Teamwork in Crisis Jerry Jones, a second-year learning team mentor, stared at his notes again. His interaction with the team last night confirmed what he suspected. Only three weeks into the first year of a BSc. program at a big-name school in Barbados, the learning team was in trouble. From his own experience the year before, Jones knew that a first-rate learning team made a huge difference in a students first-year experience. The corollary was also true: a bad or difficult learning team experience could taint the entire first-year school experience. Although Jones wanted to help, he was not at all sure how to do so. Perhaps describing the situation to his fellow peer mentors in his second-year elective class on managing teams would draw out some good ideas. In his mind, Jones could hear himself explain the story: Let me first describe the team members. Essentially, they were all around 26 years of age, athletic, and had professional backgrounds in finance or economics. Ill start with Bobby Bromfield, who was a self-professed introvert and who was passionate about the Reggae Boys Football team from Jamaica. Professionally, Bloomfield worked as a financial analyst for a few different firms. He had not traveled outside Barbados much over the past few years. With plans to target investment banking firms for his summer internship, Bloomfield had been spending a lot of nights networking with banking alumni and recruiters. Jeff King was from Barbados. He worked for Intel in Bridgetown for six years before pursuing his first degree. King spoke fluent English and was a huge cricket fan. He followed his favorite team passionately and was also very involved in the informal Barbadian club at the school and planned to make his favorite dish for the International Food Festival this year. After graduation, King wanted to pursue a career in consulting and hoped to get sponsored for a visa to live and work in the United States permanently. Joy Gordon was the only woman on the learning team and came from a mixed-race familyAfro- Caribbean and Caucasian. In 2002, Gordon was awarded the crown for Miss Jamaica and had been Miss Jamaica Teen in 1999. She worked as an analyst for a private foundation. Gordon planned to focus her career on private wealth. Despite the great amount of networking that her chosen career path required, Gordon was very involved in the school community. She spent a lot of time working on projects for the Black Business Student Forum and the National Association of Women. Keith James was originally from Nigeria and had been living in Barbados for more than 10 years. James worked as a policy research analyst for the government of Barbados, then changed career paths and worked as a real estate analyst. James was a first-generation college student and was awarded the Robert Toigo Foundation Fellowship upon entering the BSc. program. While James was not very involved in the school community, through the Big Brothers Big Sisters of Barbados organization he was a Big Brother for local youths. James planned to target the consulting industry for his summer internship. Cameron Mitchell was the only scientist in the group. Mitchell was a member of the universitys soccer club. Mitchell worked for Air and Product Chemicals in Barbados. He was hired into the competitive Engineering Career Development Program consisting of three one-year rotational assignments in varying locations and functional roles. Being single, Mitchell embraced the social life of the school community and could often be found at the Thursday night drinking club. Like Bloomfield, Mitchell planned on going into investment banking after graduation. This brings us to the sixth learning team memberFredrick Black. Black was also the captain of the varsity football team. He spent five years in real estate investment. Black was the only married member of the learning team, and his wife worked in the schools admissions office. He was very involved in the Christian fellowship program at the school and planned to continue his career in real estate. Now heres what I saw that night that brought me to share this story with you. Jones was already in the room when team members began to arrive, and James was the last to enter. I didnt realize you were going to be here tonight, Mitchell said looking up from his computer screen. We havent seen you all week. Where have you been? Ive been very busy, James responded while smiling at Mitchell, I had to head up north for an interview on Tuesday. But thanks for sending me all the answers and class notes, so I could stay caught up. Youve already had an interview!? This was an eye-opener for Mitchell who continued, Company briefings havent even started yet! And dont thank me. Joy Gordon was the one who put everything together. With that, Mitchell looked at Gordon, nodded his head, and sat down. When it looked like everyone was ready to go, Gordon cleared her throat. Ok guys; lets do takeaways from the cases from today. Mitchell