Gap Analysis: Harrison-Keyes

Gap Analysis: Harrison-Keyes

The goal of this paper is to identify the steps management at Harrison-Keye Inc. needs to take to make culture changes. The gap analysis identifies three issues that require immediate attention and new leadership. The fact that Harrison-Keyes Inc. has to stop and take stock of what they can and cannot do is critical to their success. This is due to their inherent lack of resources to implement their e-books initiative and its misalignment with their vision and mission statements.

Situation Analysis

Issue and Opportunity Identification

Harrison-Keyes Inc. management does not understand project management nor project implementation techniques. Management did not fully define the elements of the e-books initiative evidenced by the fact that Mack Evans, CIO, stated his hardware and software were incapable of delivering the e-books as planned. The vendor handpicked by the implementation team was having problems delivering on time due to inadequate estimates of the resources involved to deliver certain elements in a timely manner. Management did not align end state goals for project implementation with the capabilities and resources within the organization nor were these goals aligned with the vision and mission statements. Meg P. Mc Gill’s email of March 24th 2004 shows a glowing endorsement of her vision for e-books. Her follow up email to Marsha Goldfarb, Senior V.P. Marketing, asks for estimates of industry growth in e-books. Basically management bought into Meg’s strategy for e-books without any prior evidence or research outlining all the specific steps required to insure success. Management had several projects running simultaneously. They had a vendor digitizing the vast company catalog of books, they had their internal CIO running the software and hardware solution which was integral to delivering the e-books, they had an author threatening a lawsuit and defection over legal rights while their staff was still evaluating how to protect those legal rights, they had public relations issues with the authors and delivery issues hurting shareholder confidence with no one working the public relations issues. The opportunities for all stakeholders are pitted against the strategy and implementation of the e-books initiative.

Stakeholder Perspectives/Ethical Dilemmas

The stakeholders in this scenario are the shareholders, management, and the authors. Basically each stakeholder is interested in maximizing value and the ethical dilemma shared by them is how they can do that at the other stakeholder’s expense. Can management satisfy the authors need to protect their copyrights so to insure adequate income? Can management maximize capabilities and reduce costs so shareholders see value and dividends? Can shareholders withhold investment if they lose confidence in management’s ability to create value? Can the authors withhold literature due to a lack of confidence in management? Can management find a way to insure adequate income for all stakeholders, create lasting value and do so in an ethical manner?

The solution to the ethical dilemma is to insure all stakeholders have a stake in the future of the company. Presently the management does not have at its disposal the resources necessary to implement any project including the e-books initiative. The solution presented here is to take stock of the resources at management’s disposal, create a culture of problem solvers, and institutionalize the processes needed to succeed going forward. The result of creating a culture of problem solvers will remove the trust issues now prevalent between the stakeholders. Confidence in leadership must be restored and is the cornerstone for future success.

End-State Vision

Harrison-Keyes Inc. will become the information solution to the world by providing profitable and unique information solutions through their culture of shared vision.

Gap Analysis

The gaps in Harrison-Keye Inc’s. e-books strategy and implementation are many. The easy thing would be to view just those gaps with the other alternative of examining the biggest gap. The apparent gaps are the lack of core competences, the lack of alignment with vision, the lack of alignment with mission, the lack of project management expertise, the lack of stakeholder