Case Study: “Crosby Manufacturing Corporation”, PMCS * Write a brief synopsis
This case study deals with the Crosby Manufacturing Corporation. The president (Wilfred Livingston) of the company realized that they were losing their competitive edge due to their out-dated management cost and control system. When Wilfred became president he had two major phases he wanted to implement; 1) Employee reorganization 2) an improved MCCS policy. To initiate the latter phase, Wilfred called a meeting with department managers from project management, cost accounting, MIS, data processing, and planning. He expressed how the current system was not sufficient and capable of supporting the company. The managers weighed in with appropriate lists, preliminary schedules, suggestions and opinions that were valid. Wilfred also added that he was going to appoint Tim Emary as project manager due to his wealth of knowledge pertaining to planning. * Did Livingston make any mistakes initially? How do you think the functional employees feel? Are there other alternatives?
I do not think Livingston made any mistakes initially? When he became president one of the company’s goals was to obtain large government contracts. Wilfred knew that government agencies preferred companies with customer focal point policy and that the matrix structure provided that policy. I believe the functional employees didn’t like the restructuring that occurred when Wilfred became president. The average person does not like change and the reorganization of the employees represented just that. As far as alternatives, the only one I believe that was available was the different strength levels of the matrix (e.g. Weak, Balanced, or Strong). The corporate plan was to obtain large government contracts and the president believed that the matrix organization would accomplish that. So, that type of structure was in