Assignment:
Your team should be prepared to make a short (8-10 minute) presentation to the class. Your instructor may also want a written report; if so, the report should be typed and be well organized.
Make sure you turn in any additional analyses you performed in order to make better decisions, including charts, graphs, etc., for which you have not received credit. You may want to prepare a short handout for the class indicating the main points of your report.
For the purpose of this audit, assume that your firm is a case study out of the textbook. Investigate the performance of the firm as though you were management consultants brought in to determine what kind of job the firm's management team has done. Of course, there are several methods of approaching this assignment and you are encouraged to be creative. The major point you will be graded on is your OBJECTIVITY AND HONESTY in reporting your findings; i.e., be brutally frank. Your instructor has been following all the teams closely via administrator reports furnished by the simulation, and any attempt to "whitewash" or omit critical points will be dealt with unkindly.
Listed below are some key questions to help you get your thinking caps on. However, your report (both verbal and written) may follow any creative format you wish; just try to address in some way or other most of the points covered below.
Your instructor may ask you to conduct the audit by playing the role of a consultant firm to encourage objectivity on your part.
1. Refer to the original goals and objectives. Did the strategies work as planned? What strategies, goals, objectives, policies, etc., were changed? Why? How closely did the firm end up doing what it said it was going to do? (You will not be penalized if your goals did change substantially.)
2. The functions of the manager are planning, organizing, directing work, and controlling.
a. To what extent and how were these functions handled by this team?
b. Comment particularly on the controls that you may or may not have used. Were they effective?
c. Did the team have enough records, controls, and worksheets to manage effectively?
3. If this firm were to begin again, what should it do differently?
4. If the management team were going to be transferred, what advice should it give to the new team coming in to manage this company?
5. Does the firm have a prudent dividend policy? What would a committee of stockholders say about this firm's treatment of its stockholders?
6. Did the team make decisions on a rational basis or did it often "stab in the dark"?
7. What are the firm's strengths and weaknesses? What are the threats and opportunities facing the firm at this time?
8. At this point, is the firm a healthy, going concern? Is there any evidence of "end playing" the simulation? Such evidence would include a large dividend payment at the end, reducing all budgets, buying or selling stock to influence the stock price, etc.
9. Was there any evidence of lack of teamwork in the firm? If so, what communication, decision-making, and cooperation efforts need improving?
NOTE: Most Instructors will penalize a team heavily if the team does anything at the end of the simulation that attempts to make the firm look better. See Number 8 above.