Case 7.2: Working Hard at Being Fair
Case synopsis and analysis
Jenny Hernandez is the production manager at a mid-size mortgage company. Salespeople,
closing officers, underwriters and other personnel report to Jenny. The company culture is
positive, and employees generally respect each despite their varying pay.
Jenny’s leadership style is relationship oriented. She is fair and kind and works to build a
Learning objectives:
1. Students should be able to determine what leadership-making phase a person is in under
the LMK model (Graen and Uhl-Bein’s model).
Answers to questions in the text:
1. Based on the LMX model, how would you describe Jenny’s leadership?
2. How do you think the employees at City Mortgage respond to Jenny?
3. If you were asked to follow in Jenny’s footsteps, do you think you could or would want to
manage City Mortgage with a similar style?
Students will appreciate Jenny’s style and find it to be effective. However, students should
discuss the difficulty of leading without favoritism. It is a worthy and important goal but one
Northouse, Leadership: Theory and Practice, Seventh Edition: Instructor Resource
Potential teaching approaches:
Below is a way to structure a class based on skill theory and case study 7.2:
• Consider exercise 1 below.
Exercises for this case study:
1) In small groups, students can discuss situations where they were part of an organization
2) Jenny is a strong and effective leader. Despite having a close friend as subordinate, she
does not play favorites. This is a hard, tall task. Indeed, leaders naturally will find some
subordinates more likeable and/or effective than others. Given that, how can a leader be
truly fair?