1.What did Betty do wrong prior to the meeting and what could have been done to avoid missing the deadline?

Betty could have managed the situation better by keeping track of Don’s progress. She said he had a history of turning things in late, knowing that she could have checked in with him at three weeks to the deadline and again a week and a half before it was due, and the end of the prior week, just to see if anything came up that required extra time or if more resources were needed for the project.

2. What did Betty do wrong in the meeting itself, and what could have been done to make the meeting more effective?

In addition to asking for updates, she could have asked Don what the status of the report is. Instead, she started to attack him for being late. There is a number of reasons that it may not be ready. It may have been more productive to work with him to solve the problem, and then go back to figure out what went wrong.

The problem started to escalate when Betty began to attack Don personally, for always being behind, having a messy office, and then she threatened his job. It was counterproductive and if anything, may have left him demotivated to complete the project, worst-case scenario is that he quit and she’ll be stuck completing it.

3. What should Don have done to be more effective?

Don should have provided Betty with an update when he ran into his first issue. One can assume that the reason she asked him to do the project is because of his diligence and attention to detail. If he had told her that there was an issue with the numbers, she may have been more willing to allocate additional resources to assist him with the project to ensure that it would be completed on time.

He called Betty to provide an update, but when she didn’t return his call, he should have persisted to ensure that she got the message instead, she was blindsided when she returned to the office.