The Virtual

Environment Work Team

(Prelim Case Study-HBO 1B)

Submitted by: Catherine Zuñiga

(MBA-1B)

Submitted to: Maria Victoria C. Macale, MBA, PhDBM (CAR)

I. BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

T.A Stearns was a national tax accounting firm whose main business was its
popular tax preparation service for individuals. This company characterizes a virtual
working environment wherein being flexible makes the employees motivated to be
committed with their work.

The working environment was composed of highly trained individuals as the

virtual work team. Most of the time, employees get their work done and
communicate with other members via e-mail, telephone and conferencing software
whenever they want to. Formal meetings took place only few times a year. One of
the virtual work team members were Tom Andrews, Cy Crane, Marge Dector and
Megan Harris. In this case, team members have different personal life situations
that make them accept the virtual working environment.

In studying the case, Cy developed a new programming tool called Macro. He

and his team make this development a secret which later on became evident during
the evaluation of Dave Regan wherein productivity and quality goes up and also Cy
tell other group about this development. Dave investigated the reason for this result
but no one says the truth in the team even Tom. Dave was worried because he
knows his boss will soon know the situation and that he would be the one to answer
his boss’ questions.

II. STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

The given case study further sought to answer the following questions:

1. Why is this group a team?

2. What characteristics of the team predispose it to making ineffective decisions?
3. What are the characteristics of groupthink that are manifested in the work team?
4. Has Dave been an effective group leader? What should Dave do now?
III. AREAS OF CONSIDERATION
In the given case study, the following areas should be considered:
 Individual differences and perceptions
 Organizational Policies
 Cost and benefit of the action

IV. ALTERNATIVE COURSES OF ACTION

Given the circumstances in this case study, the following courses of action can be
taken into effect:

1. Dave has to communicate with other members of the team not only Tom to
know their own personal beliefs in the case separately and further in a meeting
encouraging the open-door policy of communication. Dave can be an effective
leader if he will practiced this type of communication, listening first then tell
what is the essence of their behavior.The disadvantage of this action if the
members will not talk because they have keep the reason as a secret because
there may be a human resource lay-off because a job is simplified resulting to
not resolving the problem and not help the dilemma of Dave in answering his
boss questions.

2. Dave should follow the Contigency approach, though a policy is evident in the
organization. In this approach, the situation and perceptions of the team
members should be taken into consideration so an effective decision can be
made. It may result to identification of necessary incentives for further
developments of employees like Cy. The only disadvantage of this approach is
that when the management don’t accept the recommended changes for the
incentive program.
 3. Another approach is that Dave should have a cost-benefit analysis, the secrecy
of Tom’s virtual team about the new program helps the productivity and quality
of the whole group. Though, the working time spent was lessen, the
productivity and quality of work was not taken for granted. Having this analysis,
the management might think of decreasing the manpower because the working
time is lessen, this is what Cy and Tom fear about.

V. RECOMMENDATION

As the case unfolds, the analysis suggests the courses of action#2 wherein Dave
will follow the contingency approach wherein the situation and perceptions of the team
members should be taken into consideration so an effective decision can be made
accordingly.

VI. CONCLUSION/ACTION PLAN

A team leader should have an ethical leadership skills who can be socially
responsible with his team members, open to for communication and knows how to
make some cost and benefit analysis to decide effectively in a given situation. A virtual
working environment have the characteristic of being flexible so the management
should be flexible also in dealing with the different behaviour and perceptions of the
members. In this case, contingency approach is applicable, decisions should be made
based on the current situation. In this case, Cy and Tom are scared that some employees
may be jobless because of the development and incentives are not really high to give
great importance. Dave should have an approach that is favourable with the
management and people of the organization. Team members’ fear should turn into
somewhat a motivational behaviour to be a responsible member of the organization.
Groupthink should not be based on personal values, a team is a team when opinions are
shared and taken into considerations.