The Virtual Environment Work Team
Chapter 1: The Virtual Environment Work Team
Introduction
A national accounting firm offers tax preparation services to individuals. T.A. Stearns was a popular national accounting firm because of its superior reputation for high quality of its advice and the excellence of its service. Superior computer databases and analysis tools that were highly technical in tax laws they covered and in code they were written was the key to T.A. Stearns reputation. They were perfected by high levels of programming skills with the ability to understand the law. T.A. Stearns’ work was carried out in the greater Boston area by four programmers namely: Tom Andrews, Cy Crane, Marge Dector and Megan Harris in a virtual environment. The virtual work team was asked to make a major program change to help do work more efficiently so they developed programming tools called macros. Cy Crane in particular enjoyed hacking the macros and created a new macro that could save many hours of work. It was made a secret by the virtual work team because the small amount of money generated by company reward offsets the free time they gained. They also believed that if the management learned about the innovation which let them do the work quickly, three programmers might only be needed therefore causing the loss of job to one of them.
The purpose of this Case Analysis is to know whether it is better to implement the new created macro in the virtual environment. To study its advantages and disadvantages in the virtual environment is the next thing to do. Next is to come up with an alternative course of action. Lastly is to choose the right alternative course of action for the virtual environment work team.
Background of the Study
T.A. Stearns, a national accounting firm, was a popular national accounting firm because of its superior reputation for high quality of its advice and the excellence of its service to tax preparation services. Highly-trained
Introduction
A national accounting firm offers tax preparation services to individuals. T.A. Stearns was a popular national accounting firm because of its superior reputation for high quality of its advice and the excellence of its service. Superior computer databases and analysis tools that were highly technical in tax laws they covered and in code they were written was the key to T.A. Stearns reputation. They were perfected by high levels of programming skills with the ability to understand the law. T.A. Stearns’ work was carried out in the greater Boston area by four programmers namely: Tom Andrews, Cy Crane, Marge Dector and Megan Harris in a virtual environment. The virtual work team was asked to make a major program change to help do work more efficiently so they developed programming tools called macros. Cy Crane in particular enjoyed hacking the macros and created a new macro that could save many hours of work. It was made a secret by the virtual work team because the small amount of money generated by company reward offsets the free time they gained. They also believed that if the management learned about the innovation which let them do the work quickly, three programmers might only be needed therefore causing the loss of job to one of them.
The purpose of this Case Analysis is to know whether it is better to implement the new created macro in the virtual environment. To study its advantages and disadvantages in the virtual environment is the next thing to do. Next is to come up with an alternative course of action. Lastly is to choose the right alternative course of action for the virtual environment work team.
Background of the Study
T.A. Stearns, a national accounting firm, was a popular national accounting firm because of its superior reputation for high quality of its advice and the excellence of its service to tax preparation services. Highly-trained