1. What type of team was formed here? Was it necessary, in your opinion?

2. Use the team effectiveness model and related information in this chapter to identify the strengths and weaknesses of this team’s environment, design, and processes.

3. Assuming that these four people must continue to work as a team, recommend ways to improve the team’s effectiveness.

For the past five years, I have been working at McKay, Sanderson, and Smith Associates, a midsize accounting firm in Boston that specializes in commercial accounting and audits. My particular specialty is accounting practices for shipping companies, ranging from small fishing fleets to a couple of the big firms with ships along the East Coast. About f8 months ago, McKay, Sanderson, and Smith Associates became part of a large merger involving two other accounting firms. These firms have offices in Miami, Seattle, Baton Rouge, and Los Angeles. Although the other two accounting firms were much larger than McKay, all three firms agreed to avoid centralizing the business around one office in Los Angeles. Instead, the new firm—called Goldberg, Choo, and McKay Associates—would rely on teams across the country to “leverage the synergies of our collective knowledge” (an often-cited statement from the managing partner soon after the merger).