Issue 1 - Ethics and Legal Environment - 30 points (1,000-word limit)
Playtopia Toy Company, once the undisputed leader in the action toy industry and a beloved brand among consumers, finds itself in dire economic straits. The slow recovery of the economy, the emergence of strong niche competitors in nearly every one of its product lines, and a recent string of less-than-successful new-product introductions has produced such dramatic revenue losses and accompanying decreases in profitability that the very existence of the company is thought to be at serious risk. In fact, the situation has become so desperate that Playtopia —which has always thought of itself as more like a family than a business and which had avoided laying off employees even during the Great Depression—now feels it has no choice but to cut costs by cutting employees.
Each department manager has been asked to cut one employee. In the small (15 employees), but highly compensated, Toy Ideation/Mockup Department, there are 4 people under consideration:
The first, Ari, is a highly educated and experienced former marketing executive in his early 60s. About 4 years ago, though he had no formal toy-design experience, he submitted an application portfolio to Playtopia, “just for fun.” The portfolio so impressed Playtopia’s reviewers that the company flew him in for interviews and hired him on the spot. Playtopia paid a substantial sum to move Ari and his wife to Breezedale, the medium-sized Midwestern city where Playtopia is headquartered. Ari also was hired at a higher pay grade than Playtopia typically offered to new employees. Since joining Playtopia , Ari has done well. He is acknowledged to be one of the more conceptual thinkers in the company, and his broad experience in other industries and his flexible and innovative thinking have allowed him to contribute productively to many phases of the Playtopia product line, from blister-pack character sets to movie tie-in offerings. He is liked by co-workers, is a sought-after collaborator, and has contributed significantly to many important projects. Ari and his wife have no children. His wife has a successful career as a highly compensated academic administrator. They have a showplace home and seem to be well fixed for money.
Gloria is a 40-ish single mother of two teenagers. She moved to Breezedale because its atmosphere was more conducive to bringing up her kids than big-city life on the west coast, where she had worked in the entertainment industry in a wide variety of positions, ranging from animal wrangler to stunt person to script doctor. Gloria is very savvy about the likes and dislikes of tweens, teens, and young adults—prime audiences for Playtopia’s products. She is an extremely hard worker and is always willing to take on multiple projects simultaneously and to do grunt work that others find boring. Her performance evaluations have always been excellent. Gloria’s financial situation is iffy: she was hired at the base level for a toy designer so, with kids to care for, she has to take moonlighting jobs in order to make ends meet. These jobs leave her in an on-again/off-again state of sleep deprivation, which in turn leads to somewhat more frequent than usual bouts of illness and missed work days. Despite this, Gloria has rarely missed a deadline and is thorough and professional in her work. However, her unpredictable absences can be a little frustrating to her project teammates and sometimes result in having to reschedule important meetings multiple times. Gloria’s been with Playtopia for about 5 years but has not yet been promoted and is known to be disappointed about that situation.
Terry is a hotshot designer in his early 20s. He was recruited to Playtopia after a summer there as an intern, where he had shown great promise. Although he’s been at the company for less than two years, he’s already been promoted from Designer I to Designer II. He has formal training in computer design techniques and animatronics, has attended film school, and is a brilliant conceptualizer. He has a wicked sense of humor and, although he’s generally well liked, his occasionally immature and barbed remarks about others’ work sometimes gets him into awkward situations with peers. He can also at times be something of a prima donna concerning what projects he is or is not willing to work on or people he is or is not willing to work with. He is a little cavalier when it comes to observing work hours and deadlines; and his supervisor has spoken to him about this on a couple of occasions—but nothing has ever been considered serious enough to mention on his formal reviews. Terry is quite ambitious—while Playtopia feels lucky to have landed him, there are also recent rumors that he is floating his resume out to competitors. But whenever this subject comes up, for example in casual lunchtime conversation, Terry denies the rumors and always asserts his satisfaction with his current situation.
