An MBA 687 Module 1 memo analyzing a failed system rollout at a software branch: what was planned, what went wrong, why, using Kotter and research on change cynicism, and four lessons for the next change. Searches like "mba 687 module 1 assignment", "mba687 module 1 correspondence on a failed change" and "mba 687 module 1 example" land here.
The MBA 687 Module 1 example, in full
Memorandum
To: Incoming General Manager, Veritane US (composite)
From: [Student Name], HR Consultant
Date: [Date]
Re: Lessons from the abandoned customer system rollout before the One Platform program begins
Purpose
You asked for a short account of the last major change at the branch before the One Platform program is announced. In brief: the rollout of headquarters' customer relationship and ticketing system two years ago was abandoned after nine months, at a cost of about 410,000 dollars, and the failure came from how the change was led, not from the software. Employees still refer to it, and it will shape how they hear the next announcement. This memo describes what happened, explains why, and sets out four lessons.
What Happened
Veritane US is the Delaware branch of a Singapore software company, with about 140 employees and roughly 20 million dollars in annual revenue from supply chain visibility software. Headquarters decided that every region should use one customer system so that account and support data could be seen globally. The branch learned of the decision in a single email from the regional operations office, with a go-live date eleven weeks away.
The branch had no local sponsor for the project. Configuration was done in Singapore without input from the U.S. sales or support teams, so the system arrived without fields the branch relied on, such as the custom contract terms most enterprise clients hold. Training was offered in three live sessions scheduled for Singapore business hours, which fell at 9 p.m. on the East Coast; attendance was under a third. Within two months, the sales team had returned to its own spreadsheets, support staff were entering tickets twice, and managers stopped asking for reports from the new system. Nine months after launch, headquarters quietly allowed the branch to revert. No review was held and no explanation was given to staff.
Intended Versus Actual Results
Table 1 compares the goals set for the rollout with what occurred.
Table 1
Customer System Rollout: Goals and Outcomes
| Goal | Intended | Actual after nine months |
|---|---|---|
| Share of accounts managed in the new system | 100% | About 35%, then abandoned |
| Staff trained before go-live | All 140 | 43 attended live training |
| Duplicate data entry | Eliminated | Increased; support logged tickets twice |
| Global view of U.S. accounts | Available to headquarters | Incomplete and out of date |
| Cost | Within the regional budget | About 410,000 dollars with no lasting benefit |
Note. Composite figures assembled from project records and staff interviews.
Why It Failed
Kotter (1995) described the errors that most often undo transformation efforts, and the rollout made several of them. It never established why the change mattered to the branch: the email explained headquarters' reporting needs but said nothing about how the system would help a U.S. account manager or support engineer. It had no guiding coalition in the branch, so no one with local credibility could answer questions or push back on configuration choices. And it declared the change done at go-live, when the real work of adoption had barely started.
Beer and Nohria (2000) distinguish change driven from the top for economic results from change that builds the organization's capability through participation, and they argue that lasting change usually needs both. The rollout was entirely the first kind. The people who would use the system every day had no part in shaping it, so the design missed their work, and they had no stake in making it succeed.
Practical signals of trouble were visible early. Low training attendance and the return to spreadsheets appeared within weeks, but no one in the branch was accountable for adoption, so no one acted. When a change has no owner close to the work, early warnings have nowhere to go.
The Larger Loss: Cynicism
The 410,000 dollars is the smaller loss. When a change is announced with confidence and then dropped without explanation, employees learn that waiting is the safest response to the next one. Reichers et al. (1997) described this pattern as cynicism about organizational change: a belief, built from experience, that leaders will not see changes through, which lowers people's willingness to support future efforts. Branch staff now use the phrase "another HQ system" for any new initiative. An exit interview last spring put it plainly: an engineer said the branch had learned to "nod and wait." The One Platform program will be heard through that experience.
A Caution on Failure Statistics
Change plans often open with the claim that 70 percent of change efforts fail. I have left it out of this memo on purpose. Hughes (2011) traced the claim to its sources and found no valid empirical evidence for a single failure rate. The honest point is narrower and more useful: the branch's own record shows that this organization's changes fail in predictable ways, and those ways can be addressed.
Four Lessons for the Platform Change
First, explain the case in the branch's terms. The platform change will retire the custom code that many of our enterprise clients run, so the message must say what it means for those clients and for the engineers and consultants who support them, not only for headquarters.
Second, appoint a sponsor in the branch and a small coalition that includes respected people from engineering, implementation and sales. They should have a real voice in migration sequencing and client communication.
Third, design training and support for U.S. hours and for each role, and measure adoption, not attendance, for at least six months after each client migration.
Fourth, acknowledge the customer system failure openly when the platform change is announced. Saying what went wrong, and what will be different, is the most direct way to answer the cynicism it created. If this branch hears the next change explained, owned locally and followed through, the "nod and wait" habit can begin to fade.
Next Step
I recommend a one-hour session with the branch leadership team before the platform announcement to agree on the sponsor, the coalition members and how the earlier failure will be acknowledged. I can prepare a stakeholder analysis for that meeting.
References
Beer, M., & Nohria, N. (2000). Cracking the code of change. Harvard Business Review, 78(3), 133-141.
Hughes, M. (2011). Do 70 per cent of all organizational change initiatives really fail? Journal of Change Management, 11(4), 451-464. https://doi.org/10.1080/14697017.2011.630506
Kotter, J. P. (1995). Leading change: Why transformation efforts fail. Harvard Business Review, 73(2), 59-67.
Reichers, A. E., Wanous, J. P., & Austin, J. T. (1997). Understanding and managing cynicism about organizational change. Academy of Management Executive, 11(1), 48-59. https://doi.org/10.5465/ame.1997.9707100659
How this MBA 687 Module 1 example is structured
The memo opens with its purpose and the bottom line, then describes the failed change in plain facts, including cost and timing. A table sets intended against actual results. The analysis ties each breakdown to change research, adds a caution about the widely repeated failure statistic, and closes with lessons phrased as commitments the new leader can make.
Get MBA 687 Module 1 written to your instructions
Send your MBA 687 Module 1 correspondence prompt and rubric with the change you are analyzing. A memo that traces a failed change to its causes comes back within 24 to 48 hours, and your first one is free. The paper above is an original model document written by our desk, not a submitted student paper and not an official Southern New Hampshire University document.
MBA 687 Module 1 questions, answered
What does MBA 687 Module 1 ask students to write?
The opening module commonly asks for a piece of business correspondence analyzing why an organizational change failed, drawing on the course readings about change leadership, and explaining what should be done differently.
Is it true that 70 percent of change efforts fail?
The figure is widely repeated, but a review of the sources behind it found no valid empirical evidence for a single failure rate. It is safer to say that many change efforts fall short and to explain why, rather than to cite the number as fact.
Why does a failed change make the next one harder?
Employees remember how the last change went. When an effort is announced loudly and then quietly dropped, people learn to wait changes out, and that cynicism lowers their willingness to invest effort in the next initiative.