Chattanooga Ice Cream Division Case Study

Team Members and Contact Information: Name Preferred Email Phone Number Time Zone

Team Values
Commitment
Productiveness
Respect for all team members
Support
Be Proactive
Trust

Team Expectations * Commitment: Attend all meetings. In case of an emergency notify team promptly. * Complete all assignments, by assigned date. If this cannot be completed, please notify the team leader. * Respect: For each other’s opinions and individual style * Proactively: Clear and effective communication on the front end will limit confusion on the back end * Productivity: Complete all assignments on or before assigned date. Be realistic and aware if you get behind and notify the team leader. * Support: Be there for each other and help each other. We will succeed only as a team. * Trust: Be open. Be honest. Be candid. Be accountable.

Team Assessment (Strengths / Weaknesses): y: DiSC (ID Influencer and Dominant) and TKI (Collaborating, Competing) (Thomas-Kilmann, 1974,2002,2007) * Strength – My strength is the ability to dissect and analyze critical KPI’s. My other strength is my ability to motivate other through collaborative team work and able to drive results. * Weakness – Through my dominant side I can come off as too pushy. Sometimes I’m not a great listener because of the fact that I have my blinders on. My dominant side has exceled me to achieve my accomplishments however it can be my Achilles heel as well.

W: DiSC (Dominant/Influencer, DI) (Inc., 2013) and TKI (Compromise, Avoiding) ( Thomas-Kilmann, 1974,2002,2007) * Strength – Collaborative, very goal oriented. Connecting with others and motivating people to achieve their goals. Very positive and energetic and believes in empowering others * Weakness – As a manager need to work on candor without offending others. l: (Di: Dominant Influencer) * Strength – My strengths are best identified in my motivation and drive to accomplish a task. * Weaknesses – I have difficulty motivating others on the team to accomplish a goal and ultimately take on additional responsibilities to ensure a task is complete.

my: (CS: Conscientiousness and Steadiness) * Strengths – Thoughtful, reliable, motivated by opportunities to gain knowledge, performing quality work, and personal growth, organized, values quality and accuracy, consistent, commitment to quality * Weaknesses – Overcritical, overanalyzing and isolating myself, difficulty delegating tasks, may get bogged down within the specifics, avoids controversy, tend to take on too much endra: * Strengths – Team oriented, very open minded, confident, outgoing, also I enjoy seeing the true essence in everything * Weakness – I can be hesitant and need to improve on time management

Roles of Each Member

Name Function * Facilitator/Team Leader * son Editor/Quality * Ces Editor/Quality and Recorder * Vanh TimeKeeper/Process Monitor * is Recorder Team Sponsor

Expertise and Background
While everyone on this team is a subject matter expert in their relative field, each individual brings different personalities and thought processes to the cohort. This should help us diagnose the problems CICD is having.

Expectations of Team Members

Attendance
Attendance of each team member is essential to accomplish the necessary goals of the team. If a team member expects to be absent from a meeting, proper notification would benefit the team’s preparation for the upcoming meeting.

Participation
Attendance is important for teams to fully function, but active participation is expected from each team member and will aid in the development of the current project. Team members must be willing to engage each topic on the agenda with a 100% effort to help the team reach its goal.
Encouragement
Team members should be supportive of each other and provide emotional and verbal support to each other to complete the necessary tasks. Motivation levels vary from person to person, so it is imperative that team members assist each other whenever possible.

Dependability
Members need to trust and rely on others to get the job done, correctly and in a timely manner. If dependability is absent, frustration and conflict may arise amongst the team.

Respect/Professionalism
Members need to respect each other’s thoughts, ideas, and opinions to ensure cohesiveness. If respect is absent from a team, conflict starts and tension builds, which takes away from tasks.

Effective Communication
Each Member needs to effectively communicate their ideas on each project. Expressing potential time conflicts, role dissatisfaction, and the need for additional assistance will avoid future problems. People cannot assist each other if they are not aware of problems and conflicts.

Flexibility
Graduate School is extremely challenging because many students work full time jobs, have families, and other community events. Therefore, it is important to be flexible with the team and workload to ensure that each member is contributing to the task of the group, while maintaining their commitments at home, work, and within their community.

Organization/High Performance
As graduate students and subject matter experts, it is expected that each team member will perform at high levels at all times. Detailed timelines, well-written reports and papers are essential for the team to be successful at reaching their goals.

Assessment of Team Effectiveness
After each meeting the team will revisit the agenda to ensure that the team has met the goals and objectives of the meeting. This process will allow the team to evaluate the production and reach a common assessment of the time spent together. This time will allow the team members to finalize any concerns, comments, and visions for future meetings.

