The Virtual Environment Work Team at T a Stearns

CASE INCIDENT –  A  A Virtual Team at T.A. Stearns

T.A. Stearns is a national tax accounting firm whose main business is tax preparation services for individuals. Stearns’ superior reputation is based on the high quality of its advice and the excellence of its service. Key to the achievement of its reputation is the state-o theart computer databases and analysis tools that its people use when counseling clients. These  programs were developed by highly trained individuals. individuals. The programs that these individuals produce are highly technical both in terms of the tax laws they cover and the code in which they are written. !erfecting them requires high levels of programming s"ill as well as the ability to understand the law. #ew laws and interpretations of existing laws have to be integrated quic"ly and flawlessly into the existing regulations and analysis tools. $our programmers in the greater %oston area carry out the creation of these programs in a virtual environment. The four wor" at home and are connected to each other and to the company by email telephone and conference software. $ormal onsite meetings among all of the programmers ta"e place only a few times a year although the wor"ers sometimes meet informally outside of these scheduled occasions. &ere is some bac"ground on the four' Tom Andrews is Andrews  is a tax lawyer a graduate of the (niversity of )aine and a former hoc"ey player there. At *+ Tom Tom has wor"ed on the programs for six years and is the longest-standing member of the team. Along with his design responsibilities Tom is the primary liaison with Stearns. &e is also responsible for training new team members. Single Tom Tom wor"s out of his farm in Southern #ew &shire where in his spare time he en,oys hunting and fishing. Cy Crane Crane a tax accountant and computer science graduate of the (niversity of )assachusetts is * years old married with two children ages four and six. &is wife wor"s full time in a law firm in downtown %oston. n his spare time /y en,oys  bi"ing and fishing.  Marge Dector  a tax lawyer graduated from !enn State (niversity is *0 years old married with two children ages eight and ten. &er husband wor"s full time as an electrical engineer at a local defense contractor. )arge’s hobbies include golf and s"iing.  Megan Harris Harris tax accountant and graduate of ndiana (niversity is 1 years old and single. She recently relocated to %oston and wor"s out of her apartment in the %ac" %ay area. These four people exchange e-mail messages many times every day. n fact it is not unusual for them to step away from guests or family to log on and chec" in with the others. 2ften their e-mails are amusing as well as wor"-related. Sometimes for instance when they were facing a deadline and one of )arge’s "ids is home sic" they help each other with the wor". Tom Tom has occasionally invited the others to visit his farm and )arge and /y have gotten their families together several times for dinner. About About once a month the whole group gets together for lunch. All four of these Stearns employees are on salary which consistent with company custom is negotiated separately and secretly with management. Although each is required to chec" in regularly during every wor"day they they were told when they were hired they could wor" wherever they wanted. /learly flexibility is one of the pluses of these ,obs. 3hen the four get together they often ,o"e about the managers and wor"ers who are tied to the office referring to them as 4face timers5 and to themselves as 4free agents.5 3hen the programmers were as"ed to ma"e a ma,or program change they often developed programming tools called macros that would help them to do their wor" more efficiently. These macros greatly enhanced the speed at which a change could be written into •

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the programs. /y in particular really en,oyed hac"ing around with macros. 2n one recent  pro,ect for instance he became obsessed with the prospect of creating a shortcut that could save him a huge amount of time. 2ne wee" after he turned in his code and his release notes to the company /y bragged to Tom that he created a new macro that had saved him eight hours of wor" that wee". Tom was s"eptical of the shortcut but after trying it out he found that it actually saved him many hours too. Stearns has an employee suggestion program that rewards employees for innovations that save the company money. The program gives an employee five percent of the savings generated by their innovation over a period of three months. The company also has a profit sharing plan. Tom and /y felt that the small amount of money that would be generated by a company reward would not offset the free time that they gained using their new macro. They wanted the time for leisure or consulting wor". They also feared their group might suffer if management learned about the innovation. t would allow three people to do the wor" of four which could mean one might lose their ,ob so they did not share their innovative macro with management. Although Tom and /y would not share the innovation with management they were concerned that they were entering their busy season and "new everyone on the team would  be stressed by the heavy wor"load. They decided to distribute the macro to the other members of their team and swore them to secrecy. 2ver lunch one day the team set for itself a level of production that it felt would not arouse management’s suspicion. Several months passed and they used some of their extra time to push the quality of their wor" even higher. %ut they also now had more time to  pursue their own personal interests. 6ave 7egan the in-house manager of the wor" team pic"ed up on the innovation several wee"s after it was first implemented. &e had wondered why production time had gone down a bit while quality had shot up and he got his first in"ling of an answer when he saw an e-mail from )arge to /y than"ing him for saving her so much time with his 4brilliant mind.5 #ot wanting to embarrass his group of employees the manager hinted to Tom that he wanted to "now what was happening but he got nowhere. &e did not tell his own manager about his suspicions reasoning that since both quality and productivity were up he did not really need to pursue the matter further. 6ave has ,ust learned that /y has boasted about his tric" to a member of another virtual wor" team in the company. Suddenly the situation seems to have gotten out of control. 6ave decided to ta"e /y to lunch. 6uring the meal 6ave as"ed /y to explain what was happening. /y told him about the innovation but he insisted the team’s actions had been  ,ustified to protect itself. 6ave "new that his own boss would soon hear of the situation and that he would be loo"ing for answers8from him.

