This Questions are based on the “Martha McCaskey” case.

Question 1

Seleris was a medium sized consulting firm based out of Chicago with offices in New York, Los Angeles, and San Francisco. Industry Analysis was the youngest and smallest of Seleris’s four divisions and was a separate, autonomous unit operating exclusively out of San Francisco. IAD consisted of 15 professionals, 12 analysts and 6 support staff.
IAD has a formal organization structure but becomes blurry on the projects. Richardson was the senior vice president for the IAD with Malone as vice president and two group managers for the division. The remaining 11 professionals formed two groups of senior associates who reported to two group managers. The groups were divided based on who worked with Richardson in the past and others who joined the firm from top-tier MBA schools referred as the “new guard” with significantly higher starting salaries. Another difference between the groups was that while members of new guard tended to spend their time equally between individual and team projects, the old guard worked strictly on individual projects.
Roles and reporting relationships among the professional staff were loosely defined. Senior associates discuss the status of their project directly with Malone or Richardson rather than with the group managers. Both group managers and senior associates served as project leaders. On team projects it was not unusual for the group manager to be part of a team on which a senior associate was the project leader. The assignment to projects, determined by process of informal bargaining among associates and project leaders served to further blur the distinction between senior associates and group manager.
IADs more blended functional organizational structures in project groups based on camaraderie provides a more responsive teams. This saves senior associates time