Talia is the northeast regional sales rep for Mountain Bike Tires 4 Less (MBT4L). Her territory includes a number of large chain stores and smaller bike shops that carry her company's bike tires. She has good personal relationships with many of the smaller shops, but she has been hearing from many of them that they are having trouble competing with the larger chains on price. In order to keep the smaller retailers happy, she offers extended payment terms on large orders. She told Bob of Bob's Bikes that he could take 120 days to pay on his latest order. Bertram works in the credit department at the MBT4L headquarters and is in charge of monitoring shipments and payments to the customers in Talia's region. When he sees that Bob's Bikes has not paid for their most recent order, he places their account on credit hold pending the receipt of payment. When Bob is unable to place a new order, he calls to complain to Talia who then calls and yells at Bertram for holding up one of her customers' orders. Bertram explains that Bob's Bikes' account is past due. Talia tells him that it is not past due because she offered extended terms. Bertram tells Talia that he had no knowledge of these special terms. The conflict between Talia and Bertram causes mistrust and resentment, and Bob's Bikes is caught in the middle. Eventually, Miguel, the VP of sales and marketing, is forced to intervene. Keeping the benefits of cross-training in mind, which approach should Miguel use to achieve improved communication and reduced friction between Talia and Bertram?

Question

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One type of team training involves training members in the duties and responsibilities of their teammates. The idea behind this type of training, which is called cross-training, is that team members can develop shared mental models of what's involved in each of the roles in the team and how the roles fit together to form a system. What exactly does cross-training involve? Researchers have found that cross-training may involve instruction at three different levels of depth. At the shallowest level, there is personal clarification. With this type of training, members simply receive information regarding the roles of the other team members. At the next level of cross-training, there is positional modeling, which involves team members observing how other members perform their roles.

Talia Is the Northeast Regional Sales Rep for Mountain Bike