Anna kept her word. She re-read many of the documents from the project she had worked on. Talked to her colleagues. And she wants to go deeper in order to send valuable information.
Anna emails Steven: “Gotten my head back into the project. We have really good data for FastTrack. I want to put more time into it. Will get back to you next week.”
Steven was in a staff meeting with his boss, Craig Smith. He reads the email on his smartphone, holding it under the table. Oh no, Anna needs another week. This is insanely slow!
Smith then asks Steven about the status on his work. Steven takes a deep breath: “Good progress on U.S. side. Slower on the German side. I’m pushing, but have to be careful not to lose their cooperation. Smith: Ok. Stay persistent. If you need help, I can go up chain of command.”
Steven fires a response back to Anna: Great. Thanks. Can we discuss now?
Anna responds: No time. Husband and I sitting down for dinner. Please wait til next week. It will be worth it. I’m uncovering valuable material.
Steven, getting very nervous, writes: “Pressure increasing here. Need to talk tomorrow as planned. I call you. Anna: Tomorrow won‘t work. How about on Tuesday?” Steven: I’m out of office Monday til Wednesday. Please, can we talk over the weekend?
For Anna this was simply too persistent of Steven: “Why can’t he just calm down and trust that I will get the job done. Does he want quality results or just some data thrown over the wall?”
Anna writes back: Be a bit more patient. As a good German, I like to perform my tasks properly. And by the way, I try to spend my weekends with my husband and our children.”
Steven thought: Good German? Slow German. Over-analytical German. Bureaucratic German.
Questions
The situation appears to be coming to a head. What do think will happen next?
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