Case study (Read the below case study and write brief answers (i.e., not more than 6-7 sentences per answer) to the questions given at the end. Questions:

1) Based on the information given above, what would you say was the level of the following structural dimensions for the firm in case of scenario A (i.e., before investment)? (a) Hierarchy of authority (b) Specialization (c) Centralization ( d) Formalization 2) Based on your answer to the above question, would you say the organization had a mechanistic or organic structure in scenario A? 3) What changes do you recommend in the structural dimensions and organization design for scenario B to better manage the changes the organization is experiencing in the wake of investor funding?

You are the co-founder of a start-up that has achieved recent success in securing a large amount of funding from a venture capitalist firm. You have come up with a unique and creative product that has caught the eye of investors because of its new features and capabilities that are not present in other products in that category. As such, investors are excited about the potential of your product and have poured in money to help you scale up your operations, even as you continue to refine the product. This sudden interest and investment has led to a lot of big changes in the organization over a very short period of time. You realize that these changes pose a challenge because if these changes are not managed properly, they may derail the operations of the firm. As you sit down to analyze these changes, you realize that the organization looked and felt very different before and after this huge inflow of capital and investor interest. Below is a summary of these two states of the organization: Scenario (A) Before the investment Until a few weeks ago, you were working with a group of 8 co-workers out of a small, rented office in a very informal work environment. At that time, the product was in the stage of being developed and your main aim was to ensure that the product was unique and innovative so that investors would be ready to fund it. Thus, creativity and innovation were the buzz words in your firm at that time and all actions and tasks in the organization were directed towards achieving this unique product. The result was a very loosely organized firm where people worked on whatever task needed to be done at that time. The firm lacked well-defined workflows or job descriptions. As such, employees did not have fixed, well-defined work tasks but rather they worked on a variety of different tasks during the day. This allowed them to try out different configurations of the product and making ad hoc changes to its features and think out of the box. Also, there were no formal work roles assigned to employees. So, people would often assume different roles as needed, working in R&D, marketing, managing finances and so on as per requirement. Additionally, since it was just the 8 of you working out of a single room, there was no formal vertical hierarchy of reporting. The firm was very small and had a completely flat structure that facilitated horizontal communication and collaboration among employees. This horizontal exchange of ideas and information was important for creativity. With regarding to decision makingit was highly decentralized. Given the small size of the firm, all decision were taken through mutual discussion among all 8 employees. Finally, there were almost no written rules or policies about work hours, leaves, vacations, promotions, benefits etc. It was not required because of the small firm size. Employees could easily coordinate with each other to mutually adjust their work hours and holiday schedules to ensure that the work was not affected. Often people would have to work long hours and even come in on weekends, for which they did not get any extra pay. Scenario (B) After the investment Things have changed a lot since receiving the investor funding. The firm has grown suddenly from 8 employees to 247 employees in just two months! Moreover, due to space constraints you have added MGMT445 Case Study #1 2 more locations, which means that these 247 employees are now spread across 3 different locations. You expect the number of employees to reach approx. 500 by the year end. Thus, the size of the firm has grown exponentially, and the firm has also added more work locations. This has brought on added complexities. Earlier employees used to work in an ad hoc manner doing what was necessary and working a variety of tasks during the day. This helped boost creativity. But you are realizing that this informal working style may not be feasible in a firm that now has almost 250 employees. The lack of formal work-roles and specific job descriptions is creating confusion among new employees. They do not know what is expected from them or what they are supposed to work on. This is causing backlogs, confusion and redundancies. Thus, it is becoming clear that the employees in the firm cannot simply continue working on different tasks as needed. Another problem is about decision making. While earlier it was easy to take decisions together through mutual discussion, this is now difficult due to the large influx of new employees. It is almost impossible to discuss every decision with everyone in the firm anymore. You are realizing that some structure and vertical reporting hierarchy needs to be introduced so that key decisions can be taken by the top management team and then the employees in the lower levels can focus on working on these decisions. That would save a lot of time and make the decision making process faster. Finally, the lack of policies related to work hours, leaves, holidays, and general expectations in the workplace have added to chaos and confusion. Employees come in at any time they want and often leave early. Also, they are keen on getting paid over-time wages if they need to work on weekends, for which there currently is no policy. Overall, you realize that things are changing and that to manage this change you need to alter some of the processes and management style, but you are not sure what needs to be done. So, you refer to the part about structural dimensions from your Organizational Theory textbook....