A Virtual Team at T.A.Stearns Question 1

3hy is this group a team9 Answer 1

This group can be easily seen as a team in which there is a formal group of four people who have pre-defined roles to perform. The group members here are part of a virtual team which means they can operate from anywhere they wish to that is  they ,ust have to chec" once a day through e-mails messages and group conferencing softwares . &ere are the reasons why this group is a team ' :. The team has shared leadership roles. All the four members of the team have full independence to wor" from anywhere and has a say in the decisions made by the team. . Team has individual and mutual accountability *. The team has specific purpose The soul goal of this team is to prepare highly technical both in terms of the tax laws they cover and the code in which they are written. ;. The team has a collective wor" products They have a team which wor"s together to solve big problems through programming such as building complex macros for the company. +. The team encourages open-ended active problem solving meetings They tal" to each other daily via mails and messages and group conferencing softwares. 1. The team measures performance by assessing collective wor" products <. The team discusses decides and does real wor"  They openly discuss with each other the problems and ma"e decisions there by leading to programming new programmes for the firms. &ere the team goes beyond the traditional formal wor" groups by having a collective synergistic =the whole is greater than the sum of it’s parts> effect.

Question 3

3hat if any characteristics of groupthin" are manifested in the wor" team9 Answer 3

$ollowing is a brief  loo" at the situation T.A.Stearns is a national tax accounting firm whose main business is tax preparation services for individuals. t has a superior reputation due to its quality of advice and the excellence of service. The "ey is the state-of-the-art om!uter "atabases an" anal#sis tools  used when counselling clients which are developed by hi$hl# traine" in"i%i"uals. The creation of the  programs is done in a virtual environment by teams. &ere four programmers named Tom An"rews& C# Crane& 'ar$e Detor& an" 'e$an (arris wor" at home and are connected to each other and the company by email telephone and conference software. The team is %irtual in nature and formal and they can wor" wherever they want but have to chec" in daily onsite meetings among programmers ta"e place only few times in a year though they meet informally outside of these scheduled occasions. The team exchanges emails many times a day and often they are amusing as well as well wor"-related. Also once about a month the whole group gets together.

 #ow let’s have a brief loo" at how the !roblem arose due to $rou!thin)  !rogrammers develop programming tools called maro that helps them to do their wor" more efficiently when a ma,or program change is required due to changes?amendments in laws. C# beame obsesse" with the prospect of creating a shortcut that could save huge amount of time and he was successful in doing so. &e told Tom about it who tried it and found it clic"ed. Stearns has an em!lo#ee su$$estion !ro$ram rewarding employees for innovations saving company money. t gives an employee five percent of savings generated over a period of three months and a profit-sharing plan. The members of team wanted a time for leisure an" onsultin$ wor) an" feare" their $rou! mi$ht suffer if the management learned about their innovation. This way the wor" of four people could be done by three and one could lose the ,ob so they "ept it to themselves. #ow as the busy season came they distributed the maro to other members of the team an" swore them to sere# . They set a level of  production that would not arouse the management’s suspicion. $or several months this continued and they pushed to more quality wor" with more leisure time. &owever 6ave 7egan the in-house manager of the wor" team pic"ed up the innovation several wee"s after it was first implemented. &e found out that the !ro"ution time ha" $one "own a bit& while *ualit# ha" shot u! . &e found proofs to his doubt in emails of )arge to /y. &e hinted it to Tom but he would not tell the truth. $inally thin$s be$an to $o out of ontrol as C# boaste" his tri) to a member of another %irtual team and 6ave too" 

