Mr. Brown is one of the company’s best commercial account managers. He is successful and this results in fantastic clients. Mr. Brown is held up as an example for many
of his colleagues. The management board sees Mr. Brown as a role model for young talented employees in the company.
The company’s policy on deals of more than € 500.000 is to require one of the managing directors to co-sign the documents. One Friday afternoon, at closing hour, Mr. Brown comes to your offices and requests you send his latest bid as soon as possible. It is of great importance as the as the bidding window is nearly closed and the client insists on receiving the bid today. The directors have already left for the weekend and are not available anymore. As the bid is € 800.000 the documents may, according to the policy, not be sent to the client without the director’s signature.
What will your decision be?: not cooperate with Mr. Brown and take the risk that your company will not get the important client. Or do you agree with Mr. Brown and let him send the documents without your boss’ approval.
Advice
You can easily explain Mr. Brown that he is violating the company’s policy. It may be a suggestion to have Mr. Brown call one of the other directors to at least inform him/her on this deal. The board of directors are to take the final decision. If there are absolutely no directors available, you can consider leaving the decision over to Mr. Brown.
