Two weeks after the initial meetings, Stacey Porter, a
DMA consultant, arrived at the MSCC offices to install the
first version of the telemarketing module and to provide
training on the constituents, territory management, and
committees modules. This training served as the staff’s
first look at the software. The territory managers, however,
were not impressed with the layout or content of the soft-
ware, as it often forced them to work through more than
twenty screens to perform relatively simple tasks. As a
result, Lassiter demanded a significant rewrite of the
territory management module, and by March 2010, similar
delays were a part of the PAC, accounting, meetings, and
legislative modules as well.
With the scheduled conversion to the DMA software
quickly approaching and delays becoming the norm,
Gramen and Wallingford decided to continue running the
old system until the staff was completely comfortable with
the new system. Within three months, however, even
though the DMA software was still not fully operational,
the MSCC abandoned this directive as it had simply
become too expensive to pay the consulting fees to keep
UNITRAK operational.
As implementation pushed into late July, DMA began
encountering substantial problems converting the member-
ship database from UNITRAK into the DMA custom soft-
ware package. As progress ground to a halt on the software
installation, Lassiter summoned Gramen and Porter into his
office. During this meeting, the working relationship
between the MSCC and DMA began to deteriorate further
as Gramen warned Porter, “I think we’ve been pretty patient
with you so far, but that is about to change. I’ve heard of far
less serious situations ending up in court before. And I know
you understand that this all falls on you.”
The Start of Additional Problems
Further complicating this relationship had been a series of
billing issues. In the process of installing the system, DMA
ran into a myriad of problems with solutions in one area
often leading to problems in other areas. By the middle of
July 2010, no less than five MSCC staff members were in
regular contact with DMA identifying problems and
requesting assistance. As a result, DMA had quickly used
up the development hours specified in the contract, and it
had subsequently started billing the MSCC for the work
beyond the free hours guaranteed.
As the problems worsened, Lassiter became increas-
ingly involved in the daily implementation problems.
Feeling as if he was the only one who could right the ship,
Lassiter went to Wallingford and argued that he should be
given the responsibility of overseeing the entire project.
Wallingford gladly consented to Lassiter’s request.
Immediately, Lassiter arranged a conference call
between himself, Gramen, and Porter to address the many
outstanding items past completion date. In the call Lassiter
emphasized,We are in our eleventh month, and we still cannot use
your software to close our books each month. This is
completely unacceptable. You could at least provide
the system documentation you promised so that we
can reduce our own learning curve. It’s no wonder that
you cannot get the more complicated modules com-
plete, though. I’ve been making simple requests and
for some reason you can’t meet them. And one more
thing, we were promised the source code when our
negotiations began, and now I’ve been told by one of
your team members that this will cost us $20,000.
What type of dishonest organization are you running?
This is completely unacceptable and my patience is
thinning. If this situation doesn’t improve...The exchanges between DMA and MSCC continued
to become increasingly strained, and disagreements on
what items were and were not promised as part of the sys-
tem installation became a key point of contention. Given
the nature of this relationship, Lassiter ordered that all
DMA billings were to be carefully reviewed by Gramen
for inappropriate charges. Furthermore, Lassiter asked for
the opportunity to review the DMA contract.
There first appeared to be a glimmer of hope, as the
contract specified that roughly half the cost of the soft-
ware system had been due as a down payment with the
balance due upon Gramen signing acceptance certificates
after the satisfactory installation of each individual mod-
ule. After meeting with Gramen, however, Lassiter
learned that although none of the acceptance certificates
had been signed, the full system had nonetheless been
paid for in full. Lassiter could not believe that they had
given up one of the most important pieces of leverage that
the MSCC had. Lassiter quickly decided it was time to go
back to Wallingford for his input.
“Jack, we have two problems,” Lassiter said. “First,
it goes without saying that there are serious problems with
the software and with DMA’s capacity to support and
deliver it. Just as important, however, is that Gramen does
not seem to have the requisite ability to maintain and sup-
port the hardware platform and is really of little value in
terms of overseeing or solving problems with the software
implementation. As a result, we are completely dependent
on DMA for this project’s success or failure. I think it’s
time we go in a different direction.”
Wallingford replied, “I agree with you. I trust your
judgment in these matters. But before we go any farther,Case Study I-7 • Midsouth Chamber of Commerce (B): Cleaning Up an Information Systems Debacle 183