Power, Politics, and Conflict in the Thomas Green Case
This paper examines the workplace conflict between Thomas Green and his supervisor Frank Davis at Dynamic Displays, as explored through the lens of organizational power and political behavior. After an unconventional promotion supported by division vice president Shannon McDonald, Green found himself in a tense reporting relationship with Davis, who had not been involved in the hiring decision. The paper identifies competing power bases, contrasting work styles, and a low-trust organizational environment as the primary drivers of escalating conflict. Drawing on concepts including legitimate power, pressure tactics, secondary tension, and rational persuasion, the analysis concludes with practical recommendations for both individuals and the organization to resolve the dispute and restore productive working relationships.
- Introduction: Thomas Green's Rise and Conflict: Green's unconventional promotion sparks supervisor conflict
- Power Dynamics Between Green and Davis: Competing power bases create political workplace war
- Causes of Conflict and Contrasting Work Styles: Different values and methods fuel escalating disagreement
- Power Tactics and Political Behavior: Davis uses legitimacy and pressure against Green
- Organizational Environment and Defensive Behavior: Low-trust climate drives Green's political behavior
- Recommendations for Resolution: Three strategies for individuals and the organization
- Conclusion: Secondary tension and lessons on power disparity
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What makes this paper effective
- The paper grounds its analysis in named organizational behavior concepts—legitimate power, pressure tactics, rational persuasion, and secondary tension—connecting theory directly to specific events in the case.
- It maintains a balanced perspective, identifying failures on both Green's and Davis's sides rather than assigning blame to one party alone.
- The concluding recommendations are concrete and actionable, addressing the individual, interpersonal, and organizational levels of the conflict.
Key academic technique demonstrated
The paper demonstrates applied case analysis: it introduces a real-world scenario, diagnoses the underlying organizational behavior concepts at work, and moves systematically from problem identification to cause analysis to recommendation. This structure—situation, diagnosis, prescription—is a standard format in business and management writing and shows how theoretical frameworks can be applied to interpret workplace events.
Structure breakdown
The paper opens with a narrative summary of Green's career trajectory and the circumstances of his promotion. Subsequent sections analyze the power relationships between Green and Davis, catalogue the specific causes of their conflict, and identify the power tactics each employed. The paper then situates the conflict within Dynamic Displays' broader organizational climate before offering three recommendations and a brief conclusion that introduces secondary tension theory as a unifying concept.
Introduction: Thomas Green's Rise and Conflict
Thomas Green was an up-and-coming marketing specialist who found himself in his dream job, only to watch things spin completely out of control before his eyes. Green graduated from university with a degree in Economics and obtained a position with Dynamic Displays as an account executive. He hit the ground running and immediately made a good impression on management. Within four months he had been promoted to a Senior Market Specialist position, a step made possible by the division vice president, who had taken him under her wing and effectively made the promotion happen. The move was a significant step upward and did not follow the traditional path that most Senior Account Executives take.
Once promoted, Green began reporting to a new supervisor, Frank Davis. Unfortunately, Davis had not been included in the promotion decision and was therefore not receptive to having Green on his team. This was the beginning of Thomas Green's downfall. Rather than offering Green guidance, the division vice president essentially left him to manage the situation on his own. She told Green that he had been given an unusual opportunity, that he was walking into a tricky situation with his new boss, and that if Davis had been able to choose a new employee it would not have been him. She offered no plan for managing the fallout. Green and Davis diverged on work styles as well as market projections. Green believed that the sales goals set by Davis were based on creative accounting and grossly overstated the current market environment. An atmosphere of silent conflict developed quickly between the two men, and Green worried that Davis was building a case to fire him. Green's circumstances illustrate how a failure to adapt to a new work style and fully recognize the demands and boundaries of a new position can lead to professional crisis.
Power Dynamics Between Green and Davis
Power is the ability one person has to influence the behavior of another so that the other acts in accordance with the first person's wishes. This includes dependency power, where a particular individual possesses something of importance, scarcity, and non-substitutability that another person seeks (Power and Organizational Power, n.d.). Thomas Green and Frank Davis both established individual power over one another, creating a conflicting relationship that led to a political struggle involving people outside the immediate work group.
The central problem was that both Davis and Green believed they possessed superior knowledge for performing their respective roles. Davis was reliant upon Green in order to do his own job effectively — he needed information from Green, who was responsible for identifying industry trends, evaluating new opportunities, and establishing sales projections. This dependency created a power imbalance that neither man managed constructively. Alongside this central issue, there were numerous other tensions: a conflict between Green's work environment and his personal life, a breakdown of trust in the organization, and a deteriorating relationship with his supervisor. Each man displayed a distinct personality and a very different vision of how their work should be carried out.
Causes of Conflict and Contrasting Work Styles
Many factors contributed to the problems between Davis and Green. Both men held different values and beliefs about the role. Frank Davis had previously served as a Senior Market Specialist and brought direct experience and strict expectations to the position. Although Thomas Green had been promoted to the same title, he believed he could fulfill the role without prior managerial experience. In his previous position he had demonstrated strong ambition and a drive for growth, which contributed to his rapid promotion. However, his motivation to accept the role was not matched by the skills needed to fulfill its demands, and this gap created ongoing conflict with Davis.
The two men also presented starkly different working styles. Frank Davis prepared detailed memos and proposals before meeting with clients, while Green preferred to present ideas as he developed them in the moment. Green spent his first week as a Senior Marketing Specialist reviewing current sales data, whereas Davis expected him to be preparing for client meetings and developing proposals. Davis frequently used his formal authority to direct Green, and in response, Green exhibited defensive behavior. As organizational behavior theory notes, a marketing director depends on gathering information from senior marketing specialists to perform effectively. The regional sales information that Green held was critically important to Davis, and there was no readily substitutable source for it. This dependency, left unmanaged, allowed the conflict between them to escalate completely out of control.
Conclusion
The disproportionate use of power produced a damaging relationship between two colleagues. Each person sought advice from outside group members rather than addressing the conflict directly, which allowed it to grow well beyond its origins. Thomas Green and Frank Davis's issues developed into a significant organizational conflict that involved people at multiple levels of the company.
Power strategies are most effective when properly and thoughtfully applied. People of lower status can hold a substantial degree of power over those of higher status, particularly when they control information that others depend upon. Organizational conditions strongly influence an individual's political behavior and the amount of power they are perceived to hold.
Secondary tension — the tension that arises as group members struggle for influence, develop roles and norms, and explore differences in approaching shared tasks (Jenkin, 2010) — captures the essence of what occurred between Davis and Green. Each man wanted to establish authority within the company, and both sought the same organizational outcomes but through incompatible methods. The approaches Green favored did not serve the company's long-term interests, while Davis's methods, though sometimes heavy-handed, were oriented toward Dynamic Displays' future success. Power and political disparity, this case demonstrates, should always be addressed within the concerned group and resolved through structured, transparent organizational processes rather than allowed to escalate into a broader political conflict.
References
Jenkin, Kate. (2010). Workplace Stress. Retrieved August 3, 2010, from docstoc Web site: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/2651516/Workplace-Stress
McShane, Stephen L. and Von Glinow, Mary Ann. (2010). Organizational Behavior (5th ed.). Boston: McGraw Hill Irwin.
Power and Organizational Power. (n.d.). Retrieved August 3, 2010, from Management Consulting Courses Web site: http://managementconsultingcourses.com/Lesson30Power&OrganizationalPolitics.pdf
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