The Case of the Email Goof

By -
I'm writing a case for my Management Research Report (MRR) so I figured to flex my case-writing muscles with this little caselet:

It's 9:00pm and you were lounging in a very comfy chair right in front of your laptop computer. It had been a long day at work, but like any other dedicated Marketing manager, you decided to take a peek at your office email inbox before you surfed away to the Facebooks, the YouTubes and Orkuts of the world wide web.

The first couple of emails were the standard fare "Do-this-do-that" messages from the boss but then you noticed a subject line that stood out: "Re: FWD: The Happiness of Life." You inspect that the email was from Rita Angeles, one of your colleagues from Human Resources, and you thought to yourself that the email was one of those pointless email forwards that contained happy-sappy messages. However, you realized that the email was a reply to a forwarded message that went straight to your trash bin. This stroked your curiosity.

You opened the email and what you saw was far from "The Happiness of Life"-- it was a strong reply to the sender of the original forwarded email, Alvin Sabordo, a manager from your company's Finance unit. Rita's email was sent to the company's group email address for managers but the message was addressed solely to Alvin. You scanned the message and several lines grabbed your attention:

"Please refrain from seeing my friend Steph in the office..."
"...as per our company's policy, employees who are in non-professional relationships with co-employees are subject to sanctions..."
"...if you cannot help yourselves, please be more discrete, or just go elsewhere..."
"...I will not hesitate to report you, if you still persist..."
"...This is just my word of advice to you..."

It then occured to you that the Steph the message was referring to was the one from Human Resources.

While you were very intrigued by the message, you stopped and thought: You did not have any proof of the allegations Rita made, yet she seemed to be a person who knew a lot of the situation. Although there were indications that Rita wanted to communicate with Alvin only, you were not 100% convinced that was the case.

As you sat in your comfy chair, you thought more importantly: What was the best thing to do in this situation?

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Getting Admitted to the MBA Program

By -
Let backtrack a bit: How was I able to get admitted to the Asian Institute of Management (AIM)? The admission process is a relatively brief process, but rigorous nonetheless. The AIM Website outlines the procedure on how to apply and the requirements as well. However, I found some old content at the AIM site that might get some users confused. But in spite of that, my experience in applying was a very smooth and hassle-free one. I made sure that I had the following accomplished: Application Form - This can be downloaded online . The application form is very long and has 14 essay questions! It is better to answer the essay questions briefly and direct to the point. Official Transcripts - This is my undergraduate transcript from the University of the Philippines - Diliman . Academic Recommendation Letter - I had a former professor of mine from the Ateneo Graduate School of Business accomplish this one. Professional Recommendation Letter - I asked a former superior make a recommenda...
Read more

My Experience with the Embassy of India in Manila

By -
Image
Are you a Filipino going to India? Be warned. You may be in for a great deal of frustration. I've been spending the past week arranging my visa for my Action Consultancy (AC) in India. (The AC is equivalent to AIM's industry internship for its MBA students; I'll blog more about this in future posts). The frustration has really been mounting because of the very confusing and Byzantine system of the Indian embassy here in the Philippines. First point of frustration: the customer service. I initially called the embassy to clarify the requirements and procedures. The embassy has an automated answering system that has a selection where a caller can get an itemized list of requirements. That's all. No information of procedures, steps or guidelines. I selected the option to talk to a staff member and when I asked my query, she told me I'll find everything I need at the Indian Embassy website . If you look at the site, there are some information, but not the ones I'm lo...
Read more

Asian Institute of Management in India?

By -
I've been following the "new campus" moves of the Asian Institute of Management as of late and while I said my piece a while back, there was some development that reached the media last week. I've speculated that AIM's new campus may be outside of the Metro Manila. But how about a new campus outside of the Philippines? President Francis Estrada said in an interview with Business Standard : AIM is an Asian Institute and is not just for the Philippines. We are thinking of creating campuses beyond the capital Manila and are looking at proposals to establish presence in India. My take on this is that from a strategic point of view, it's pretty sound.The Indian graduate education student market is very huge and talented and AIM had seen a big growth of Indian students since the start of the 2000's. Here's a fact: For the MBA program, the Indian population in AIM has steadily grown and if you compare the 2001 class to our class, the Indian percentage o...
Read more