1) You have been called in as a consultant to analyze the operations at WRU. What would you advise?

2) What structural design changes might be undertaken to improve the operations at the company?

3) What are the strengths and weaknesses of the alternative solutions the company could employ?

This case highlights a company experiencing a number of challenges that are directly related to its willingness to shift to a project-based approach. As the case notes, product life cycles have dramatically shortened; however, at the same time, products are slow to market. Many new innovations have passed right by WRU because the company was slow to pick up signs from the marketplace that they were coming. Internal communication is very poor. These are all signals of an organization that is now facing a very different strategic challenge than one it had been pursuing previously. In the face of these problems, it needs to consider how a new, project-based approach will help the company. Key to understanding this case is recognizing that the old, functional organizational structure it had used will no longer support operations within a new, highly complex marketplace.