• Read the Harvard case, Lisa Benton (A). Focus on person fit concepts.
o Diagnose the problem.
? How did it occur and why; what is the motivational issue?
o What recommendations do you propose?
o Consider these questions:
? How good is the fit between (a) Lisa Benton and (b) the position and organization?
? How good is the fit between who she wants to be and the learning opportunities the position affords?
? Why might she have done some things differently?
o Action planning: What should she do now, specifically?

Lisa Benton (A)
Early one afternoon in mid-October 1991, Lisa Benton, 27, gazed at the thin partitions of her
Research Associate Katherine Seger Weber prepared this updated case under the supervision of Professor Linda A. Hill as
the basis for class discussion rather than to illustrate either effective or ineffective handling of an administrative situation.
This case is a revision of an earlier case with the same title by Professor Vijay Sathe.
Copyright © 1994 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College. To order copies, call (617) 495-6117 or write the
Publishing Division, Harvard Business School, Boston, MA 02163. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored
in a retrieval system, used in a spreadsheet, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical,
photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the permission of Harvard Business School.
cubicle and reflected on the past four months of her job as an assistant product manager in the Home
Care Division of Houseworld. Benton was bored with her job and lack of responsibility and frustrated
by her relationships with her boss, Deborah Linton, and her colleague, associate product manager Ron
Scoville. From her first day at work, when Linton had informed her that she did not like Harvard
MBAs, Benton had struggled unsuccessfully to please her boss. A series of stormy exchanges with
Scoville had compounded her problems; recently he had accused her of being a “cocky MBA” when
she expressed her opinion. Benton was concerned about these events, and especially about her lessthan-
promising performance review, and she contemplated her future in the company with increasing
consternation.
Background
Between her first and second years at the Harvard Business School (HBS), Benton worked
as assistant to the president of Right-Away Stores, a premier chain of convenience food stores based
in Chicago. She enjoyed the job and was proud of the new nonmerchandising services that she had
successfully introduced, in particular, the in-line roller skate (“rollerblades”) rentals, a project she had
supervised from concept to execution. The kickoff to this project, a skating cookout, had been a huge
morale-booster for Right-Away employees. Right-Away president Scott Kingston, himself a Harvard
MBA, was especially pleased with Benton’s performance. Not only had she been the first woman
manager in the company, her “roll-up-your-sleeves” approach won people over and allowed Benton
to relate well to employees at all levels. At the end of the summer internship, Kingston offered her
a full-time position upon graduation, as well as part-time consulting during her second year at HBS.
Job Choice
Benton and her husband finished their studies simultaneously and faced the decision of where
they would go next. Chicago held opportunities for both of them, and Benton’s husband would take
up residency in a hospital in that city in July. Lisa Benton had to choose between two positions: one
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as director of marketing at Right-Away, the other as assistant product manager at Houseworld’s Home
Care Division.
The job at Right-Away was clearly appealing. Not only was its salary substantially higher
than the offer from Houseworld, Kingston indicated that Benton would be promoted to vice president
in a few years. While flattered, Benton was hesitant. She was concerned about assuming so much
marketing responsibility based only on a summer’s internship. Benton knew that Kingston believed
in her abilities, but she would actually be reporting to the vice president of operations and was unsure
about his reactions to her. Moreover, while the offer sounded attractive, Right-Away seemed anything
but glamorous: a small company, its headquarters were in a rundown warehouse section of Chicago.
And while Lisa had done well as the first woman manager, she also missed having other women
managers around.
In contrast, by taking the position at Houseworld, Benton would receive classical marketing
training in a structured environment from an industry leader. The people whom she had met during
her interviews struck her as being professional, well-educated, and outgoing. And the company was
headquartered in a brand-new office building downtown.
