Question & Answer

1.       : Describe the advantages of using a balanced scorecard to measure and control organizational performance. Suppose that you created a balanced scorecard for a Walmart Neighborhood Market. Which specific customer service measures would you include?

1.       You’re a manager who employs a participative control approach. You’ve concluded that corrective action is necessary to improve customer satisfaction, but first you need to convince your employees that a problem exists. What kind of evidence do you think employees will find more compelling: quantitative measurements or anecdotes from your interactions with customers? Explain your answer.

1.       You have been hired to manage a 20-person staff for Nightlight Travels, a travel agency in Las Vegas. For a full year, sales have been hammered by the COVID-19 pandemic, and staff morale has plummeted as key employees left for positions in more secure industries. The few remaining key customer relationships have been damaged by the sloppy and unprofessional work habits of the remaining staff members. Your first responsibility as a new manager is to create next year’s budget for all planned expenditures. But first you must decide if you will adopt a hierarchical approach or a decentralized approach to control. Which would you choose, and why?

: Discuss the use of financial statements and financial analysis as management controls.

: Explain how expense budgets and cash budgets are useful as management controls.

: Send copies of the reports anonymously to the operations manager, who is Taandil’s boss

1.      : Mind your own business. Taandil hasn’t said anything about the new guidelines and you don’t want to overstep your authority. You’ve been unemployed and need this job.

1.      : Prepare a memo to Taandil summarizing the new safety guidelines that affect the Lion Cub product line and requesting his authorization for implementation.

1.       : Would you expect the structure of a company such as eBay, which operates almost entirely online, to differ from the structure of a bricks-and-mortar company, such as General Motors, which uses the Internet for some things, such as customer service and business-to-business transactions? Why or why not?

1.       : This chapter suggested that structure should be designed to fit strategy. Some theorists argue that strategy should be designed to fit the organization’s structure. With which theory do you agree? Explain.

1.       : Experts say that organizations are becoming increasingly decentralized, with authority, decision-making responsibility, and accountability being pushed further down into the organization. How will this trend affect what will be asked of you as a manager?

1.       : What is an organization’s workflow technology? How do an organization’s strategy and workflow technology influence the type of structure that will be most effective?

1.       : A report published by Hay Group found that some managers have personalities suited to horizontal relationships, such as project management, and achieve results with little formal authority. Other managers are more suited to operating roles with much formal authority in a vertical structure. In what type of structure—functional, matrix, team, or virtual network—do you believe your personality would best fit? Which structure would be the most challenging for you? Give your reasons.

  : What is the virtual network approach to structure? Is the use of authority different compared to other forms of departmentalization? Explain.

1.       Some people argue that the matrix structure should be adopted only as a last resort because the dual chains of command can create more problems than they solve. Discuss. Do you agree or disagree? Why?

1.       An organizational consultant said, “Some aspect of functional structure appears in every organization.” Do you agree? Explain.

1.       : If you wanted to add a group of food scientists to a large organization such as PepsiCo, would you centralize the scientists in a central pool at headquarters or decentralize them to separate divisions? Discuss your reasons.

. Identify how structure is influenced by an organization’s strategic goals and its workflow technology

Compare task forces, teams, project managers, and relational coordination in terms of how they can provide coordination across departments and hierarchical levels.

: Describe functional, divisional, matrix, team, and virtual network approaches to structure

: Explain the fundamental characteristics of organizing, including division of labor, chain of command, span of management, and centralization versus decentralization.

1.              : What are Krista Russell’s options for responding to Tate’s decision? What should she do now? Why?

What decision approach would you have used if you were Tate? Why?

1.              What decision style did John Tate use (Exhibit 9.5) and what mistakes do you think he made with the way he solved the problem of limited office space? Explain.