Your pharmaceutical project team of 30 specialists is executing a predictive plan to develop regulatory submission documentation. You have one team member, a senior regulatory expert with 20 years of experience, who possesses unique knowledge critical to project success but consistently demonstrates poor mentoring skills, dismisses junior team members' questions as 'basic,' and has caused two junior regulatory writers to request transfers. The junior members are necessary for document production volume, but the senior expert's specialized knowledge of FDA interactions cannot be easily replaced. Your HR business partner has documented complaints but states the expert has not violated any policies. The project is at the midpoint and approaching critical regulatory milestones. What is your best approach?

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Accepted Answer

The correct answer is B. Option B is correct because it addresses both immediate and long-term risks through parallel strategies (ECO People Task 2.4 - Empower team members and stakeholders). Professional coaching can improve the expert's interpersonal effectiveness while knowledge capture reduces project dependency on a single individual—a critical risk mitigation strategy. This approach invests in team capability building while protecting project delivery. Option A is the main distractor and may seem practical but perpetuates the dysfunction, fails to develop team capability, and increases single-point-of-failure risk by isolating critical knowledge. Option C abdicates the PM's responsibility to address team dysfunction and long-term project risk. Option D is too aggressive given HR states no policy violations occurred, and the 30-day timeline during critical milestones creates unnecessary project risk if the expert becomes disengaged.

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