We had an interesting case in our Asia Pac class - it actually won an award!

It was about a State-Owned Enterprise (SOE) being taken over by a CE (some collectivist structure) which had already been taken over by a charismatic manager. The CE manager need to change the culture - fairly lazy as people were busy producing items that no one would buy and would not really care about quality - so they introduce drastic measures and shock therapy. Among other treatment, they have a Yellow Feet humiliation when people really screw up. In the end, because people suffer too much and see their employment threatened (it was guaranteed as part of the SOE) and go on strike - the French way!!! In fact, even more so! They break everything they can get their hands on in the office building and beat up the middle managers.

The questions for us (and we had to advice the big boss) was about what to do. here is a compilation

- I mean, we can change the yellow feet if they don't like it. We can put a different color.
- We can guarantee employment but not income
- Mr Professor, do you think that the use of force would be considered inappropriate?
- Actually, I am really in favor of using force. Can we call up the military?

I am glad that our group identified the key success factor for short term management of the crisis

- fire workers who caused violence to show that you do not tolerate such a behavior
- go to local government and get them on your side to ensure that you are credible before you talk to the workers
- talk to the workers. Whoever's in is in, whoever's out can walk away.

The only thing different was that we were ready to compromise on the yellow feet. The actual management didn't.