/y out to a lunch. At the lunch /y revealed about the innovation and that the team’s action had been ,ustified to protect itself. +rou!thin) -

A dysfunction of highly cohesive groups and teams that has received a lot of attention has  been referred to as groupthin". n groupthin" there is a deterioration of mental efficiency reality testing and moral ,udgement that results from in-group pressure. t results from the  pressures on individual members to conform and reach consensus that there is no realistic appraisal of alternative courses of action in a decision and deviant minority or unpopoular views are suppressed. $ollowing are the harateristis of $rou!thin)  are manifested in the wor) team @  There is the illusion of in%ulnerabilit# @There is excessive optimism and ris" ta"ing. As we can see here there is excessive optimism and ris" ta"ing behaviour shown by the team as they "ept the innovation to themselves having optimism regarding that the management won’t easily find out about it. Also the ris" ta"ing behaviour can be seen when they ignore the company policy for their own benefits. There are rationalisations by the members of the group to discount warnings. This can be seen when the members ignore the threat of being caught and whwn 6ave hinted Tom he rationalised thin"ing if everything’s all right why does dave has to worry. There is an unquestioned belief in the group’s inherent moralit# @ The group ignores questionable ethical or moral issues or stances. &ere the group ignores the moral issues and stances by "eeping the innovation to themselves "nowing about the company policy of suggested rewards. 3or"ing for Stearns for a long time they should have been more loyal. Those who oppose the group are stereot#!e"  as evil wea" or stupid. &ere not a singleperson in any team lea"ed the secret of the macro to the management though it is hard to believe that no one had any morality or loyalty for Stearns. There is "iret !ressure on any member who questions the stereotypes. Similar to above no one questioned /y and Tom for being immoral and their unrealistic approach. There is self-ensorshi! of any deviation from the apparent group consensus. This can be easily seen in this case as no one person came out with the truth unless it was finally out. There is the illusion of unanimit# @ silence is interpreted as consent. &ere /y and Tom swore the other members to the oath of secrecy thin"ing what they thought was everybody’s thin"ing but this actually might not have been the case.

There are self-a!!ointe" min" $uar"s  who protect the group from adverse information. n this case study Tom was the self-appointed mind guard who "ept the information of 6ave hinting to him about the innovation to himself thin"ing that there would be nothing done as long as the wor" was done well and company was in profit. Question ,

&as 6ave been an effective team leader9 xplain your position. Answer

Bes 6ave is an effective team leader according to my interpretation because he "nows how to converse with employees in different situations without offending them in any way. n this case when /y developed a program using his superior programming s"ills to reduce his man- hours and increase productivity he told about it only to his colleagues so that they  benefit from it and en,oy some leisure time. &e didn’t tell about it to 6ave=his boss> because he feared that since his program helps in doing the wor" of four people by only three people one of them might lose their ,ob because of him. Another reason contributing to his secrecy was that their team would get only +C of the profit generated by the aid of their innovation only for three months which was very less in comparison to the leisure time they had. The group even increased the quality of their wor" so as to not arouse any suspicion. %ut /y made the terrible mista"e of telling about his program to a member from another group which aroused 6ave’s suspicions. 6ave was wondering for a few wee"s after the implementation of the program as to why the production time had decreased and the quality of wor" had shot up. &e got his first in"ling form an e-mail he intercepted from )arge =another member of the team> to /y than"ing him for his brilliant thin"ing. 6ave tried to confront Tom =group member> trying not to create an embarrassing situation  but got no further leads. &e did not even tell his boss about his suspicions since quality and  productivity were up. %ut one day 6ave learned that /y had boasted about his tric" program to a person from another team in the company. 6ave decided that the matter had gone out of hands and pulled the reins by inviting /y to lunch and as"ing him to explain what was happening.

This method was wise and effective as it gave a sense of security to the offender who  pleaded guilty immediately but insisted that the reasons were ,ustified so as to protect himself. This manner of interrogation and his good use of intellect to cover an embarrassing situation shows that he is an effective team leader. Also he respects the sentiments and

feelings of others which ma"es him a considerate man leading to his effective team leadership.