The BCPC Internet Strategy Team: An Exercise
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HIP HIP was a modem technology that used existing telephone lines to transport high-bandwidth data such as multimedia and video to service subscriber personal computers (PCs). By turning a customer’s existing phone line into a three-channel data delivery system, phone and internet services were available simultaneously. HIP access was six times faster than that of traditional analog modem and cost only $10 more per month than local phone service ($40 instead of $30). Both cable and phone companies could offer HIP. The HIP technology required users to have a signal splitter (to separate the phone and internet data streams), a HIP modem, and, of course, a PC that met HIP system requirements—a broad range of PC possibilities. There were installation challenges at BCPC and customer locations that required considerable technical skill. To provide HIP service BCPC would have to integrate many vendors’ technologies. Team leader Berkowitz observed: “You’ve got this end-to-end experience that's incredibly complicated.” There was a very high customer demand for the service. BCPC had just completed a successful three-month market test of 25 customers in southeastern Tennessee. While BCPC anticipated that its brand name could attract HIP users, some were concerned that supporting such a qualitatively different service might hinder BCPC’s ability to provide its trademark reliable and excellent customer support. For this reason, BCPC planned to rigorously survey HIP customers to ensure that they were continuing to achieve “Very good” and “Outstanding” ratings of service quality. The Team Berkowitz's team consisted of herself from business development, and five other members from finance, marketing, information systems, operations management, and human resources. Team members represented several levels of hierarchy at BCPC, creating a challenge for open communication and teamwork. Nonetheless, Chris hoped that team members would introduce themselves and start right in on their work. The questions they would have to answer before reporting back to BCPC’s CEO were: (1) What do you recommend BCPC do in terms of the launch of HIP in Big City? (2) What were the key issues you considered in making this decision? Exhibit 1 provides guidelines for participating in the BCPC team decision-making exercise.
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