Business Management Resource Group (BMRG) is not your ordinary accounting firm. Typically, this kind of business rents office space, which projects an image of stability and prosperity. In this office space, accountants and support staff work together to meet with clients and prepare reports. BMRG, however, does not operate out of a brickand- mortar office. Instead, the Connecticut-based company’s two dozen employees operate in their own locations and keep in touch mainly online.

Although BMRG is prospering today, starting any business is full of challenges and stresses. The company’sfounder, Jennifer Katrulya, initially worked out of her home and struggled to teach herself about computer hardware as technology advanced and her business grew. She had a background in accounting, not technology, but she knew she needed a smoothly running computer system to meet her clients’ needs. Katrulya persevered, began hiring employees, and opened an office. She built BMRG into a successful firm that specializes in handling the controlling activities (overseeing all of a company’s accounting functions) at growing start-ups and midsized businesses across the United States and in several other countries. BMRG stores the data online so that clients can look up their financial data from wherever they are located.

Katrulya’s decision to go virtual followed developments in the firm’s growth. As investors referred businesses to BMRG, she needed employees in locations convenient to those clients. However, setting up an office for each new employee would have been expensive. Meanwhile, at the main office, some employees increasingly wanted to work from home. Katrulya also observed that more and more of the space she was renting was unoccupied. In addition, BMRG had been moving data and software online and eventually found the technology that made remote accounting painless. Virtual offices looked like a logical and practical next step.

Katrulya planned the transition to virtual offices to take place over a year. During that time, she shrank the company’s office space by half before eventually moving out. That way, until employees became comfortable with working from remote locations, they had the option to go into the office occasionally. Even so, Katrulya encountered resistance and conflict. She admits that she did not fully anticipate the human relations challenges of implementing this organizational change. Instead, she presented employees with her entire vision and expected them to be on board. Several employees left, however, and by the end of the change process, only two of the staff members remained. BMRG has since rebuilt with employees who appreciate the work arrangement.

1. The chapter discusses three classes of factors (people, structure, and technology) to consider when determining what should be changed. How has BMRG’s growth brought changes affecting each of these factors?

2. How can Jennifer Katrulya help her employees manage the stress of working in a growing organization with virtual offices?

3. If you had been advising Katrulya about her plans to set up virtual offices, what advice would you have given her for overcoming resistance to change and for meeting the challenges of managing virtual offices?