However – the fact that it’s an MBA program, not an academic-track program, is relevant. In the busines world, you are likely to be forced to work on project teams in conjunction with people you may actively dislike, or at least would not voluntarily associate with – if that’s a part of the idea behind the team structure for the MBA program, it makes a lot of sense.
If you can’t make people suspend their dislike of you long enough for school, then you don’t have the skills required of an MBA holder. This is a professional training program, not an academic one, and part of the skillset required is to work on teams without alienating all of the other members. I do agree that the director or dean needs to man up and kick the guy out instead of leaving him to flounder, but that’s as far as my sympathy extends.
Anecdote time.
We lived through this exact same issue. It was while doing a Post Graduate Diploma (300 hour course only open to graduates)
First two group projects went okay, but rumblings were heard about The Jerk. For the third, the whole class refused to work with him.
As back ground: my wife and I attended the course together, we were in the same working group, and our group was stable throughout the course. No members changed, we got along with no issues. All the other groups changed fro project to project.
We had “calss meetings” where the lecturer of that segment tried to talk sense to the class, followed by meetings with the (equivalent of) Dean. Everybody still refused to work with him.
The meeting with the Dean actually turned out to be quite entertaining, after about 75 minutes of negotiations, accusations, pleas and promises, the student body started leaving the class one by one, until just the course supervisor and the ostracised student were left.
Not sure of the eventual outcome…we never heard nor saw the guy again.
I say - if he can’t work in a group environment, it is up to the school to work out a solution that does NOT involve forcing one of the groups to take him in. If that solution is compromising on the standards expected of him, allowing him a repeat with no penalty or allowing him to fail is up to them to decide. This would of course also impact on the reputation of the programme, their standards and future perceptions, setting a precedent etc etc.
Can you give examples of this “bad behavior”? There’s nothing more unsatisfying than all this hype being told he’s a “creepy asshole” and you wouldn’t be surprised if he turns out as a serial killing cannibal, yet not a single example of what you are talking about? Just saying he has “bad behavior” and everyone hates him?
Come on, you can do better than that.
Rigmarole, I basically understand and agree. But I’m gonna take a WAG here: there might have been several incidents just adding up: unsolicited groping, a rude stare here, a chauvinistic or perv-y comment there. Not just one jerkish faux pas, but continual creepy/assholish behaviour on Paul’s part. But as I said, that’s just a wild-assed guess.
So yes, Sundrop, would you mind elaborating?
So what’s to be done? At what point do you divert him to resources to improve group-work skills in conjunction with the class, and where do you tell him he needs to retry next semester? It’s late April - I’m guessing he’s screwed at this point.
Paul sounds like he not only doesn’t belong in an MBA class, but he doesn’t belong in any job where he’ll have to interact with people. It’s one thing to not be able to get along with one particular group of people. It’s quite another thing for someone to be told and counseled repeatedly about his behavior and he is resistant to the idea that he needs to change.
Social skills can be learned by most people who have at least normal intelligence. Paul probably does know how to interact with people, but he chooses not to do it.
I think it’s great that there’s a situation with a built-in disincentive to act like an asshole. I think a better-run universe would provide more such situations.
This program is for working professionals, right? Does it take substantial time away from normal working hours?
It’s not unknown for managers to deal with someone who causes more problems than they’re worth to let them spend all the time they want in training classes, just to get them out of the way. Maybe that’s what Paul’s boss did?
Heh. “You’re an asshole. If you don’t believe me, we’re paying to send you to take courses so that 30 new people can tell you the same thing.”
It’s not only easier, it can be a lot cheaper than firing the guy.
So what’s up with this guy? Did he actually grab someone’s tit and key her car or has he taken the women-love-jerks-so-I’m-going-to-be-one douchebaggery so far he’s become a psychologically unstable caricture of a hedge fund manager? Is he a screamer? Openly insulting? I’m curious.
I’m inclined to agree, but so are quite a few of the students in other courses just starting their term papers today, or realizing that without actually working some of the example problems all semester they are totally screwed for the quantitative final.
I’m kind of assuming that some interventions have been offered to him already. The similar program I’m familiar with puts quite a bit of thought and structure into teaching effective teamwork. If the programs didn’t, they would be Junior High, Part II. So the professor / program director get to make the call on failing him, letting him retake the class, etc. according to the school’s policies and some professional judgment.
I’m totally unfamiliar with MBA programs, but what about how this influences the other students? It seems to me that you frequently have to work with people you find personally distasteful, and learning how to do so with aplomb would be pretty valuable. I mean, you generally can’t vote your co-managers out of the company, can you? I’d think the appropriate response would be dealing with it through your supervisors (or the professor/program director/dean, in this case).
While Paul may be showing that he is unable to work well in a group and succeed in an MBA program (I am not doubting the OPs claims), what is interesting is that 30 other students are showing that they do not know how to manage and work with a difficult co-worker/employee and feel that ostracizing is an acceptable course of action in a “professional” environment.
Which school is this again? Remind me never to go there!
No, because that would be ridiculous.
I have never heard of this in my 15 years of working in the corporate world. Training costs money and it’s hard enough to get legitimate training for your people, let alone use training as a place to dump problem employees. And since they can’t be in training all the time, it doesn’t really solve the problem anyway. AND since this is an executive or part-time MBA program, presumably most classes are after work hours anyway.
One of the most valuable experiences of an MBA program is working on project teams with your peers. Every class I had pretty much had at least one and often multiple group projects. It seems to me that if you can’t even manage to stay in a group, how can you possibly manage other people?
You have to really be a jerk to get kicked out of every group though. The main reasons seem to be 1) being willfully offensive or argumentative on a constant basis, 2) not pulling your weight (and even then you REALLY need to not be pulling your weight).
A cannibal with someone’s tongue in his cheek? Someone needs to talk to a dean.
How many “professional” environments have you worked in? Ostracism and empire-building are pretty common in the professional world. In fact at just about every job I know of I could think of at least one manager or executive that was slowly having his power drained because he or she can’t get anything done, because no one will work with him/her.
Oh, and I would so love to be in a program where you can kick out the asshole. Most of the time you are just stuck with them and have to work around them as best as possible, and then they take all the credit when you’re done. Sort of like real life…
Oh, I’ve worked in a handful or so of professional environments, and I don’t really disagree with you.
But I’ve also been in school a lot (working on my second undergrad) and a school project based “professional” environment tends to expect people to work in a very idealised, perfect-world manner to get things done. Which is why the MBA program allowing a student to get ostracized, allowing students to change groups and not becoming involved to help teach “ideal” conflict resolution seems odd to me. It seems that this is an opportunity to perhaps actually learn something useful, and that’s not happening.
That isn’t an absolute deterrent, in the management world.
When the manager has to justify the expense, sure. Not when it’s imposed upon him.
It did happen, on a wide scale, at a previous employer of mine whose famous CEO got religion about the latest fad, and required every department to give up a certain number of people to become its high priests. The department heads, thinking it was just the latest fad and would blow over like the rest, sent their *least *valuable people. They never suspected that the CEO was a genuine convert, that the religion wasn’t going to blow over any time soon, and that this bunch of turkeys was really going to be anointed the company’s new leaders.
I’ve never been a bit impressed by Six Sigma Black Belts ever since.