Company C is a $ 2 0 0 million national trucking company with regional headquarters offices in the Southeast, Midwest, and West. Regional managers control all operations aspects of the business. However, accounting and data processing until recently were centralized in the corporate offices. Raw accounting data was sent from the regions for actual processing, and reports were returned to the divisions. There was virtually no local accounting or financial analysis capability.

The company decided to decentralize the accounting and, as necessary, data processing support for accounting. The resources and systems to support regional needs would be provided.

The corporate staff and systems would be reduced to the level required to consolidate regional results.

Regional and corporate personnel were assigned to accomplish this objective through defining regional systems and procedures, resource acquisition, training, and so on. Naturally, the regional personnel were excited about the changes, and the corporate personnel were somewhat unenthusiastic.

The motivation approaches used for the groups were again different for each group. For the Southeast group we emphasized explicit rewards; the Midwest group stressed personal achievement and responsibility; the West group focused on needs for power, achievement, or affiliation;

and the corporate group emphasized group participation.

Quantitative measurements were based on success in putting together detailed plans and implementing them according to the planned schedules and budgets. Qualitative measurements were based on the general level of morale, trauma, and disruption associated with this major change in management philosophy.

The results are shown in Figure 3. In a nutshell, everything worked for the regions, and

nothing worked for the corporate group. The reason is simple: The fact of decentralization transcended all o t h e r considerations. The regions were overjoyed at having control of their own destiny and the corporate g r o u p was not particularly enthusiastic about the change. Under the circumstances, a participative approach for the corporate group probably worked as well as anything else would have, but the odds were against overwhelming success with any technique.

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FIGURE 3 Effectiveness of Teams in Case Study C Quantitative ratings Group Southeast Motivation technique ABSOLUTE RELATIVE Qualitative ratings ABSOLUTE RELATIVE Behaviorism- explicit rewards High 3 High 3 Midwest Personal achievement and responsibility High 2 High 1 West Pluralism-power, achievement, or affiliation High 1 High 2 Corporate Participation, group effort Medium 4 Low