groaned lightly in response. With an arched eyebrow, Gordon asked, Is there something wrong? Mitchell hesitated for a moment and looked around at the other group members. Well, we never really agreed that we should do takeaways every day. They take up at least a half hour every meeting and we might be able to make better use of that time or at least get out of here earlyIm sure that Blacks wife would appreciate that! Black just shrugged his shoulders. I think that takeaways are great and they should really help us when exam time rolls around. King agreed with Black as did Bloomfield. Gordon asked James what his opinion was. He shrugged his shoulders and said that it didnt really matter to him either way. Well, I guess Im outvoted then, Mitchell said smiling slightly. Lets keep going. Gordon looked at Mitchell, If it helps, I can take ownership of the document and put something together at the end of the term for all of us. Anything that helps with exams is great, Mitchell responded. Okay so none of this seems that bad right? Well please just keep listening. Gordon started with her own notes of takeaways and then asked for additional ones from the rest of the group. As they worked, they passed around the table some chocolate cookies that Blacks wife had made. Black gave his takeaways and stood up to draw a chart on the board, replicating something that his professor had done in class. As King began covering his takeaways, his cell phone went off and he left the room to answer it. The group paused and several members started to check their email. King walked back in, apologized for the interruption, and presented his takeaways. Then Gordon, who had been taking notes for the group, asked James if he had anything to say. James passed because he had no input, but he looked flustered. Whos leading the marketing case tonight? he asked. Well since none of us are marketing experts, Black replied, were just going to have to struggle through this together. I spent some time this afternoon on the first two questions, Bloomfield told the group. Let me go through my responses and we can talk about it as a group, OK? Gordon and Black nodded their heads, but none of the other team members responded. Bloomfield started the case and made sure to mention that everyone was welcome to add anything as he worked his way through the questions. Once Bloomfield started to repeat himself, King interrupted. Let me share some of the stories Ive heard about people having problems with OnStar technology, he looked at Bloomfield for approval before continuing. I think that customer perception is a good indicator of brand awareness. Black spoke up with his interpretation of the case study questions. Mitchell, who had been sitting silent the entire time then spoke up to mention that OnStar was purchased by affluent people. No joke, James said, laughing sarcastically. Mitchell quickly turned his eyes back to his laptop. Let me provide you some background about why this was unusual. Mitchell was normally the most outgoing of the team members and often shared funny anecdotes from his class sessions. That night he was very quiet. Black appeared to notice this because he kept looking over at Mitchell with a small frown on his face, but he didnt say anything. Bloomfield brought them back to the case questions and provided his thoughts on the next question. Black waited for Bloomfield to finish before he spoke up: I really dont understand why you feel that way. I think that you are looking at this too much from a finance standpoint. I think that the important point here is that OnStar has the first mover advantage but it wont last much longer especially if they cant fix the defects in the technology. Isnt that pretty much what I said? Bloomfield asked the group. Before Black could reply King interrupted, You guys do this every time! One of you thinks he has a different point and you argue about it for 15 minutes before you realize you are saying the same thing. Black and Mitchell looked at each other and neither responded to Prasads comment. Gordon looked around the table. I think were working really well on this case tonight so lets not let things deteriorate, OK? OK, I agree, King said, Lets continue on and talk about the 4 Ps in this situation. Bloomfield groaned, I am so sick of talking about the 4 Ps and we are only three weeks into class! Mitchell and Gordon laughed as Bloomfield threw his hands up in the air in disgust. Well, I heard from a second year, King smiled and said, that understanding the components of a marketing plan will be crucial for the final. Well OK. Lets just do it, then, Bloomfield said. So OnStar is being positioned as a luxury item for a few select brands of car. Do we think that is the right move for them to make? Absolutely not, James snorted. After all, Toyota only has a few luxury cars and arent they mostly lower-end affordable cars? Gordon exchanged confused looks with Black and Mitchell and said, Umm, dont you