Gap Analysis

Gap Analysis: Global Communications

Introduction

In recent times the increasing levels of competition in every industry have created pressures for management that had not previously existed. With the level of information available in the world today, instant access to data, and far more powerful tools for analysis, businesses are now faced with a conundrum. On the one hand companies can now project business opportunities years out. On the other hand their competitors are able to create plans to take that business away. The major defense against this has often been to cut costs. The Global Communications scenario presents exactly that problem.

Situation Analysis

Issue and Opportunity Identification

In order to increase their market share and deal with falling share prices Global Communications' management team has developed a complex business plan to increase growth. Additionally the senior management has created a plan to cut expenses and increase profitability. The company plans to expand aggressively into international markets in order to maximize revenue. They also plan to outsource a large number of jobs, using India and Ireland as a source of well trained cheap labor.

The management team presented this idea to the board of directors and was approved. They then presented the idea to the union representation, and found that the union had a problem with the plan. The union had given concessions some months earlier and was going to be unwilling to settle for further cuts to their union members' wages. They were even more unwilling to accept cuts to the union membership, in the form of layoffs. In the end the union president felt compelled to "take action both through the government and all other available resources."

Stakeholder Perspectives/Ethical Dilemmas

Each stakeholder has his or her own agenda. Many of their problems come from this fact, and although they are fractured into three large groups, each one brings a different perspective and each has his or her own ethical dilemma.

Katrina Heinz, as a new CEO for the company, has the task of establishing her abilities before the board of directors. She has a fiduciary responsibility to the shareholders and is required to put them before all other considerations. To do this she must increase profits, and she believes that aggressive globalization is the best way to do this. She is aggressive and seems to know her business, but she is also the major driving force causing the rifts with the unions. It was her orders to keep the unions in the dark during the early negotiations.

Sy Rodriguez, as Executive Vice President of Consumer Marketing and Sales has the difficult task of protecting Global Communications image during a major layoff. He views the layoff with some skepticism but is willing to spin the whole thing to their advantage. His major objections are not so much the human tragedy of a large layoff, but rather the publicity of the layoff.

Nancy Everhardt is in a tenuous position as a new VP with the company. Her main concern appears to be ingratiating herself with Katrina. She is very focused on her task, growing the small business market. She is less concerned with the repercussions of the plan, and more concerned with making the plan succeed, and increasing her own capital with the company.

Joel Thompson is a good intermediary with the union. He has very good relationships with each of the major stakeholders. He was able to help secure concessions from the unions in the last round of negotiations but he is concerned with the direction this newest round of negotiations may go. His major goal does appear to be making Katrina's plan succeed, but he wants to create some sort of consensus with the unions.

Maria Antez is in a very difficult position. Her last negotiations went poorly, and the current situation has made her look very bad with the union. The company is putting her in a spot, and she will have no choice but to take a very strong stance. The only way for Maria to keep her position is to force the company into some form of compromise.

End-State Vision

Should Global Communications Company move in the right direction, they could easily enter the marketplace garnering a very large share of the available business. To do this they require the support of their employees, and to avoid any messy entanglements with the unions. The future could hold a large increase in their share price and a major influx of revenue from an increasing share of the international and domestic markets.

Gap Analysis

Global Communications did not properly identify the challenges they would face in presenting their plans to the union membership. By excluding the unions from the early discussions management created a hostile environment from the very beginning. Unions are often treated by management as a hostile organization, but to make them an enemy is to create a potentially serious threat to the plans of a company, or indeed a threat to the actual existence of the organization as a whole. "Union power is the ability of a union or, indeed, the union movement to control its own destiny in an arguably adversarial or hostile environment," (Perry, 1997, 1). Forgetting this fact can be disastrous.

The opportunity in this case is for the stakeholders to work as a group to find the issues and find ways to mediate differences. While each of them has his or her specific agenda, their agendas are not mutually incompatible. Katrina needs to take care of her shareholders; Maria needs to help her union members. While the goals can be seen to conflict, in fact, employees do benefit from improved revenues, through raises and new opportunities. The problem is that the company did not foresee the issues that would be created by massive layoffs.

By not identifying the right problem, Global Communications was unable to identify the right solution. "If the right problem or opportunity has not been identified, the best solutions cannot be identified," (Maul, 1). Global Communications has several important players with conflicting interests. In this regard, the scenario directly mirrors reality well. Each of the players has done an excellent job of defining the problem, at least from their own perspective. According to June Maul in her white paper "Defining the Problem: The Critical Step to Realizing Opportunities" "Defining the right problem the right way is both the most difficult and the most critical step in problem solving," (Maul, 1). This defining was done well on the part of the key players in the Global Communications