REPORT

Current Situation:
Before joining MLI, Turner was assured of autonomy in decision making and was
guaranteed to be promoted as president within two years. But pretty soon, Cardullo
started interfering, questioning, criticizing and even changing the course of decisions
taken by Turner. One such interference caused MLI a considerable loss in terms of
sales and the deteriorating environment of the organization. Amid all this, the CEO
announced a visit to review the situation.
The current situation has arisen due to differences among people at MLI more
precisely the nature of differences due to goals and values:
1. Difference of goals:
 Cardullo led the merger of two companies mainly on his own and was
positioned as president of Triple-S's mobile system and support and wanted
to leave MLI’s president position at earliest, but MLI’a financial position was
weak and he wanted to make it profitable as soon as possible before leaving
it. Therefore, he wanted no interference in his decisions, but his lack of proper
knowledge about each division of the business combined with the urgency to
make decisions led him to make many mistakes that worsen the situation at
MLI. Also, since Cardullo was likely to be the COO of Triple S, he wanted to
make sure that things went well with the parent company and spent most of
his time in San Diego, leaving MLI without a guiding president, which added to
the worsening of the present situation.
 Turner, on the other hand, had joined this company for the independence and
autonomy of decisions despite not liking the marketing job in manufacturing.
But he could not handle the vastness of responsibility thrown upon him as he
was not given proper time to acclimate. But when Cardullo starting interfering
with his decisions, he began questioning the choice of joining MLI. He did not
want to leave this company afraid that he will be viewed as a job hopper.
2. Difference of Values:
 Cardullo saw people as either competent or incompetent and distrust for
later. Also, he believed that managers need to be sufficient on their own and
do not interfere with each other functions.
  Turner, on the other hand, appreciated each person for his competency and
hoped to improve on incompetency. Also, he believed that each function
should focus on organizational benefit rather than a particular function. That’s
why he interfered in Cardullo’s decision of cost allocation and reported
Swenson’s cash flow problem to Chin and Cardullo.
 Chin also has the same value of focusing on her own area and expected
others to do so, which led to an altercation between Turner and Chin.
 In the case, MLI has been referred to as paternalistic(meaning centralized
organization), and the organizational chart also suggests that there is no
horizontal flow of information, making it by default the nature of organization
such that people don’t want to be interfered by other people in the
organization, that led to the failure of MLI financially.
3. Lack of effective communication:(Difference of information)
 As mentioned in the case, Cardullo spent most of the time in San Diego
leaving a positional gap at MLI and Turner felt like making all the decisions on
behalf of Cardullo, so he was not sure, what Cardullo wanted of him as the
primary job assigned to him was of marketing, but he was given the task of
sales also. As he was responsible for increasing sales, he has to interfere with
the operations department, but Cardullo did not support decisions taken by
him, so Turner was in a fix.

Things needed to be done differently to avoid the present situation:

1. A proper discussion about the merger and future plans:
It seems that Cardullo individually has taken the decisions for the merger, and
future plans were not clearly discussed among the people, and therefore, they
were facing problems in decisions made by him. (Removal of the sales force,
selling old inventory, firing Kelly).
Has there be a discussion and future plan ready, the financial crisis that MLI
was facing would not have taken place.
2. Giving complete autonomy to Turner and clarity about roles:
Cardullo should have given the freedom of decision making, and instead of
outrightly rejecting his decisions, he should have discussed it and understood
the implications.
Also, as he was to leave MLI, he should have given Turner the right to look
after MLI as a whole instead of only marketing and sales division.
 3. Making MLI more open and decentralized:
Cross-functional engagement and flow of information should have been
allowed. Before taking any measure decision like costing of inventory in the
case, Cardullo should have discussed it with Controller, the COO and Turner
himself. This would have made Cardullo aware of his mistake and prevented
him from making the wrong decisions. Also increasing engagement among
different departments would make sure that each department would not only
focus on its benefit but also about the organizations as a whole, which would
have prevented the ignorance of the weak cash flow prediction of MLI
generated by Swenson (finance department). Also, it would have avoided the
altercation between Chin and Turner.
Things do be done now:
1. Understanding and acknowledging the problem:
Given the current situation at MLI, Turner should make sure that he tells
Cardullo about the main issues:
1. Lack of coordination, communication among different divisions
2. The absence of a leader for MLI( in essence, a clear direction), as
Cardullo, spends most of his time in San Diego.
3. Need for making MLI more centralized.
4. Ensure proper communication engagements among people from different
divisions.
5. Promote organizational benefit sentiment among employees.
2. What to present before CEO?
Turner needs to make sure that he acknowledges the problem before the
CEO and tells him the future plan created to address the current situation.