We agree to use consensus as our decision-making style. We agree to work on handling conflict.When we have an issue between our departments, rather than go to the general manager, we will go to each other and problem-solve using a winwin orientation.We agree that no additional resources are required. We will maintain a weekly report of the number of rooms that were cleaned before maintenance took place to help measure compliance.
We will determine how the relationship is working using two criteria: (1) the number of times we meet each week (the more the better) and (2) how many times we have unresolved conflicts that require us to go to the general manager. We will define success as a decline in the number of complaints from customers about rooms that were not properly cleaned because of maintenance work.
After thirty days of working at their partnership, Marty and Jean wanted to review the outcome. They held a meeting with me, and the first thing they did was review the Stages of Partnership Development. Then Marty and Jean analyzed the data they had collected. Over the thirty days there had been more than 240 maintenance calls. During that period, all but thirteen of them had been scheduled during normal business hours. Maintenance had been able to schedule all but three of the maintenance jobs before the rooms were cleaned. They thought this was a huge success—especially since no guests complained about the condition of their room after a maintenance call.