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You have a problem with one of your subordinate employees. While they work in a position that requires constant cooperation with their colleagues, they always express opinions forcefully, and are incapable of accepting their criticism even when constructive or deserved. Their attitude is starting to affect the confidence of other members of your team, and is starting to marginalise people whose opinions are central to core business processes.

As their direct superior, responsibility for the conduct of this employee rests with you. A subordinate who can't accept their position is a challenge to your authority, and objectionable to those in similar positions and their own subordinates.

While they have not directly challenged your authority yet, you resolve to deal with the matter before this occurs. You do so in the manner of which the employee acts - a public display of dominance. Politely, but very directly, you remind this employee at a meeting in front of several other staff members that no-one is impressed with their attitude, that they themselves are not perfect, and that their cooperation rather than dominance is appropriate.
 

Your manager is very upset with one of your direct subordinates. It seems they turned down a hastily-presented offer for collaboration from a competitor company, but in doing so failed to capitalise on what would have been an exceptionally profitable opportunity.

While you have a low opinion of this employee and the quality of their work in general, you seek out information about the offer, the conditions under which it was made, the company concerned, and the environment under which your subordinate made the decision. You consult your subordinate's colleagues and the representatives from the other company who made the offer in doing so.

After deliberation, you report back to your own manager: in your opinion, your employee made the right decision at the time. A commitment to the offer would have involved a degree of commercial and financial risk. At speed, there was no way in which to responsibly determine a correct decision (which might have taken a some weeks to determine), and if the decision had to be made quickly, the only sensible answer was to decline.
 

A question in your quarterly evaluation asks you to define "good leadership", and explain how you demonstrate it. You do so thus:

"Leadership is the quality by which one inspires and directs people. It is a quality that is inevitably determined by the personality and character of the leader.

There is a modern tendency to identify degree of leadership with successful professional or commercial outcomes, or the degree of administrative control. I would argue that these are issues of management, not leadership. While these things may be necessary (and should rightly be present in a good leader) they say nothing of the capacity of a leader to motivate, to provide cohesion and enthusiasm for a task.

This is something I think I provide. My staff see me as a source of reason and encouragement, a touchstone for good values and business practice in the workplace, and as a friend."
 

An employee in your workgroup needs to be transferred because of friction with others. It was a difficult decision to make - in your experience, rarely is someone so totally objectionable that they can't form healthy working relationships with those around them. Often, such issues need careful management rather than direct action.

You know that many people in your organisation substitute removal or transfer of their employees for the ability to deal with office conflict - in your opinion, this reflects badly on their capacity to support and direct those around them, and provides a bad example to others.

However, this is a situation which has no other obvious solution. Three of your other employees have complained about the conduct of this person in the last month, and more in the previous month. This person is borderline rude, abrasive, difficult to deal with, and most importantly, perpetually misses important deadlines which reflects badly on others. There is a strong general consensus for their removal.

You haven't told this employee that their transfer is at your request - they think it is merely a routine reassignment. There is little point in mentioning it, of course... what could possibly be achieved by telling them?