Benton turned down the Right-Away job in early April, eight months after she had been
invited to return, and just after she accepted the Houseworld offer. She had ceased consulting for
Right-Away in January and had told Kingston that she intended to interview elsewhere. Nonetheless,
he was upset by her choice. He had invested so much time and money in her, he claimed, because
he believed that she, in particular, would fit into his tightly knit organization. The summer internship
as well as the months of consulting had all been part of his plan to draw her gradually into the
company. Now, he indicated, he was set back a year because of her decision. Benton reminded him
that she had mentioned that she would be looking at other companies, and that Houseworld would
offer her the extra marketing training she needed at this point in her career. She also said she wanted
to keep in touch with Kingston and hoped that he would keep her in mind in the future. Kingston
wished Benton good luck but suggested that she was making a big mistake.
Houseworld
Before interviewing with Houseworld, Benton had tried to learn as much as possible about
the company. She read the relevant material in the Career Resource Center, and also spoke with a
product manager at Houseworld to whom she had been referred by a friend at HBS. Houseworld was
an established consumer products company specializing in home care goods, holding the largest
market share in many of its product groups. While it was regarded as a conservative company, its
reputation for providing excellent marketing training had attracted MBAs from the top-tier business
schools.
Houseworld consisted of three decentralized divisions: Home Care, Paper, and Laundry.
Home Care, considered to be the rising star of the company and the grooming ground for top
management talent, was the division that was recruiting at HBS. The product manager whom Benton
had contacted during her research spoke highly of the president of Home Care, characterizing him as
an aggressive innovator who had great plans for turning Home Care into the dominant division at
Houseworld. He also said that he liked the marketing staff, and that they were “a decent group of
people.” He assured Benton that Home Care was a secure division, but said that at present, morale
in the marketing area was low because there had been very few promotions in the past few years.
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When Benton interviewed at Home Care, she met with several product managers, and was
particularly impressed with Group Product Manager Richard Clark (Exhibit 1). Benton also talked
more informally at lunch and dinner with some of the assistant and associate product managers. One,
a Wharton MBA, told Benton that the product management staff was a supportive bunch who worked
hard but liked to have fun. The 8:30 to 5:30 hours that most marketing people kept seemed very
reasonable to Benton, and she planned to lead a balanced life.
Benton asked what her role would be as a new assistant product manager, and they told her
she would assume responsibility quickly and become a product manager within two to three years.
Benton knew from researching the other top consumer packaging companies that the route to product
management usually took from three to four years, and she was attracted by Home Care’s faster career
path. In the first year she would be immersed in the day-to-day brand business through assignments
on different product management teams. Benton learned that product managers generally moved
assignments every 18 to 24 months and associates and assistant product managers moved assignments
every 12 to 18 months. This practice, typical of the leading brand management companies, allowed
product managers to acquire experience in different stages of the product life cycle; it sometimes made
it difficult, however, to develop close working relationships.
Benton also learned that Houseworld used an MBO evaluation process (conducted annually
in January using very specific objectives) and that promotion occurred from within. It was the product
manager’s responsibility to groom his or her associates to be “promotable.” At the end of the lunch,
one of the associate product managers told her, “You’re the kind of person the company wants.
You’re so enthusiastic.”
Benton was offered the job of assistant product manager in the Home Care Division, and was
invited to return to the company for a second visit. As was standard procedure at Home Care and
other consumer packaging companies, she was informed that she would not know until the first day
of work who her boss was, or to what product she had been assigned. Because working relationships
had always been important to her, this prospect made Benton somewhat nervous; but it was reassuring
to know that she had liked all of the people she had met at Houseworld. They seemed warm and
down-to-earth, and Benton thought she would be able to get along with most of them. On April 7,
Benton accepted the job at Home Care.
Initiation
Arriving at 8:30 a.m. on June 15 for her first day at Houseworld, Benton was taken to meet
her new boss, Deborah Linton, a woman that Benton had not met during the interview process.
Benton was immediately struck by Linton’s attractive office on the twentieth floor and her boss’s
sophisticated appearance and confident manner. Linton greeted Benton pleasantly, and said that she
was not expecting Benton for another week and that her office was not set up yet. She then called
in Ron Scoville, the associate product manager, and asked him to help Benton get settled.
