Practice Case Study: Problem Oriented

A&A Online
Background Company

A&A, online retailers had emerged as one of the finest online retailers of electronics products in
the region. Quality of the product and affordability are two major hallmarks of the business
success. Ahsan Ali and Akshay Trivedi are the co-founders of the company, both friends and
graduated from the same university and just after 6 month of the graduation, they
conceptualize the business model and turned it into the reality within one year.

After one year company reported a 7$million sale and 45% sales Revenue. This astonishing
figures however, started to decline for the last two quarters constantly.

Started with 10 employees, at different levels (technical and non-technical), both friends are
unable to figure what went wrong.

Ahsan and Akshay having a very strong economics and finance background understand that
how crucial is to maintain the business sustainability by improving efficiency and increase sales
while reducing overhead costs. The following Organization chart of A&A tells the story of the
work roles of the 10 people.

Organization Chart of the A&A Online

Ahsan and AKshay Founders

Technical
John Distribution
Team- and
Sally
IT/Ecommerce Marketing

Web/Analytics Philips/mary
Khan,Rakesh
Khan and , Philips,Mary &Neha and Neha
empty
Tufail,Rakesh

A&A Philosophy on HR Functions

600 word count Reading/Notes time 20 minutes Answer time 30 Minutes

Ali and Ahsan, believe that” lean” is better therefore, they both engage in major hiring
decisions of IT/Marketing teams, majority of the decisions on recruitment were made on the
basis of their social networking contacts or a referral from friend or relatives. Each department
employees have to report their department heads and can also report directly to Ali and Ahsan
if it all requires. Therefore, the organization structure does not follow a real “formal”
communication process.

A&A Concerns

John was graduates from one the top IT institute from India and had barely couple of month
internship position before joining the A&A as Head of IT/Ecommerce. He applied A&A for the
job through one of family friends and got the job immediately. The other positions filled also
like the same way as John got the job. However, the web analytics job is still open and no
employees doing this job properly are this is been done on ad hoc basis.

Basically, there were no formal interview nor any selection criteria had ever been in the A&A.
Despite, working fine for a year, things are getting out of control form the employees of the
A&A and the co-founders.

Recently, their online –ecommerce site had been crashed (not hacked) and become
unresponsive for 6 hours, despite many effort the team cannot fix it and therefore they had to
outsource one of company services to fix the issues. Akshay was furious, as he knew it did not
only cost them huge but also the loyal A&A customers would buy from others competitors.

A couple of week earlier, their distribution team, have also lost almost $150000 discount on
bulk purchase for a branded printers from it three suppliers. This was certainty due to not being
responsive and compliance to the requirements of their suppliers to avail this benefits.

Akshay and Ahsan Dilemma

In the board room, both friends and partner were looking at each other, and sharing the same
thoughts “do we have made some mistakes” in hiring our employees?. Is there anything that
we could fix now before its too late….? I mean who we should blame…its both of us who made
the team… but there is something definitely wrong Ali… Akshay exclaimed!!!

Discussion Question

1. What are the key Issues/Problems identified in this case study

2. Do think these issues/Problems identified in Q1 are caused by any or multiple factors? If
yes. Discuss the causes of the issues/problems of A&A online
3. Suggest a compressive solution to A&A to resolve these problems.

600 word count Reading/Notes time 20 minutes Answer time 30 Minutes