Making changes, improving time management, adjusting roles, and constructive feedback will improve the team’s performance and provide a detailed path to goal obtainment. We will review our developed Team Effectiveness form to help us evaluate each other’s effectiveness and discuss the feedback as a team. If necessary, we will suggest steps to improve performance.

Figure [ 1 ]

Team and Interpersonal Conflict Resolution

Team and Interpersonal Conflict Resolution * The Team will intervene when conflict escalates * A member of the team will become a mediator to ensure productivity is met
If there is no resolution, the team leader will make the decision based on facts * You had to understand that as individuals we all have various personalities and everyone is not able to adjust to new environments. So it's best to identify each trait within another but when it comes to teams selfish attics has to be place aside for the business
Team Distance as a Barrier
In the beginning the team was not on the same page. It was difficult to arrange a meeting time that would sufficiently please all parties. Just until recently, the team started to communicate on a regular bases. It was extremely difficult to have conference calls because we kept talking over one another. Solutions that we came up with: * Communicate thoroughly (text, email, or voice) * Verify that all understand by asking, “does everyone agree”?

Project Overview
Chattanooga Food Corporation (CFC), a family own company since 1936, founded by Charlie Moore’s grandfather: Charlie Moore serves currently as the President and the General Manager of Ice Cream division of the company. CFC is composed of three divisions: Grocery Products, Specialty Foods, and Ice Cream. With the ice cream division declining in sales, the biggest news hit them yet on June 5th, 1996. They were informed that the Stay & Shop, which is their third largest customer in the southeast region with sales of $6.5 million, had just signed a 2-year deal with the competitor. This is a significant event considering sales have been already declining. Charlie Moore has been with the company for over 10 years in many capacities within the company. The team is clearly not on the same wavelength.

Problem Statement
Chattanooga Ice Cream Division Case Study
With sales declining and profit plummeting, the blow to the team came on June 5, 1996 when their third largest customer with sales exceeding $6.5 million dollars signed with the competitor. The pressure to build new clients and gain market shares for the lose of the account continues to mount, not to mention for the first time is unable to dividend cash up to it’s parent company. How can this dysfunctional team get back on track?

Team Purpose
The purpose of this team is to dissect the dysfunctional aspects of what caused the down spiral and the result of that is a critical loss of an account. Through research and discussions this team will improve Chattanooga Ice Cream Division’s leadership and team dynamics by recommending actions for moving forward. The company’s vision and mission is largely at stake if corrective action is not implemented. At the end of our work, we will provide recommendations and actions steps to improve the team’s functionalities.

Team Objective * Find recommendations to cure Chattanooga Ice Cream Division’s dysfunctional team * Learn from one another’s different perspectives * Present finding of Zappo’s Culture and why they are successful and how that can help CICD
Methodology and Research Strategy
The team’s strategy is to conduct a thorough and healthy discussion in ways of: * Literature review of peer-to-peer reviews through the online library * Healthy discussion among team members

Research Plan
Literature review began in Week 4 of JWMI 510 Leadership in the 21st Century. The core of our research consists of class materials, independent research and discussions.

Research Findings
Based on what we have gleaned from the reading this team is dysfunctional on almost every level of Lencioni’s “Five Dysfunctions of a Team” pyramid. Through the course of the case study, it seems clear there is not fear of conflict. There is an inattention to results, but not failure to generate ideas or ability to generate results based on the pedigree of the current leadership team. We find that three of Lencioni’s dysfunctions are the largest contributors for failure in this case and based on our understanding of Jack’s perspective thus far, we expect he would agree.

The first and largest dysfunction of this team is the “absence of trust”. Without establishing trust a team, an organization, a business has a failing foundation. Jack reminds us that at the core of every business is a “real and concrete” mission statement supported by a set of values. (Welch, 2005) CICD has lost sight of the core in this lost account, but it has likely been waning since the entrance of the new leadership team. We also believe that Jack would assess the lack of trust is creating a lack of candor which leads to lack of idea generation and honesty.

The second dysfunction is “lack of commitment”. Lencioni advises, “Trust is a prerequisite to commitment”. (Lencioni, 2002) Therefore, commitment can only happen when trust exists. Again enters mission and values, as we have learned in JWMI, “the mission announces exactly where you are going and the values describe the behaviors that will get you there”. CICD is not aligned nor committed to a common goal because Moore, as CEO, has not ensured the goal clarity and focus.

