Think You Can Solve a Management Dilemma?

Think you're a smart and savvy business person? Think you've got executive potential? Think you can make it as a management consultant or an executive coach? Guess what? You get to try your hand, right here, right now. Ready? Okay, let's do this.

Here's the deal: I give you three real-life management dilemmas that plagued me and/or a company I worked or consulted for during my career. You pick one and tell us what you would do. Simple, right? Yeah, we'll see.

But hey, these are complex issues so there are no wrong answers and nobody gets shot down for trying. You can comment or send me a direct email using the appropriate link at the end of the post, your choice. I'll follow up with a post that explains what really went down for each one, along with at least one intriguing reader solution.

One more thing: this is going to be a regular on The Corner Office, so, if you've got a juicy dilemma or problem you're dealing with now, send it along as a comment or an email. If it's a good one, we'll use it in a subsequent post and solve it for you. What have you got to lose? But if you send it as a comment, check back because we may have some questions for you.

Okay, here are today's three; have at it:
Dilemma #1: Your product is a dog; now what?

You're the VP of marketing. Six months ago, your much-larger competitor preannounced a product under development and you did likewise to keep pace. Only now, the development folks are telling you that your version, which you'll be launching in three months, is a dog that won't come close to meeting its performance targets. Your competitor has no such problem and will leave you in the dust. The product takes more than a year to develop so it's too late to start over. Remember, you've already publicly preannounced.

What do you do?

You're seven years into a promising career as a manager with a big company. Your company has singled you out as an up-and-comer with executive potential, but you're also being courted by a few startups. Do you play it safe with the big company or roll the dice with a startup? Your company pays better, and although you're a low-level manager today, you can climb the corporate ladder, albeit at a "big company" pace. The startup, on the other hand, offers mega-stock options with windfall profit potential and a big job title with big responsibility, but if it doesn't survive, you'll end up with no title and worthless stock options.

It's your career, what do you do?

A decade before Microsoft came under intense antitrust scrutiny, the software giant had a business proposition for a small, fast-growing company with a very popular software utility. Microsoft would incorporate the utility into its operating system and give your company nothing in return. Sounds like a bad deal, right? Not exactly. You see, the program Microsoft chooses becomes an instant standard and the company might still survive on aftermarket upgrade sales. If you decline, however, a competitor is chosen as standard and you're incompatible, i.e. out in the cold.

You're the CEO. What do you do?

So, pick one and try your hand at solving it or give us a real-world dilemma of your own. Your choice.