Acuscan

Acuscan Account Executive Summary

Purpose and Scope

The purpose of this document is to present the facts and issues surrounding the initiative “Operation Optimize”. The scope includes conversations held with various department heads, and the issues inferred from those conversations. This executive summary will summarize the situation; formulate conclusions, and present recommendations for actions to be taken to remedy the problems that are evident.

Summary of the Situation

Project “Operation Optimize” has effectively stalled. Our competition is thought to be just months away from a marketplace breakthrough. It is essential to the survival of AcuScan, Inc. – as we know it – to beat them to market with a viable product of our own.

We have a serious situation in which several of our department heads are in conflict. This conflict is not constructive in nature – indeed it is the cause of the hiatus in the project. We must remedy this situation as soon as possible in order to get “Operation Optimize” back on track and schedule.

Key Points

As mentioned, there are several senior staff members that are unable to agree on a course of action. Pat Lambert – the new director of Marketing, and Kelly Thomas – chief of the software development team, cannot agree on the capabilities of the programmers. Thomas argues that even with current staffing levels, his team is pushing the envelope in maintaining support of existing systems. Placing the additional burden of multiple new product features is too much.

Lambert’s stand is that a fully-featured prototype can be brought to market within the desired timeframe and budget, and that this can be achieved without the need for time consuming and costly statistical analysis. She further believes that it is possible to accomplish this through the use of outside resources. Neither Lambert not Thomas appears to be willing to reach a compromise, since both are so intent on defending their positions. Thomas is particularly upset that Lambert approached and questioned one of his staff without his prior knowledge.

Chris Martinas – vice president of Product Development, argues that the iScanner product can be brought to market with minimal hardware changes. He believes that Marketing and Software Development can work together to thrash out the details. However, while he may be correct in his evaluation about minimal hardware changes, Martinas is not considering software changes that may be required.

Overall, no single staff member appears to be interested in taking responsibility or ownership for the project. Martinas is leaving it in the hands of Lambert and Thomas. Lambert expects Thomas to get the software side working, and Thomas is claiming that his people already have too much to do.

Conclusions

Pat Lambert and Kelly Thomas are at emotional loggerheads. As a result of this, Lambert has alienated Thomas and thus will find it difficult to encourage him to motivate his staff. Partly this is due to Lambert’s unrealistic expectations of the design team, but the issue was exacerbated when Lambert approached a member of Thomas’ team without his knowledge. This is clearly a breach of the chain of command and was highly inadvisable.

This serious rift between two key staff players is evidenced by a long string of memos between the two. Lambert and Thomas are in disagreement about the capabilities of the software design team. Lambert has a lack of experience in dealing with Thomas’ team, and has made some erroneous assumptions. However, she also appears to be unwilling to consider Thomas’ explanations as to his team’s limitations. Since Thomas’ response was overly emotional and defensive, he has lost his ability to remain objective in this situation. In so doing, he has also lost a great deal of credibility with Lambert.

Conclusion and Recommendations

Conflict within a team can be a highly productive tool, provided that it is constructive, controlled and channeled usefully. Unfortunately, the conflict in this situation is of the worst sort. The first course of action should be to assemble all three department heads in a conference room. After allowing a brief period of steam-letting, the meeting should be called to order. Each person should be allowed a five minute period to calmly, and without interruption, present his or her opportunities, obstacles and challenges.

If emotion can be excluded from the situation, the potential for a beneficial and productive brainstorming is fantastic. These are all very intelligent and business-oriented individuals, that all want