DBAX 9102C Week 9 Consulting Design Defense Example

When Someone Proposes the Quicker Study: Defending a Staggered Rollout Against Buying Equipment for Every Truck at Once, in the Terms a Moving Company Owner and Operations Manager Would Use

Student Name

Walden University

DBAX 9102C: Business Consulting Research Project Stage 2

Instructor Name

Month Day, Year

When Someone Proposes the Quicker Study: Defending a Staggered Rollout Against Buying Equipment for Every Truck at Once, in the Terms a Moving Company Owner and Operations Manager Would Use

The Quicker Study

Somebody at the client will propose the quicker study, usually in the first meeting. At this household moving company it was the operations manager: "We're buying the equipment anyway. Put it on every truck in February and look at the injury numbers in December. If they're down, it worked." The proposal is reasonable, cheaper in coordination and faster. This defense explains, in terms the owner and operations manager would use, why a staggered rollout across the four depots is worth its modest extra trouble.

What the Quicker Study Would Show

A company-wide start followed by a year-end comparison would show whether this year's injury count differs from last year's. It would not show why. Many things change in a year at a moving company: crews turn over, the mix of jobs shifts toward or away from heavy furniture, weather changes how often stairs are icy, and the reporting form itself is changing. Any of these could move the count up or down. Shadish et al. (2002) describe this as the core weakness of a simple before-and-after design: without a comparison group, anything else that changes during the same period is tangled up with the effect.

The Comparison in the Client's Terms

Table 1

Quicker Study Against Staggered Rollout

Insurer's view reported from a conversation with the loss control representative.

Answering the Objections

The operations manager raised three objections. The first was delay: depots starting in May wait three months longer for equipment. The answer is that last year's injury reports show February through April as the lightest months, so the delay falls when risk is lowest, and the last depot is equipped before the summer peak.

The second was fairness: crews at later depots might feel left out. The answer is to draw the order publicly in front of all four crew leaders, so no depot is favored, and to explain that every depot receives the same kit.

The third was complexity: "We're movers, not scientists." The answer is that the extra work is small, an hour of briefing per crew and a shorter incident form, and that the consultant carries the analysis. Hemming et al. (2015) note that stepped designs are often chosen precisely because every site receives the intervention, which suits a company that has already decided to adopt it.

What the Owner Gains by Waiting

If the quicker study showed injuries down and the cause was something else, the company would keep paying for equipment that does not work and miss the real cause. If it showed injuries up because of a heavy-furniture year, the owner might abandon equipment that does work. Evidence-based management, in the account by Briner et al. (2009), aims at reducing exactly this kind of error by combining research with careful local evidence. The staggered rollout is the cheapest way to get local evidence worth trusting.

Where the Quicker Study Would Be Right

The defense should admit when the rival proposal would be the better choice. If the owner needed equipment on every truck immediately, for example because the insurer required it as a condition of renewal, the quicker study would be the right one, and the evaluation would rely on observation of use rather than on comparisons between depots. The staggered rollout is preferred here only because the insurer has offered credit for a documented trial and because the delay falls in the lightest months. Saying so keeps the defense honest and shows the operations manager that the design was chosen for the client's situation rather than out of habit.

The Outcome of the Meeting

The operations manager accepted the staggered rollout on one condition: if equipment is clearly unused at the first depot after a month, the plan will pause and the crews will be asked why before buying more. That condition improves the design, and it has been added.

References

Briner, R. B., Denyer, D., & Rousseau, D. M. (2009). Evidence-based management: Concept cleanup time? Academy of Management Perspectives, 23(4), 19-32. https://doi.org/10.5465/amp.2009.45590138

Hemming, K., Haines, T. P., Chilton, P. J., Girling, A. J., & Lilford, R. J. (2015). The stepped wedge cluster randomised trial: Rationale, design, analysis, and reporting. BMJ, 350, Article h391. https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.h391

Shadish, W. R., Cook, T. D., & Campbell, D. T. (2002). Experimental and quasi-experimental designs for generalized causal inference. Houghton Mifflin.