- Individual plants used to be owned by one division. While that plant might make products for many divisions, only one owned it and was in charge. This gave the plant a clear chain of command for decision making. In A3M plants were now owned by LVS. This gave the plant manager at least two bosses, the lead division manufacturing group and the LVS leadership. In the end nobody was able to make a decent decision on how to run the plant. The theory here is that under A3M the division staff was basically supposed to place orders on the plants and let LVS figure out how to fill them at standard cost. That theory lasted roughly a week until division presidents had to push something on the plants, breaking the chain of command.
- Marketing/sales internationally was cross-eyed with too many leaders. In old 3M, international staff regardless of function reported to the country leader/MD/GM. In A3M, apart from a few HR people, everyone reported back to St. Paul. This isn't the worst thing in theory, but the St. Paul staff didn't know local well enough and international staff didn't know the global play well enough to do their part. Leaving everyone frustrated and non-productive.
- Mostly because of above, A3M shut down almost all international R&D beyond product localization. Basically only St. Paul and Neuss were left with enough critical mass to do any proper new product development.
All in all, A3M is a giant clusterfuck that left half the company with at least two bosses and nobody knowing what the actual strategy for the company was, other than cut costs at all costs.
Well said, @fio+1l4oEpAN.