WHITESPACES PEANUT BUTTER MANIFESTO

WhiteSpace! which was once the webs advertising giant and the most visited sites on the internet, has in recent

times seen significant market value decline. The once revered market leader has been loosing market share to

rivals Google and Facebook in the digital advertising space which is getting more competitive with the entry of

Twitter, Amazon and the Linkdin. Growth had slowed, Google had overtaken WhiteSpace! in terms

of online advertising revenues, and the share price had fallen by nearly a third since the start

of the year, with an imminent problem of Microsoft takeover which could spell danger for WhiteSpace! Over

all, employees, shareholders and internet users have been at the receiving end of this exploitative management.

Leadership was sharply ciritcised for lacking ownership and strategic direction. It would soon

be realized that Senior Executives had personally benefited from the problem faced by WhiteSpace! The

situation has been perceived as synonumous to the tragedy of the commons, a problem in economics that occurs

when individuals neglect the well-being of society, the common good, in pursuit of personal gain; and this is

related with two currents that have developed in Economies. It was Greed! Greed prevented application of

common resource/common endowment from fulfilling its purpose, that is, from serving the common needs of

all stakeholders.

In November 2006, Brad Garlinghouse, MBA graduate and a WhiteSpace! Senior Vice President, wrote a memo

to his top managers arguing that WhiteSpace!, the diversified Internet Company, was spreading resources too

thinly, like peanut butter on a slice of bread. Edited extracts from the memo follow:

Three and half years ago, I enthusiastically joined WhiteSpace! The magnitude of the opportunity was only

matched by the magnitude of the assets. And an amazing team has been responsible for rebuilding WhiteSpace!

But all is not well. I imagine theres much discussion amongst the Companys senior most leadership around

the challenges we face. At the risk of being redundant, I wanted to share my take on our current situation and

offer a recommended path forward, an attempt to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem.

Recognizing Our Problems

We lack a focused, cohesive vision for our company. We want to do everything and be everything to

everyone. Weve known this for years, talk about it incessantly, but do nothing to fundamentally address it. We

are scared to be left out. We are reactive instead of charting an unwavering course. We are separated into silos

that far too frequently dont talk to each other. And when we do talk, it isnt to collaborate on a clearly focused

DC: ACD01-F004

strategy, but rather to argue and fight about ownership, strategies and tactics. Ive heard our strategy described

as spreading peanut butter across the myriad opportunities that continue to evolve in the online world. The

result: a thin layer of investment spread across everything we do and thus we focus on nothing in particular.

We lack clarity of ownership and accountability. The most painful manifestation of this is the massive

redundancy that exists throughout the organization. We now operate in an organizational structure admittedly

created with the best of intentions that has become overly bureaucratic. For far too many employees, there

is another person with dramatically similar and overlapping responsibilities. This slows us down and burdens

the company with unnecessary costs. Equally problematic, at what point in the organization does someone really

OWN the success of their product or service or feature? Product, marketing, engineering, corporate strategy,

financial operations... there are so many people in charge (or believe that they are in charge) that its not clear

if anyone is in charge. This forces decisions to be pushed up rather than down. It forces decisions by committee

or consensus and discourages the innovators from breaking the mold... thinking outside the box. Theres a

reason why a centerfielder and a left fielder have clear areas of ownership. Pursuing the same ball repeatedly

results in either collisions or dropped balls. Knowing that someone else is pursuing the ball and hoping to avoid

that collision we have become timid in our pursuit. Again, the ball drops.

We lack decisiveness. Combine a lack of focus with unclear ownership, and the result is that decisions are

either not made or are made when it is already too late. Without a clear and focused vision, and without complete

clarity of ownership, we lack a macro perspective to guide our decisions and visibility into who should make

those decisions. We are repeatedly stymied by challenging and hairy decisions. We are held hostage by our

analysis paralysis.

We end up with competing (or redundant) initiatives and synergistic opportunities living in the different silos

of our company.

REQUIRED:

i. Explain five (5) reasons why the issues facing WhiteSpace were strategic. Find examples of all the items

discussed in characteristics of strategic decisions. [10 marks]

ii. Explain in two (2) ways how the problems facing WhiteSpace would have impeded their strategy

success? [5 marks]

iii. As a Strategist for WhiteSpace, based on your understanding of the tragedy of the commons,

recommend five (5) policies/strategies you believe could be introduced by the Board of WhiteSpace in

order to address their problems and restore WhiteSpace to its position as industry leader, while fulfilling

their commitment to stakeholders.