Letter of Transmittal

To: Professor Seema Khanvilkar

From: Group 6
Date: 19th March, 2015
Subject: Martha Rinaldi: Should she stay or should she go?
This report is intended to present arguments for Martha Rinaldis career advancement.
It is recommended that she should resign from Potomac Waters and join Deep Dive Pizza Company.
Executive Summary
Martha is currently working at Potomac Waters as an Assistant Product Manager for the Brand Invi under
the Health Drink Division. She is currently unhappy with her work and is faced with a dilemma of
whether she should continue working with her current team for the same brand or speak to Bautista and
work for another brand or she could even join Deep Dive where she had done her summers. The criteria
that Martha would look out for are scope for development, appreciation of her work, market condition,
salary, role and responsibility and job satisfaction. On evaluation, the best possible option for her is to
join Deep Dive.
Situation Analysis
Martha, an MBA with strengths in marketing in management information systems, joined Potomac as an
assistant product manager in the Health Drinks Division in June 2008. Prior to this, she had interned in
Deep Dive and gained a lot of recognition. After her MBA, she had the option of joining Potomac or
Deep Dive with a higher salary than Potomac. After considerable research on Potomac, he selected
Potomac for the reputation the company had for providing training and exposure which led to marketing
excellence. She considered the learning experience more important than the salary. Her work at Potomac
was menial, much contradictory to what she expected. Her superior Natalie always kept her low on
priority, hardly assigned her challenging tasks, never spent time in training her and majorly
communicated through emails. To add to it was her strained relation with her college Jamie. Jamie came
across as a very cold man who was difficult to please and had a strong stereotype of MBAs being
arrogant. Jamie used to buck pass his work to Martha. Martha shared a very good rapport with the other
managers. She was often disturbed by the fact that though other managers could see her potential, her
superior, Natalie, never noticed it. One of the rarest interesting assignments that Martha worked on was to
project ROI for marketing activities planned for Invi. Natalie used her report to impress the seniors but
didnt give her any credit. To add to all this was her confusion which arose when Jamie asked her to work
on his PowerPoint Presentations when she was already assigned work by Natalie. Her growing frustration
compelled her to be rude to Jamie in an attempt to explain him the importance of her work as well. This
entire conversation was forwarded to Natalie who instead of supporting Martha, took Jamies side. She
communicated it to Martha that she should always listen to Jamie because Jamie would assign work for
Marthas good. She made genuine attempts to work out her equation with Jamie, but in vain. She was
even upset because her performance review which was due wasnt given to her and when she asked for,

Natalie wasnt very interested either. Natalie appreciated her work and criticized her lack of taking
initiative. When Martha came to know about the rumor of Jamie and Natalies affair, she could connect
the dots. She joined Potomac with high career aspiration and was disappointed with the way things
worked for her. She is now contemplating how should she go about her career.
Problem Statement
What should Martha Rinaldi do for her career advancement?

Options:
1

Stay in her current position at Potomac Waters

Ask Bautista to reassign her to a different brand

Accept a standing offer at Deep Dive Pizza

Criteria for Evaluation:

1

Scope for Development

Appreciation of work

Position of responsibilities

Job Satisfaction

Market Conditions

Salary

Evaluation of Options:
1
Potomac Waters was a developed organization which did well even in the bad economy. Martha
joined Potomac at a lower salary as compared to Deep Dive hoping that it would train her in all aspects of
marketing. But things were not going as she planned. There was little scope of development in the current
organization as she was not given much responsibility. Her boss, Follet was never approachable and she
would often communicate through short emails. Her work was not appreciated or acknowledged and she
would often get miniature tasks from Vaughan and Follet.
2
A different brand might aid her leaning and development. However asking Bautista would be a high
profile move and she might come across as a difficult employee to work with. Work appreciation at other
brands could go either way as it would depend on the people in that department rather than the
management. But she would still not get as much as responsibilities as she would in Deep Dive.

3
Deep Dive was still an entrepreneurial firm and its future seemed very much dependent on
successful rapid extension. The salary package was more attractive than the one offered at Potomac. Here,
she would get more responsibility where she would report directly to VP. The CEO had taken a personal
interest in Martha and appreciated her work. But she did not know the VP there and was unsure of what
their relationship would be.

Action Plan
Martha should approach the CEO of Deep Dive Pizza and talk about the problems she is facing at
Polomac. She should inquire about the roles and responsibilities she can assume if she can come back to
the firm. She should then inform Natalie and Bautista about her leaving the company.