Acorn Case Study

Emmanuel Ayala EMIS 7365 February 25, 2013

Case Study – Acorn Industries

1. What are the strengths of Acorn? Acorn Industries is able to process and utilize information very effectively to help their business grow and expand. Using consumer and competitor information, Acorn is able to structure their proposals such that a contract (a) addresses exactly what the customer wants, (b) acknowledges competitors, and (c) prices the contract to maximize profit within consumer cost expectations. The company is also able to effectively select and exploit acquisition targets to generate new business for the firm. Upper management also shows a willingness to change their business structure and focus to better compete in the future. Acorn transitioned away from a single product line to become a diversified firm, which helped to minimize the exposure of the company to changing consumer demands. Also, Acorn management tried to implement project management within their corporation to better meet schedules, costs, and customer requirements. 2. What are the weaknesses of Acorn? Acorn’s organizational structure does not promote promotion or collaboration, and therefore stifles a lot of potential for Acorn. Functional managers are accustomed to a decentralized organization, with each division operating as an autonomous unit. This leads to very little interaction amongst the divisions, as evidenced by the marketing department preparing contract proposals on their own. Also, we see that both functional and project managers must play a political game in regards to resources, with both the functional and project managers doing everything in their power to maintain control of resources. While upper management does a good job of defining goals and objectives through the KMIP, because they are defined on a division level, the defined objectives serve to further isolate the company divisions. Decisions are made in regards to meeting KMIP objectives, as opposed to what best serves the...