Provide a synopsis of the Jones and Shephard case study

1.Provide a synopsis of the Jones and Shephard case study


2. Highlight three enterprise management causes/considerations and three project management causes/considerations for the situation. Include what seemed to be missing


3. Consider that you are the systems manager who is now responsible for redesigning the organizational structure. What areas need to be addressed for the transition, and how will they benefit the company? How will you interact with the upper managers in the company? How do you make this a transition with the least impact on the employees and the customers

Case Study
Jones and Shephard Accountants, Inc.*
By 1990, Jones and Shephard Accountants, Inc. (J&S) was a midsized company and ranked
38th in size by the American Association of Accountants. In order to compete with the
larger firms, J&S formed an Information Services Division designed primarily for studies
and analyses. By 1995, the Information Services Division (ISD) had fifteen employees.
In 1997, the ISD purchased three largecomputers. With this increased capacity, J&S
expanded its services to help satisfy the needs of outside customers. By September 1998,
the internal and external workloads had increased to a point where the ISD now employed
over fifty people.
The director of the division was very disappointed in the way that activities were being
handled. There was no single person assigned to push through a project, and outside
customers did not know whom to call to get answers regarding project status. The director
found that most of his time was being spent on day-to-day activities such as conflict
resolution instead of strategic planning and policy formulation.
The biggest problems facing the director were the two continuous internal projects (called
Project X and Project Y, for simplicity) that required month-end data collation and
reporting. The director felt that these two projects were important enough to require a fulltime project manager on each effort.
In October 1998, corporate management announced that the ISD director would be
reassigned on February 1, 1999, and that the announcement of his replacement would not
be made until the middle of January. The same week that the announcement was made, two
individuals were hired from outside the company to take charge of Project X and Project Y.
Exhibit 3–1 shows the organizational structure of the ISD.
Within the next thirty days, rumors spread throughout the organization about who would
become the new director. Most people felt that the position would be filled from within the
division and that the most likely candidates would be the two new project managers. In
addition, the associate director was due to retire in December, thus creating two openings.
On January 3, 1999, a confidential meeting was held between the ISD director and the
systems manager.
ISD Director: “Corporate has approved my request to promote you to division director.
Unfortunately, your job will not be an easy one. You're going to have to restructure the
organization somehow so that our employees will not have as many conflicts as they are
now faced with. My secretary is typing up a confidential memo for you explaining my
observations on the problems within our division.

“Remember, your promotion should be held in the strictest confidence until the final
announcement later this month. I'm telling you this now so that you can begin planning the
restructuring. My memo should help you.” (See Exhibit 3–2 for the memo.)
The systems manager read the memo and, after due consideration, decided that some form
of matrix would be best. To help him structure the organization properly, an outside
consultant was hired to help identify the potential problems with changing over to a matrix.
The following problem areas were identified by the consultant:
1.
The operations manager controls more than 50 percent of the people resources.
You might want to break up his empire. This will have to be done very carefully.
2.

The secretary pool is placed too high in the organization.

3.
The supervisors who now report to the associate director will have to be
reassigned lower in the organization if the associate director's position is abolished.
4.
One of the major problem areas will be trying to convince corporate management
that their change will be beneficial. You'll have to convince them that this change can be
accomplished without having to increase division manpower.
5.
You might wish to set up a separate department or a separate project for
customerrelations.
6.
Introducing your employees to the matrix will be a problem. Each employee will
look at the change differently. Most people have the tendency of looking first at the shift
in the balance of power—have I gained or have I lost power and status?

Exhibit 3–1.

ISD organizational chart

Exhibit 3–2.

Confidential memo

The systems manager evaluated the consultant's comments and then prepared a list of
questions to ask the consultant at their next meeting:
1.
What should the new organizational structure look like? Where should I put each
person, specifically the managers?
2.
When should I announce the new organizational change? Should it be at the same
time as my appointment or at a later date?

3.
Should I invite any of my people to provide input to the organizational
restructuring? Can this be used as a technique to ease power plays?
4.
Should I provide inside or outside seminars to train my people for the new
organizational structure? How soon should they be held?
*
Revised 2007.
(Kerzner 138)
Kerzner, Harold. Project Management: A Systems Approach to Planning, Scheduling, and
Controlling, 10th Edition. John Wiley & Sons (P&T), 4/13/09.
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