Difficult Task Force Essay

Jos has been appointed chair of a steering task line to chassis the primary result beginning for a juvenile reefer bet on between companies from Japan, the United States, and southernmost America. The new joint venture confederation will make, sell, and service coddle caskets (coffins) for the burial of beloved pets, mostly dogs and cats. One month earlier, each company had assigned personnel to the task force From the Japanese company, Furuay Masahiko from Yokohama, suspensor to the chairperson of the Japanese company Hamada Isao from Tokyo, director of marketing from its technology group and Noto Takeshi from Tokyo, assistant director of its financial management department. From the United States company, Thomas Boone from Chicago, the top acquire manager from its lumber and forest lands group Richard M bet from Buffalo, the codirector of the companys k like a shotledge systems group and Billy Bob Tex Johnson from Arizona, the former CEO, now retired and a consultant for the company. From the South American company, Mariana Preus from Argentina, the head of proceeds design for that companys specialty animal products group Hector Bonilla from their Mexico City division, an expert in automated systems design for wood products and Mauricio Gomes, in charge of design and verbalism for the plant, which will be located in southern Chile to contain advantage of the vast forest there.These members were chosen for their expertise in non-homogeneous areas and were taking valuable time away from their normal assignments to participate in the joint venture.As chair of the task force, Jos had scheduled an initial contact for 1000 A.M. Jos started the meeting by reviewing the history of the development of the joint venture and how the three company presidents had decided to create it. Then, Jos reviewed the market for the new high-end, interior designer pet coffins, stressing that this task force was to develop the initial design parameters for the new p roduct to meet increasing demand around the world. He wherefore opened the meeting for comments and suggestions.Mariana Preus spoke first In my opinion, the current designs that we claimin production in our Argentina plant are fair(a) fine. They are top nonch designs, using the latest technology for processing. They use the take up woods available and they should sell great. I dont descry why we have to design a whole new product line. Noto Takeshi agreed and urged the committee to recommend that the current designs were good enough and should be immediately incorporated into the plans for the new manufacturing plant. Jos interrupted the give-and-take Look, the council of presidents put this joint venture together to completely revolutionize the product and its manufacture ground on solid evidence and industry data. We are to redesign the product and its manufacturing systems. That is our job, so lets get started. Jos knew that the presidents had considered using existing des igns nevertheless had rejected the idea because the designs were too old and not easily manufacturable at costs low enough to make a significant opposition on the market. He told the group this and reminded them that the purpose of the committee was to design a new product.The members then began discussing possible new design elements, but the discussion always returned to the benefits of using the existing designs. Finally, Tex spoke up I believe we ought to do what Mariana suggested earlier. It makes no sense to me to design new caskets when the existing designs are good enough to do the job. The others nodded their heads in agreement. Jos again reminded them of the task forces purpose and said such a recommendation would not be well received by the council of presidents. Nevertheless, the group insisted that Jos write a memo to the council of presidents with the recommendation to use existing designs and to begin immediately to design the plant and the manufacturing system. Th e meeting adjourned and the members headed to the golf course at 1045 A.M.Jos returned to his computer and started to write the memo, but he knew it would anger the presidents. He hoped he would not be held responsible for the actions of the task force, even though he was its chair. He wondered what had gone wrong and what he could have done to hold open it.Case QuestionsWhich characteristics of group behavior discussed in the chapter can youidentify in this case?How did the diverse nature of the group affect the committees actions?If you were in Joses position, what would you have done differently? What would you do now?