Assistant and associate product managers worked in cubicles situated in the middle of the
twentieth floor. Dividers five-and-a-half feet tall separating the small, rectangular offices had given
the area the nickname “Hamster Haven” (Exhibit 2). While gathering supplies to stock her new
office, Benton noticed Richard Clark, the group product manager who had impressed her during the
recruiting process. She was disappointed that he barely remembered her, and did not stop to welcome
her aboard.
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Later that morning, Linton invited Benton into her office and opened the conversation by
saying, “I’ve seen your resume and know something about your experience. I think you’ll find your
position an interesting one.” After explaining some of the demands of the job, she declared in a quiet
but firm tone: “MBAs act like they know a lot more than they do. The only way to learn is on the
job, and your formal education won’t help you. I’ve known some Harvard MBAs, and I don’t like
them.” Linton mentioned that she did not have an MBA; she had been with the company for seven
years and had worked her way up as one of Houseworld’s first woman product managers. She warned
Benton that she would have to prove herself like anyone else. Benton leaned forward uncomfortably
in her chair and responded:
It makes sense to me that in this job, like most jobs, you have to learn from the
bottom up. I also agree with you that some MBAs are arrogant, but I am willing to
work hard and prove myself. At Right-Away, I rolled up my sleeves and did
everything from stocking shelves to financial planning.
Benton hoped this would convey the impression that she was a down-to-earth person with no
pretensions.
Linton explained that because this was an extremely busy time in the product management
cycle, she would not have much time for Benton in the first few weeks, but that she should feel free
to stop by her office if she had any questions. Benton’s job was to help with the brand review and
assist Scoville, but Linton stated clearly that Benton was to report to her and not to Scoville. She told
Benton to get to know her way around and that in a couple of weeks, they would sit down and work
out objectives; Linton also promised to take her to lunch when she had time. Benton left disappointed
by what she felt was a cool and disinterested reception by her new boss.
Around noon, Scoville, whose cubical adjoined Benton’s (see Exhibit 2), invited her out to
lunch. They went across the street to a small crowded restaurant. He opened the door and pulled her
chair out for her, and Benton suddenly felt conscious of the fact that she was a woman. Scoville had
moved from operations into marketing and did not have an MBA. He appeared somewhat unkempt
to Benton, compared to the other well-dressed men she had noticed on the marketing floor. At one
point he asserted: “I’m a corporate misfit, so don’t develop a style like mine. But I’m smarter and
more competent than most people at Home Care. My problem is style, not substance.” He explained
that he had an aggressive, no-nonsense style and absolutely no patience for politics. He said with
disdain that some of the successful product managers and associates focused on pleasing other people
and playing politics.
Scoville also mentioned that he was not impressed with MBAs, especially those from Harvard,
but that if Benton relied on him, she would learn a lot. Scoville promised to teach Benton all the
ropes of product management, and Benton began to feel that he was acting like an overbearing big
brother. He pontificated:
Lisa, bear in mind that for the first six months you’re in a learning mode. Even
though you’ll have to dig in and learn the brand business, you won’t be expected to
be a brand wizard or decision maker until several months from now.
Scoville implied that Home Care was a highly structured environment with many rules he
expected her to follow, even though he seemed to feel that he was above them. He told her not to
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be late for meetings, and not to rely on the train, the means of transportation she said she was
planning to use, because sometimes she would need to stay late.
After lunch, Benton returned to her new office and started reading product literature on Pure
& Fresh, the solid air freshener brand that Linton had assigned her that morning. One of the assistant
product managers Benton had dined with during recruiting stopped by her cubicle and gave Benton
a warm, enthusiastic welcome; she grimaced, however, upon learning about Benton’s brand assignment
with Scoville and Linton. Around four o’clock, Benton asked Scoville what she could do to help on
the brand review, and he handed her a large stack of reports to copy. Benton completed the task
around 7:00 p.m.; most of the other product management staff had left around 5:30 p.m.
