Hasbro Inc Case Study

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Third, because of the communication and reporting structure it leads to separation of Hasbro interactive from the rest of Hasbro. As mentioned in the case, Dussenbury needs to report only to Sony Gordon, vice chair of Hasbro, an executive with legal background and expertise in mergers and acquisition. This reporting structure made Hasbro Interactive less communicates with other divisions. Communication between divisions is very important in order to have opinion or suggestion from employee in other division so that he is aware about the situation or condition of Hasbro.

Besides, communication between the staff in Hasbro Interactive also was not effective since all the decision was made by Dussenbury, there was lack of interaction between the top level management and the lower level of management. It can be seen that, the financial information for instance was overlooked by Dussenbury since there was lack of communication between them and Dussenbury only focus on the target achievement. Since he had an authority to make all the decision, consequently the communication between staff and leader was not effective. That means, Dussenbury did not need any consensus or suggestion where there will be no conversation or communication between them in order to get an idea and opinion to make a decision because he had the power to make decision.

Lastly, Dussenbury did not concern about other thing such as financial condition, operational management and risk management due to the lack of knowledge. As stated in the case that Dussenbury was lack in financial and operational knowledge. He invested in many company without conducted any analysis on the company background or further research on that particular company as well as he was not concern about the financial stability of the Hasbro Interactive before making an acquisition on that company. This shows that he was lack of knowledge in risk and financial management where it affect the company’s financial badly which at the end contribute loss to the company. As for the operational management, it can be seen that, the production of the product was continued even the product contribute to lower profit. This is because, he just focus on producing new product without took into consideration the other things such as product quality and the demand from the customer. Then, miss the product development deadline also include in operational management activity. If he had the knowledge about the operational management, he will aware about the deadline of product development because product development also include in the operational activity of the business. This symptom also can be seen when Hasbro want to implement the new financial reporting package which is not suitable with the Hasbro interactive business.

All in all, based on the symptoms mentioned above, it can be concluded that those problems occur due to poor of management planning and control system. Management planning and control system is very interrelated. That means, poor management planning will affect the control system of a company and vice versa. For example, a company cannot achieve it target if they have poor strategic planning however in order to achieve the target or goal the company not only need the strategic planning, good control system such as operational management also needs to help the company achieve the target in terms of managing or prioritize the action that is plan.

ALTERNATIVES

Based on the case problem analysis, there are two alternatives that can be conducted. First alternative is status quo which means Hasbro Inc will not take any improvement steps or action on the company. The company will continue the business operation as usual and will let Hasbro Interactive sold to Infogrames. The second alternative is improving the management planning and control system of Hasbro Interactive. This alternative is suggested based on the assumption that Hasbro Interactive is not yet sold to the Infogrames.

EVALUATION OF THE ALTERNATIVES

Hasbro Interactive had been sold to Infogrames which is a French company for $100 million consist of $95 million being in 4.5 million shares of Infogrames and $5 million in cash. That acquisition also includes the games.com website and all video games related rights and property to this company. Another consequent of choosing the first alternative is the company will operate the business using the same practice that they have. Based on the case, there might be some improvement in the planning of the Hasbro Inc operation since they are learning from the event that had happened towards Hasbro Interactive.

Having said that, this alternative unfortunately will not really contribute the growth of the company because as stated in the case, there are some weaknesses of control system during that time such as budgeting and business performance addition with the unpredictable risk that might happen in the industry for instance the life cycle of the product. This will directly impact the performance of the company badly since the company has poor control system plus with the industry risk. Besides, Hasbro also had difficulties in handle the strategic planning of the business operation.

However, there is a good side of choosing status quo to solve this problem. As it is known that, the company will not change the control system or any major changes in the operation of the business activity also the annual planning of the business. So that, it will make the staff of the company can conduct their work as usual and there will be no confusion in handling their job since there is no change implement in the work system. In addition, Status quo somehow can improve the staff efficiency due to the same routine been practice all over the time. Then, there will be no time consuming and additional cost incur to the company because there is no changes made. Therefore, it can reduce the company expense indirectly where it is a positive sign to the company financial.

On the other hand, the second alternative requires Hasbro to improve their management planning and control system. This is because management planning and control system are highly interrelated where it will affect each other directly. That means, in order to have a good management planning a company needs a good control system so that the planning can be run as it is plan since control system is the main player in business operation. Then, this alternative will help Hasbro from losing Hasbro Interactive if they can implement the changes correctly. Based on this alternative, the company needs to improve it strategic planning for daily business operation and also Hasbro can have clear picture of company activities during the financial year. Therefore,