mean GM? No, Toyota, James replied, dont they own OnStar? Shaking his head slowly Mitchell asked James, Did you even read the case for tonight? Whats the big deal? James shrugged. I had to do other things today and besides everyone knows about OnStar. Gordon was visibly upset. I thought we all talked about how we needed to be prepared for every case, she sneered. Otherwise you are basically just using this team to get answers to use in class tomorrow. Why should you benefit from all our work? OK everyone, lets just slow down for a minute, Mitchell said as he waved his hands in the air. Its been a really long week and I think that tempers are getting the best of us. Lets just finish answering these questions so we can get home and try to relax before class tomorrow. Prasad, Bloomfield, and Black mumbled their assent. Gordon didnt say anything but glared at James who said Fine lets talk about positioning some more. Gordon proceeded to share a personal story about her grandparents love for OnStar and James laughed calling them silly and suggested they were wasting money. Gordon got defensive about her grandparents, and Black and Bloomfield told similar stories so James stopped laughing. Gordon continued and brought up XM as a similar model to follow and again James laughed, claiming it was a silly connection since OnStar was not an aftermarket product. The rest of the group again defended Gordons view arguing that OnStar could be an aftermarket product so that it was not specific to GM cars. Increasing sales and allowing OnStar to get better distribution made sense. James stopped laughing and apologized to Gordon for not understanding her point. Then he asked some questions about OnStar that were not in the case and that no one had the answers to. The questions concerned the current state of OnStar so he started to Google OnStar. As he did, King cleared his throat and said, I think that looking up information on the Internet would be a violation of the honour code. Come on, that totally doesnt make sense, James snorted. Why shouldnt we have information about whats going on today? We already know about the product. It hasnt been around for that long. Black and Mitchell agreed with King and told James that he definitely couldnt look any information about OnStar up on-line. Do you think it would be possible to sell OnStar through third parties? Gordon asked the group. For example, having Courts, Circuit Land, and Great Buy carry the product. They do it with XM and Sirius radios and I think that OnStar would fit into that market. That is the dumbest idea I have ever heard, James quickly sneered. Gordon immediately turned to look him directly in the eye. Really? And why do you think that, James? James smirked and looked down at his computer. He didnt say anything. Breaking the tension, Mitchell leaned back in his chair, stretched, and said, One more question to go. Lets jam out a positioning statement and call it a night. Can we spend some time talking about what a positioning statement is, and why its important? Black looked at Mitchell and asked. My professor doesnt really spend much time talking about positioning statements so Im a little confused. Mitchell groaned and replied. Can we do that later? Why dont you meet with your professor on your own to talk about that stuff? But I thought that the point of a team was to help each other grasp conceptsnot just work through the case questions, Black pressed on. And I could use the help. What if we split cases? James suggested. That might make us more productive in team meetings and then we can spend more time on concepts. I feel like I would go back and redo your work, King said shaking his head. After all, you didnt even read the case for tonight and we only have two classes tomorrow! You also havent led any DA, operations, or accounting cases so can I trust that what you share is right? Black frowned at King and asked, What does any of that have to do with my concern about reviewing concepts as a team? Were going to have to talk about splitting cases eventually so why not address it now? King argued. With this, the team meeting quickly deteriorated into multiple side conversations as King and James continued to argue about splitting the casework. Mitchell and Black started raising their voices as they volleyed back and forth about spending time on conceptual issues. Gordon sighed and looked at Bloomfield. She turned to me and asked, Isnt there anything you can do to help? They definitely want me to step in and help but Im not sure that Im ready for thatI just dont know what to say or do! I could really use your help. Any ideas?

1. Advise and make at least four strategy recommendations to Jerry on how he could facilitate a resolution to the teams issues. These solutions must be specific and realistic. You must indicate why you have chosen these recommendations. Your recommendations must be backed up by strong evidence (course readings, discussions, outside research)