As she reviewed her first day at Houseworld on her way home, Benton felt ambivalent. She
was excited about working in an environment where people seemed intelligent and sophisticated, but
she was disappointed in her brand assignment. Pure & Fresh seemed like such an unnecessary
consumer product; she would have preferred a furniture cleaning product because she loved fine
furniture and cared about its maintenance. Yet promoting a successful new brand could be exciting,
and top management would be likely to pay close attention to its progress. While she was disturbed
by Linton’s cool welcome and bothered by Scoville’s condescending manner, her first impressions had
been wrong before, and she would give them the benefit of the doubt.
First Two Months
The next morning, Benton read more company and product literature, and at 10:00 a.m. she
walked over to Linton’s office to see if there was anything she could do. Scoville was sitting very
close to Linton discussing some aspect of the brand review. Benton thought they seemed somewhat
intimate, and she felt like an intruder. Linton suggested that Benton keep reading and getting to know
her way around the company, and that she would meet with her to tell her about Pure & Fresh’s
history in about an hour. In that meeting, Benton learned that Linton had been in her present job
eight months and that Benton was the first assistant product manager assigned to the brand.
At noontime, Helene Brenner, one of the assistant product managers Benton had met during
interviewing, invited Benton to join her and some other product management staffers for lunch in the
company cafeteria, where, according to Brenner, “everyone” ate. In the group Benton and Brenner
joined, everyone was from a different brand. They were all very friendly and asked Benton questions
about her background and personal life; they seemed to Benton more interested in her than Scoville
and Linton had been.
Benton listened to a discussion about MBAs in product management and learned that under
the direction of the vice president of marketing, Bob Mitchell, a Harvard MBA (see Exhibit 1),
recruiting practices had been changed. Previously, new assistant product managers were selected from
a mix of MBA and non-MBA candidates; the emphasis now was on recruiting MBAs from top-notch
schools for entry-level marketing positions. As a result, the Home Care Division was becoming
increasingly dominated by people holding MBAs. Benton thought this helped explain Scoville and
Linton’s apparent resentment of her. Two associate product managers at Benton’s table complained
about the lack of upward mobility in Home Care beyond their level. One warned Benton that if
anyone ever asked her what her goals were, she should reply that she wanted to “get ahead” at
Houseworld, and never say “I’m at Houseworld to get some good marketing training.”
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Early in the morning of her fourth day at Houseworld, Benton jotted down some questions
she had about Pure & Fresh, and around 9:00 a.m. she walked over to Linton’s office hoping to get
some answers. She tapped on the door and inquired, “Do you mind if I ask you a few questions?”
When Linton looked up and realized that it was Benton, she quickly covered up what she was writing
and replied, “I’m doing something right now, why don’t you come back later?” Benton thought her
boss looked as if she was not quite awake and once again Benton felt she was intruding. Benton left
disappointed that Linton did not want to make any time for her.
Making her way back to the other side of the floor, Benton decided to ask Scoville her
questions. He leaned back in his chair, and in what was to Benton his familiar all-knowing manner,
gave her his answers. He ended by saying: “Don’t worry about asking me questions. You’re in a
learning mode as an assistant and can’t be expected to know that much.” Benton did not enjoy what
she felt to be his condescending attitude, but she appreciated his taking the time to answer, and began
turning regularly to Scoville when she needed to know something.
Benton’s month-long formal orientation to Houseworld began during her second week. For
two days each week she met with department heads of the staff groups from finance, market research,
R&D, legal, and manufacturing. During this time, she was advised that she should learn about the
chemistry of the air freshener, as well as about the design, packaging, financial, and legal aspects of
the product.
Meanwhile, Scoville asked Benton to get artwork approval forms for Pure & Fresh coupons
signed-off by all the department heads, which involved taking the forms to each department and
waiting around for the secretaries to get their bosses’ signatures. Benton felt like “a gofer,” but she
assumed this boring task was just another part of being an assistant. She hesitated to ask for more
responsibility for fear of coming across as an aggressive MBA.
