work
whenever she could, and even kept track of his son's Little League feats.
But all that ended with the appointment of the new Midwest Marketing
Director. Martin had had her sights on the job and thought her
chances were good. She was competing with three other managers
on her level. Sharp was not in the running because he did not have a
graduate degree, but his voice was thought to carry a lot of weight
with the top brass. Martin had less seniority than any of her
competitors, but her division had become the leader in the company
and upper management had praised her lavishly. She believed that
with a good recommendation from Sharp, she would get the job.
But Walt Murdoch received the promotion and moved to Topeka.
Martin was devastated. It was bad enough that she did not get the
promotion, but she could not stand the fact that Murdoch had been
chosen. She and Al Sharp had taken to calling Murdoch "Mr.
Intolerable" because neither of them could stand his pompous
arrogance. She felt that his being chosen was an insult to her; it made
her rethink her entire career. When the grapevine confirmed her
suspicion that Al Sharp had strongly influenced the decision, she
determined to reduce her interaction with Sharp to a bare minimum.
Relations in the office were very chilly for almost a month. Sharp soon
gave up trying to get back in Martin's favor, and they began
communicating only in short, unsigned memos. Finally, William
Attridge, their immediate boss, could tolerate the hostility no longer
and called the two in for a meeting. "We're going to sit here until you
two become friends again," he said, "or at least until I find out what's
bugging you."
Martin resisted for a few minutes, denying that anything had changed
in their relationship, but when she saw that Attridge was serious, she
finally said, "Al seems more interested in dealing with Walter
Murdoch." Sharp's jaw dropped; he sputtered but could not say
anything. Attridge came to the rescue.
"Walter's been safely kicked upstairs, thanks in part to Al, and neither
of you will have to deal with him in the future. But if you're upset about
that promotion, you should know that Al had nothing but praise for you
and kept pointing out how this division would suffer if we buried you in
Topeka. With your bonuses, you're still making as much as Murdoch.
If your work here continues to be outstanding, you'll be headed for a
much better place than Topeka."
Embarrassed, Martin looked at Sharp, who shrugged and said, "You
want to go get some coffee?"
Over coffee, Martin told Sharp what she had been thinking for the past
month and apologized for treating him unfairly. Sharp explained that
what she saw as aloofness was actually respect and something akin
to fear: He viewed her as brilliant and efficient. Consequently, he was
very cautious, trying not to offend her.
The next day, the office was almost back to normal. But a new ritual
had been established: Martin and Sharp took a coffee break together
every day at ten. Soon their teasing and friendly competition loosened
up everyone they worked with.
Mindy was certainly happy about the way that things worked out, but
she couldn't help but wonder whether a lot of things might have been
done differently and all of the recent problems might have been avoided.