THE MULTICOM CASE

Case Analysis
Case Facts

Multicom, a small firm in public

relations field.
Started by Jim Walsh, marketing
specialist, and Wendy Bridges,
public relations expert owning 40%
equity each.
Marie Beaumont, writer and editor,
and Frank Rossi, film and video
person,
join
as
minority
shareholder (10% each).
All partners formerly worked
together.
Golden principle of company, set
in early days, all four partners
would take major policy decisions
together.
At the time of establishment,
Multicom partners adopted Client
Centered Mode of Organization.
All
partners
developed
a
reasonable competence in all
aspects of agency and could
substitute each other.
New staff encouraged to develop
all-around skills and capacities in
addition to specializations.
Work Culture in Early Days:
Start early work till late and party
hard.
Company known for its Edgy style
and fun work culture
Walsh and Bridges wanted Ad hoc
style of organization.
Age Gap between partners and
Philosophical differences arose.

Walsh and Bridges initiated the

process of re-organization without
Beaumont and Rossi.
Walsh and Bridges started Media
2000 taking many of their clients
from Multicom and started the way
Multicom worked in earlier days,
work
hard
party
harder.

1. What metaphors help us to make

sense of the developments described
in the case?

In our case when Multicom

partners Walsh and Bridges wanted
to reorganise they were focused on
process instead of end goals, they
wanted a structured organization
but they forgot that their
organization is known for their
edgy
approach.
These
organisations are perceived to work
like
living
organisms.
Consequently, they are concerned
with survival. Employees have
complex needs that must be
satisfied for them to function well.
Since organisations are open to the
environment, they should be
organised to fit their task
environments,
rather
than
according to a boilerplate. Its focus
is on survival, which is a process as
opposed to goals which are
endpoints.
Organismic
organisations have more design
choices, they are more innovative,
and they focus on interorganisational
relations.
Its
limitations are that it is too
mechanistic and therefore struggles
with social phenomena on which it
relies, most organisations do not
function well because their
elements do not cooperate, and the
metaphor can easily become an
ideology.

An organization has many metaphors

related to it depending on its working style
and how it is perceived, in our case there
are many developments that took place
over a period of 4 years. Various
developments that took place have
different metaphors attached to them.

Organismic

Brain
When Multicom major equity
partners
were
thinking
of
reorganization, it was important for
partners to question whether what
they do is appropriate in a rational
way, like a brain, which is the best
known information processor.
Organisations cannot function
without processing information,
communicating,
and
making
decisions. Which in our case did
not take place as Walsh and
Bridges didnt take in account the
consequences of this decision on
their work culture and image
perceived not only by clients but
also by future workers.
The
strengths of the brain metaphor are
its contribution to learning and
self-organisation, a shift away from
goal directed planning, and a shift
away from bounded rationality. But
it also has two major weaknesses,
namely the conflict between
learning and self-organisation and
power and control, and secondly,
the resistance of beliefs and
assumptions, or mind maps, to
change.

Psychic Prison
The psychic prison metaphor
brings a set of perspectives that
enables us to explore unconscious
processes that trap people, it shows
that
our
understanding
of

organisation is too rational, it

draws attention to ethics, power
relations, and it shows up barriers
to innovation and change. But it
also has limitations, namely that it
ignores ideologies that control and
shape organisations, it places a lot
of emphasis on cognitive processes
whereas exploitation, domination
and control are rotted in material
life, it encourages speculation, and
it raises the risk of mind control.
Beaumont and Rossi were locked
in this. Beaumont and Rossi were
more inclined towards the work
culture formed from starting and
given their age wanted to continue
the same culture which would
affect how the organization would
take shape in coming years as
people were usually out of office
during office hours for long period
of times which affected the
organization and didnt want any
domination
being
done
on
employees in any respect till they
performed well.

that that is due to a conspiracy. In

Multicom when Walsh and Bridges
wanted reorganization, they went
behind Beaumont and Rossis back
breaking their golden rule set up
while establishment of company
that major decisions would be
taken by all four partner together,
and they both exercised their
authority by proposing the
reorganization and insisting on it
which
showed
their
clear
dominance over the situation. Also
when they having problems by
work culture because of their need
for leisure time, Beaumont and
Rossi offered to share the burden in
return of greater equity but Walsh
and Bridges didnt want to give up
on their dominance even when it
meant easier life for both of them.

Machine
People are expected to operate like
clockwork by working to certain
procedures, rest according to
certain rules and repeat that in a
mechanical way. Organisations are
machines in which people are
parts. Machine organisations are
tools to achieve the ends of those
who own them. Organisations have
to adapt to the technology they use
and after the Industrial revolution
people lost their work autonomy to
become specialists in controlling
machines. Machine organisations
are modelled on the military from
which it borrowed ranks and
uniforms, standardised regulations,
task specialisation, standardised
equipment, systematic training, and
command language. Bureaucracies

Dominance
The dominance metaphor draws
attention
to
the
rational
consequences
of
individuals
seeking to advance their own
interests while ignoring values. The
model shows that domination can
be intrinsic to how we organise
human behaviour, but the fact that
domination is class based, that
ruling elites tend to centralise and
control their interests, and that
government policies sustain and
serve the interests of socially
dominant groups does not mean
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produce routine administration in

the same way as machines in
factories. Walsh and Bridges
idealised this type of organisation
and wanted to have clear ranks and
departments being allotted to
individuals
and
demanded
dominance in the company.

powers to themselves if they want the

company to achieve higher profits and
clients and it will also help them
manage company more easily and thus
proving to be an efficient way of
working and prioritizing things in their
life.

2. If you are consultant to the founder,

what advice would you give them to
about what should they do to
sustain?
As a consultant to the founders of
Multicom, I would like to put forward
a strategy to bring back some features
of the work culture on whose basis
Multicom first started out while still
having some factors of defined
organization done after that. I would
recommend them to allow people to be
master of all trades including their
speciality and not bounding them to
their offices as the company is in
Public Relations field thus it requires
employees to go out of the office for
subsequent office hours to get the work
accomplished, add on to that I would
also suggest that clear team leads
should be defined so that people have
some ranks in them and know whom to
report moreover a schedule should be
made by employees recording their
hours spent outside office and the
target they accomplished during that
time. The culture of work hard and
party harder should be brought back as
more employees are young and want to
work in that environment as with this
employees get involved in work and
have a feeling of enjoying the work
they are doing thus performing their
best. The founders should also learn to
delegate powers and not restrict those
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