In her third week, Benton began to accompany Scoville and Linton to meetings with different
staff groups and the ad agency. Linton’s presentations at these meetings impressed Benton as
articulate and persuasive. At first, Benton did not feel that she had much to offer in these meetings,
and was somewhat overwhelmed by the background knowledge that she needed to acquire for Pure
& Fresh. Even when she did have an opinion, however, Benton usually deferred to Scoville and
Linton; recalling Scoville’s “learning mode” comments, she thought it best to be quiet and act like a
learner. Besides, Scoville and Linton rarely asked Benton for her opinion, and Benton felt they made
no effort to treat her as one of the brand team. Benton began to feel “like a fifth wheel.”
When she had been at Houseworld for about a month, Benton went out after work for drinks
with Helene Brenner. Brenner had an MBA from Columbia and had been at Home Care for about
nine months. She told Benton about a presentation she had made that day:
I think I really impressed Richard Clark with all my charts and slides. You know,
when you do presentations around here, you’ve got to be completely prepared with
all the facts and figures. Presentations are a key way to get visibility with your group
product manager and higher.
Benton learned that Brenner had made her first presentation after three months on the job. While she
felt it was early for her to be concerned about presentations, Benton asked what else was important
to becoming successful in marketing in Home Care. Brenner commented that the people who
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succeeded were “enthusiastic, but not pushy, and were ambitious, creative, and analytical.” Brenner
cautioned Benton about working long hours:
Don’t stay at the office after 6:00. You don’t get points around here for working
late. I heard about an assistant product manager who didn’t get promoted because he
was really disorganized and was always at the office until at least 7:00.
In Benton’s fifth week, Linton asked her to analyze some sales data and to write a memo on
her findings. Benton knew memos were important at Houseworld, and that writing good ones was
a key to receiving top management visibility. Linton had Benton revise her memo four times before
she passed it up to the group product manager, Jack Vernon. The memo was well-received, and
Vernon personally commended Benton on her work with a scrawl at the top of the memo saying “Nice
job.” Even so, Benton derived little sense of accomplishment because she had not been allowed to
make recommendations or take any action beyond the analysis. Instead, Scoville and Linton used the
analysis to develop plans for Pure & Fresh television ads, which looked much more exciting than her
assignments. From what she had been told in the recruiting process, and given her responsibilities
and accomplishments at Right-Away, Benton expected to be more involved in all aspects of the brand
business, and after developing action plans every day for two years at HBS, she was dissatisfied with
only performing analyses.
Several days later, Benton spoke with Gary Carter, an associate product manager with whom
she shared her train commute and chatted regularly. His brand group also had a new assistant who
had just started, and Benton learned that she was “helping plan a promotion for next year, and
working on pricing recommendations.” Benton described the assignments that she had been given,
and revealed that she felt frustrated and underutilized. She did not mention, however, the difficulties
she was having with Linton and Scoville, since she believed that “loyalty to one’s superiors was
essential in the corporate world.” Carter agreed that Benton’s abilities were not being fully used, but
had no explanation for her situation. Benton was discouraged, and wondered if she was doing
something wrong or if she had gotten stuck with a lousy management team.
Benton thought that except for Linton and Scoville, she was getting along well with the people
in her network at Home Care, and had made it a point to be friendly to everyone. Her peers
frequently invited her to go to lunch and for drinks after work. Benton often chatted with the brand’s
secretary, and had no problems getting her work typed on time; when she needed people from the staff
groups to provide her with information, she always got their cooperation. She was confident that Jack
Vernon liked her, based on his commendations on her memos and from chats the two had about
Harvard.
On the other hand, her relationships with Linton and Scoville had not appreciably advanced.
Scoville frequently called over the divider: “Lisa, can you run these numbers for me?” and “Lisa,
when will all the approvals be signed?” Unlike Benton, Scoville often had trouble getting others to
do his bidding, and frequently ended up doing such tasks himself or asking Benton to do them. Six
weeks had passed and Linton still had not given Benton her objectives, as she had promised on the
first day, nor had she invited her to lunch.
An assistant product manager’s first year with Houseworld was supposedly critical for later
success, and Benton began to have some doubts about her future with the company, especially as she
recalled a few incidents that had occurred in her third and fourth months.
