Conflict in the workplace wasn't really something I dealt with at the factory I worked at for three straight summers. The people there were accommodating, worked together, and kept the business running efficient. However, as I have mentioned in previous posts, cover32 was not and still isn't a well functioning media company. The management was not good previously, and a lot of conflict arose from that. Eventually, the managing editors got into some heated conversations about issues with the site.
Over the summer, there was a viewers issue. The NFL isn't as popular in the summer as it is when it is active in the fall and winter months. Many writers were concerned with this.
This person, let's call him Travis, had a different idea of how he wanted things to run at cover32. He was the editor for one of the teams at the time and eventually rose to a national editor role. Over the summer, the schedule was being set up for the national writers. Travis had other ideas about what the direction of the company could look like. He was very into the media itself and how ratings looked at the sports media giants. So, he decided that a podcast network should be added because more people were gravitating towards podcasts and not just random little stories about every team around the league.
However, many managing editors felt that the company was just fine how it was. Those guys felt that they did their work, got the revenue, and were good to go. Also, they seemed very opposed to change and evolution.
So, Travis brought up the changes. Most were on board with the podcast network. But, Travis brought up other things that no one knew about in the process. He felt that less posts and more radio talk was the answer to the issues with viewers and that hot takes (out there statements and analysis) were the face of the future.
Many editors were not on board here. This brought Travis into first model of action from Argyris and Schon's theories for action. Travis definitely believed with the negative response and tension that followed that the organization was volatile and he had to look out for himself. He approached some of us who were more on the fence and okay with the changes and tried to make us bring an offensive towards those who were not fans of the decision. This was his private solution, to pressure the others using those who weren't against him. He believed that more people could get the editors on the other side to change over to his side. He truly believed that the others were the problem this company faced and their lack of evolution would doom the company.
He then took the final steps of the first model of action. He intensified pressure to change and began using personal attacks in public areas. One of those areas was the group email. He called out specific people and that they were a hazard to the company. Eventually, with a podcast network losing steam and his lack of power to fully change the site, Travis left cover32 in the late summer to start his own site.
One way that this could have been avoided is a stronger management. Our manager, let's call him Tyler, was very laid back and avoided conflict at all times. He finally said something after the personal attacks in the group email, but never took sides other than then. If he had addressed the problems early on, the volatile situation could have been handled well before things got out of hand.
The way you described the structure of Cover32, it's not clear to me where the final decision power resided, though I gather it wasn't with Travis. In a flat structure when somebody tries to assert authority - who voted for him as dictator? - that, of course, can backfire.
ReplyDeleteIn this case, this is mixed in with the merit of the podcast idea, and then still a different issue which I don't get because I'm not somebody who pays attention to sites like these. Isn't this space kind of crowded with other competitors? If so, what is it that they do? Normally a business establishes a core competency and uses that repeatedly in its various business decisions. The way you told the story, it isn't obvious that there was a core competency. So what you have attributed to weak management might be something else altogether - whether the operation itself made sense business-wise.
I know you have other posts where you talk about a different site that worked better. But on the business side of things, I don't understand that, so you might explain why this sort of site can make sense if it is done well.
I think when it comes to this site and its structure back in this situation, we had a chief editor who was not very involved and two national editors who were the overseers of the team editors and then their writers. Both guys were involved in the podcast network to start, but then Travis' ideas got more radical. He talked to the chief editor and kind of just went for it. There was stiff resistance from a lot of team editors that were unwilling to change. In a competitive market like sports writing, one needs to adjust and be versatile. However, the approach by Travis was the reason why things fell apart.
DeleteTo be competitive and have things well run, a strong manager at the top needs to exist. Expectations need to be laid out. If things were taken constructively and meetings were called, maybe cover32 would look quite different.
Did cover32 decide to do something about the down time in the off season? It seems like to me it would be a great time to come up with ideas and do trial runs, like what Argyris and Schon suggested. If the time and money was there, maybe the company could try different podcast formats, or something different entirely.
ReplyDeleteI think what is most interesting about this story is that most people did, in fact, support the idea of a podcast network being used to counter the downtime during the offseason. It was only until Travis began miscommunication and being uncooperative that conflict arose and people began to go against it (in addition to the other changes he paired with the podcast network). Had he gone about this in a different way, cover32 may have ended up with a successful podcast network.
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