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Motorola Case Study Essay

Decent Essays

Problem Identification:

CEO Bob Galvin ended his speech on April 24, 1983 with words that brought much

confusion to Motorola. He stated that he “wanted to decrease the many layers of

management and to bring management closer to the product and market.” This was a

revolutionary idea with great vision. However, the timing of the speech and lack of

proper preparation for the following after effects were ill advised. Bob had not consulted

with his two upper management partners, William Weisz and John Mitchell nor had he

discussed it with Human Relations. The main purpose of Bob wanting to make these

changes were the issues he was constantly hearing about employees stating there was too

many issues with the management matrix …show more content…

Middle

management certainly would not want to change their current day-to-day business plans.

As well, the changes would mean a loss of power to their power base. The new plan

would have a lot of middle managers cut out of the picture all together. Weisz and

Mitchell would be up to the challenge but being caught off guard did not help the

situation at all. Human Relations VP Joe Miraglia worked with Galvin to set the wheels

in motion but noted it would not be easy and needed to be handled with care to make it

work. HR also questioned if this would truly fix the actual problem. They felt that just

creating small business units would only correct the structural issue and not the root

cause.

Solution:

The best call of action that Galvin and Motorola need to take is to first get his upper

management as well as Human Relations on board with the vision. The plan of attack

needs to be lined out and detailed as well as have contingency plans in place for when

things go awry. Time tables need to be set out so precise measures can be taken and

charted for progress as the project develops. Middle managers need to be involved

heavily and they have to have the authority to make true change. The new vision must be

shown to everyone as a positive growth for the employees, management and the

company. Last but not least there needs to be an over abundant amount of communication

that takes place between

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