The final dysfunction blocking the team is “avoidance of accountability”. In the case study the team is self-interested and self-protecting. As the stress level rises, the questions rise, the room becomes overly heated (by the thoughts being said verbally and mentally), and defense strategy is deployed. The team resorted to blame instead of accountability. The team resorted to “them” instead of a mindset of “us” and “we”. We hold Moore most accountable in this situation and we believe Jack would as well. Moore failed to keep the team aligned to a clear goal and failed to manage this crisis. In “Winning” Jack advises that crisis can be avoided in three ways “tight controls, good internal process, and a culture of integrity”. Clearly those are missing at CICD. However, had the team been functioning properly prior to this crisis, it could have been defused more calmly, efficiently, and collaboratively and dare we say, may not have occurred at all.

We found plenty of successful companies, but decided to focus on Zappo’s Company Culture. Why is it so successful in terms of revenue and employees?

At the helm of Zappos is leader Tony Hsieh, Tony is a young entrepreneurial with big vision thinking. At the Age of 24, he sold his company LinkExchange in 1999 for $265 million dollars. He sold the company for the reason of not enjoying his work. After the sale of his company, he joined Zappos as an investor and advisor. (Duncan, 2013) He began to grow the company and took the Chief role and incorporated what is the “Ten Core Values”. This is the differentiator between CICD and Zappos. (Magazine, 2014)

1. Deliver “Wow” through service 2. Embrace and drive change when there’s a clear reason why 3. Create fun - and a little weirdness 4. Be adventurous, creative and open-minded 5. Pursue growth and learning 6. Build open and honest relationships with communication 7. Build a positive team and family spirit 8. Do more with less, and realize there’s always room for improvement 9. Be passionate and determined 10. Be humble
Compared to what we have been learning through JWMI, and Jack’s book “Winning”, this is close to his eight steps. Zappos credits much of its financial success to the culture it has established internally. The Zappos culture is unique in that they believe in motivating and encouraging the staff. Their motto is that leadership is best defined by the person is an excellent follower and leader. Theyalso believe that the best ideas come from the bottom up. They value the workers that interact with the customers day to day and take valuable lessons from their experience to make their product great and the worker to feel great for their initiative. The Chattanooga case could take pointers from this culture, working to create an environment where recommendations are welcomed and supported by all colleagues instead of distrust and avoiding accountability.

Recommendations
Overall assessment consensus
In this case we believe the immediate issue is very time sensitive. Our article this week on managing conflict in organizations would recommend a compromising or competing approach. In this case we would use compromise. There is no way to make every team happy, but a short term plan for sustaining current business, improving performance of the weak Frozen Yogurt launch, and quickly making improvements to systems that manage inventory will calm the environment. These would be the priority. Any teams not directly responsible for those functions will move to the innovative work to resolve CICD’s ability to compete in the mix-in market place and that is the only way CICD can remain relevant to their customers long term.
The recommended actions moving forward
The team came up with a strategy to implement for the Stay & Stop.
Moore would need to meet with Stay & Shop and have a heartfelt conversation with them regarding the changeover to Sealtest. Moore would need to discover Stay & Shop’s reason for leaving CICD. With all of the proposed ideas coming up by CICD executives, if CICD can figure out why a company would decide to switch to a competitor’s branded product, it might help guide CICD to a solution to the overall problem.
Next, we would suggest cutting down on all unnecessary costs and finding ways to get more cash into the business. Look at the company’s expenses and see how it is spending its money, assess which parts of the business are not critical and get rid of them. Also, talk with the company’s vendors and assess how the company is spending its money. Are there vendors that can reduce their costs, create new contracts with better terms, or vendors that owe the company money? We also suggest looking at other clients and increasing sales. These are all quick solutions to increasing profitability and getting more money into the company. This will benefit in the short-term until CICD, gets back on track.
We would also suggest the company take a little risk and come up with new ideas for products and services. This will help keep the company and its employees engaged and shows current and potential customers that the company is still alive and looking towards the future by keeping up with the latest trends and demands.
Finally, the company needs to sit down and develop a business plan, with a clear mission statement and defined values. Everyone in the business needs to be a part of this process in order to get buy in.

Bibliography
Duncan, K. (2013). The Positive Influence. Entrepreneur , 62.
Inc., C. f. (2013). Everything DiSC Management. Glenview: John Wiley & Sons Inc.
Lencioni, P. (2002). The Five Dysfunctions of a Team. San Francisco : Jossey-Bass.
Magazine, C. U. (2014, July). Ten Core Values Drive Zappos. Credit Union Magazine Vol. 80 Issue 7 , p. 12.
Thomas-Kilmann. (1974,2002,2007). Thomas-Kilmann Conflict Mode Instrument. Mountain View: CPP Inc.
Welch, J. (2005). Winning. New York: HarperCollins.