At&t Project Planning

Introduction:

Frequently, anyone could be in a situation like Jack Lee who marks their calendar to change their cell phone carrier without losing their phone number due to a new Federal Commission ruling that was passed. This was a welcomed change that came with problems for AT&T which frustrated Jack and numerous new AT&T customers. It all started with a simple transaction of ordering his phone on November 25, 2003 and he tried to get answers to his problems by making over 20 calls and spent almost 60 hours on the phone with representatives to come to an amicable solution to his problem.

Little did he knew that AT&T was having problems with their CRM system that crashed during an upgrade which did not enable customer service representatives to access new and present customer account causing a gridlock in customer service phone banks. As time passed they made a few more mistakes that were unwise and made choices in which they knew better but took chances anyway due to desperation in trying to keep their customer and place in the telecommunication market competitors.

AT&T tried to play catch up with its competitors and tried to upgrade to the Siebel CRM system in 2003 when all had failed and unfortunately for them they did not have a backup plan and this made them fall drastically in ranking amongst other competitors. To keep its current customers, AT&T needed to access its customer's records quicker and they were still having problems of accessing records slowly. In addition to their problems things went downhill further when AT&T started to outsource to consulting companies in India and local employees were assigned employee to teach them their jobs. Finally some customers gave up tracking and waiting on their phones and signed up with Verizon instead.

Objective of AT&T:

The case AT&T wireless Self-Destructs shows the continuous destruction phases of the company as an organization and its impact on its customers, employees and technology. Technology is not secure nor is it promised because it can easily make or break you if you do not plan and organize steps effectively and efficiently in introducing a project/new product to consumers. The project manager has to be one that is dedicated and in producing a dedicated team of workers who have the passion and know how to produce projects in a timely manner. Culture of an organization is important and for it to be effective one has to follow the key factors in an organization design advantages and disadvantages. In Organizational Behavior, by Hellreigel & Slocum, reference was made that, every organization's decision solves one set of problems but creates others. Organization design decisions often involve the diagnosis of multiple factors, including an organization's culture, power and political behaviors, and job design. Organization

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