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The Typing Incident
One afternoon in August, Benton was trying to complete a memo and she noticed that the
headings on one of her charts, which had been created by the staff secretary, were not lined up
properly. Since error-free reports were expected in Home Care, she decided it must be corrected. The
secretary was now on vacation. Benton knew the other secretaries were extremely pressed for time
while the brand review was being formalized, so she sat down at a computer for five minutes and
redid the chart herself. As she returned to her cubicle, she noticed Vernon walking in her direction,
and she was surprised and disturbed by his insistence that she come to his office immediately. Once
inside his office, Vernon quickly shut the door, leaned back in his chair, and said to Benton:
I don’t know what you were doing, but I never want to see you doing word
processing in this company again. We have secretaries to do that kind of work and
there is no reason why you, particularly a woman, should be seen doing it. It
destroys your credibility not only with the people on your team, but also in the
secretaries’ eyes.
Benton, slightly annoyed, responded:
You really misinterpreted the situation. I was only there for a few minutes and
thought it would be much quicker to fix the heading on one of my charts myself than
to wait until one of the other secretaries had some time to make the correction. We
really don’t have adequate coverage with our secretary on vacation.
She thanked Vernon for his concern, and said that it would not happen again; but inside, she felt
angry. She regarded her work as part of a team effort and considered his reaction overblown. But
she also wondered if Vernon might have a point and recognized that he was looking out for her
interests.
Linton’s office was next to Vernon’s, and she had observed Benton going into his office.
Later that day, she asked Benton about the incident and became furious at her description. “He had
no right to tell you that,” she said when she heard the story. “First of all, he should have told me and
let me talk to you, and secondly, that whole issue itself is ridiculous.” Benton suspected that her boss
was fuming because Vernon had gone over her head and approached Benton directly. Several days
later, Linton mentioned that she had discussed the matter with Vernon and commented: “You know,
there are times and places when we have to do things like word processing.” While Benton still was
not sure what she should do in future situations, she concluded that since Vernon was more senior in
the department, she would follow his instructions.
The Copying Episode
A week after the typing incident, Benton was working on a coupon test market booklet that
would be mailed to 600,000 homes in three test cities. Benton’s job was to help design the Pure &
Fresh coupons and iron out the details with the company producing the booklets. Linton and Scoville
were rushing to meet their own deadlines on the marketing plan. At one point, Scoville called to
Benton from his cubicle. Tired of his patronizing manner and his demands, she retorted, “I’ll be there
in a minute.” Five minutes later, she walked into his office.
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Scoville wanted Benton to do some copying for him while he made some last-minute
corrections on the marketing plan. She replied that she would do the copying with him in a while,
but she was occupied with her own project for the moment. When he insisted that she do it
immediately, she snapped: “Ron, why don’t you plan your time better and do your own copying?”
“Oh, I see, you’re too good for copying,” he responded. Furious, Benton snatched up the papers and
headed for the copy machine.
When Benton returned from lunch that day, she found a note on her desk summoning her to
Linton’s office. “I understand you’re too good for copying,” Linton said when Benton entered. For
the first time feeling genuine animosity toward her boss, Benton proclaimed:
That is patently false. Half of the material is already on Ron’s desk and I’m
going to finish the rest this afternoon. I was upset because he treated me like some
servant girl, and I was getting tired of his patronizing attitude. I have never felt too
good for this kind of work. In fact, when I was at Right-Away last summer, I
counted inventory, I dusted the shelves, I . . .
Linton cut her off, shouting:
This is a team effort. Everyone is overworked. You’ll just have to contribute.
Copying is a part of your job, even if you are a Harvard MBA.
Benton felt there was no point in arguing with her. Abruptly rising, she snapped, “I’m going to do
the rest of the copying right now.”
Benton felt furious and frustrated. It was the first time that a boss had actually yelled at her.
She felt that Linton should have acted as a buffer between her and Scoville, and instead she blamed
Benton. Marching into Scoville’s office, Benton announced:
You had a lot of gall going to Deborah when I’ve been doing a lot of tasks for
you. I don’t mind copying, and I’ve never felt “too good” for copying, but I expect
you to ask me for favors witho