In response to the major risk factors identified, National Furniture has formulated the following plans:

>   Diversion from Core Competency

The company will not allow it’s mission statement to be diluted.  Therefore, it has revised it’s mission statement to include the use of consulting as another means of implementing the mission itself.  Since the public increasingly demands guidance in purchasing the products that it produces and integrating them into their spaces, the company has decided to create the consulting division as a way to fulfill it’s mission statement of making these products more accessible to the public.

National Furniture has committed itself to maintaining it’s core competency, the making of high quality, classic furniture.  In order to do this, it has divorced it’s consulting operation from it’s production facilities, and provided it with only limited support through it’s retail system.  Instead, the consulting department is now operated with it’s own line items under each budget item, and must place orders with the company through it’s wholesale and retail line as do other companies.  Once the orders are received, they are given priority, but the consultants do not have direct access to the computers or specific resources of the other divisions.

Finally, there is no intersection in the management structure of the company.  Kevin Flowchart and Amy Spreadsheet, the two vice-presidents, have no supervision of, and little interaction with the consultants.  This division reports directly to Bob Wood Jr., with no manager in the middle.

As the consulting division continues to grow, Mr. Wood will consider creating a separate corporate structure for the consulting division with it’s own management, and National Furniture as the holding company.

>   Excessively fast growth.

The company has had frequent management meetings to discuss the potential for quick growth, and has formulated a number of tactics to identify problems and smooth the transition.

First, National Furniture is committed to detecting transition problems in their infancy.  Because this is not always easy, it has developed ten benchmarks to serve as triggering points for re-evaluation of the company’s growth.  For example:

>  If a manager ever becomes responsible for more than ten persons at one time, that position will be immediately assessed for signs that it is becoming overburdened.

>  If employees in a division are consistently putting in more than 50 hours per week, that division will be re-evaluated for signs that it is becoming overburdened.

>  If gross sales exceed 7% over the previous year on an annualized basis for a one-month period in the retail division, a meeting will be called with all employees to investigate hiring and promotion needs.

Second, the company has committed to early education of employees about the changes that can occur with the anticipated rapid growth.  A series of five company-wide seminars of one-hour each will be held in order for top management to present ideas on their possible modernization of computer systems, hiring efforts, and the subsequent anticipated effect on the corporate structure, and personnel policy changes that may occur as a result of growth.

Third, it has committed to using ABC Consulting to review it’s growth patterns and the subsequent effect on the organization every six months for the next three years, since ABC Consultants have several noted authorities on managing growth in organizational development.