A unique Training Program at UPS

Mark Colvard, a coupled Parcel Manager in San Ramon, California, recently faced a unwieldy decision. One of his drivers asked for 2 week off to help an ailing family member.But troupe rules said this driver wasnt eligible. If Colvard went by the book, the driver would probably tax return the days off anyway and be fired. On the other hand, Colvard chose to maintain the driver the time off. Although he took several(prenominal) heat for the decision, he too kept a valuable employee.Had Colvard been faced with this decision 6 months earlier, he says he would have gone the other way. What changed his designateing was a month he spent living in McAllen, Texas. It was part of a UPS direction training experience called the Community Internship Program (CIP). During his month in McAllen, Colvard make housing for the poor, collected clothing for the Salvation Army, and worked in a medicate rehab Center.Colvard gives the program credit for helping him empathize with employees facing crises back home. And he says that CIP has made him a better grappler. My goal was to make the numbers, and in some cases that meant not looking at the individual but looking at the bottom line. After that one month stay, I Immediately started stretch out to people in a different way.CIP was established by UPS in the late 1960s to help open the eyes of the confederacys predominantly white managers to the poverty and inequality in umteen cities. Today, the program takes 50 of the companys most promising executives from each one summer and brings them to cities around the country.There they deal with a variety of problems from transportation to housing, education, and health care. The companys goal is to awaken these managers to the challenges that many of their employees face, bridging the cultural disjoint that separates a white manager from an African American driver or an upper-income suburbanite from a worker raised in the rural South.1. Do you think individuals can learn empathy from something like a 1-month CIP experience? Explain wherefore or why not.2. How could UPSs CIP help the organization better manage work life conflicts?3. How could UPSs CIP help the Organization improve its reply to diversity?4. What negatives, if any can you envision resulting from CIP?5. UPS has 2,400 managers. CIP includes altogether 50 each year. How can the program make a difference if it include only 2 percent of all managers? Does this suggest that the program is more semipublic relations than management training?6. How can UPS justify the cost of a program like CIP if competitors like FedEx, DHL, and the U.S. Postal Service dont offer such programs? Does the program increase costs or get over UPS profits?