Michelle is a long-time employee of Playtopia: she joined the company right out of high school many years ago and it’s the only place she’s ever worked. She began her career as an administrative assistant in the payroll department, but worked hard to learn all aspects of the company’s operations and managed, through her innate talent and long hours, to make the rare switch from the business side to the creative side of the company. Her rise at Playtopia coincided with the company’s go-go years, when it could do no wrong and made huge profits each year, and the retirement package she has amassed will be substantial. That retirement package will become 100% vested in six months. During her years in the Toy Ideation/Mockup Department Michelle has created many lucrative products for Playtopia, particularly in the plush and interactive toy areas, which seem to be particular strengths of hers. But in recent years, with the emphasis shifting to comic-book action heroes and sci-fi blockbuster tie-ins, Michelle has struggled to contribute—it’s been awhile since one of her ideas has been accepted for development. However, the other designers love working with her and say she is really good at offering suggestions that improve their ideas.
Using Professor Badaracco’s framework, if you had to make this decision, what would you do? Consider all steps of the process, including the three tests. Incorporate any relevant information from preceding weeks of the course in your discussion. Your discussion should not exceed 1000 words (approximately 4 pages, double spaced).

Issue 2 - Organizational Environment - 30 points (1,000-word limit)
Cookie has been an artisanal baker for the past 10 years. She operates her small business under the name "Cookie’s Custom Cupcakes" out of a tiny bakery shop in the Squirrel Hill area of Pittsburgh where she makes highly customized desserts that appeal to an upscale restaurant market, as well as to occasional walk-in customers, most of whom are affluent, young professionals who have “discovered” her elegant and tasty treats. These customers have great regard for Cookie’s unique, high-quality baked goods, so “CCC” (as it’s commonly referred to) products command a premium price.
Currently, Cookie’s baked goods are produced and sold only in the Greater Pittsburgh area. This is largely due to a concern for making sure the products are always served fresh; but also partly due to operational constraints. Production is limited to what Cookie herself and a small staff of family members and trusted friends who have been with her for several years are able to produce. Cookie’s restaurant contracts account for most of her production but she also, as time and workload permit, accepts special orders. The special-order items are produced in quantities ranging from single, one-of-a-kind confections to party-themed dessert items of no more than 50 count.
After Cookie appeared on a popular cable television reality show, "Bake Your Tarts Out!," her dessert items gained instant national recognition. Even though she did not win the competition, she made it to the finals and the resulting publicity generated many new fans for CCC’s goodies. Now, people across the country want to serve CCC desserts at their parties and other social gatherings.
Cookie has been approached by representatives of a major food-industry investment firm that is willing to fund CCC’s expansion. They have told her that, despite the less-than-favorable economic conditions, they believe now is the time for her to expand to take advantage of the television boost to her popularity. In addition, they believe that there is now a growing demand for her baked goods in markets outside of the U.S. Since food trends are often fleeting, the investors advise Cookie that she should "go big now" and try to capture as large a market share as possible. Of course, she would have to produce her baked goods in larger quantities and sell them at lower prices to do so. Cookie is used to running a small business, so all of this production up-scaling talk is new to her. She knows CCC will have to invest in more trained staff and production equipment to meet the increased demand, but she’s not sure how to go about it—or even if it’s a good idea to move forward with such a plan.
Cookie has hired you to give her advice about how she should proceed.
Answer the following questions about CCC. Be sure to state clearly any assumptions you make about the organization as part of the description of factors to consider, and state the reasons for including each factor. Use organizational structure language and theory in your response.
• In deciding whether or not to produce larger quantities, what factors should Cookie consider?
• What specific recommendations do you have for Cookie?

Issue 3 - Critical Thinking - 5 points (400-word limit)
Read the following paragraph and provide a brief analysis of it from a critical thinking point of view
“Why do people fall for all the fad diets out there when the only nutrition plan that’s even close to sensible is the Fill Up with Road Kill Diet? Anyone who thinks another diet will do them any good is a complete bozo who knows nothing about the nutritional needs of the human body. The Fill Up with Road Kill Diet has been a top seller on Amazon.com for over 10 weeks now, far outselling any other diet books, which demonstrates beyond the shadow of a doubt that this diet is superior to all others. This diet takes us back to the old ways of dealing with food—bag it yourself, with your own vehicle--and as everyone knows, the old ways are the best ways. My friend Thelma, who has tried more diets than you can shake a Slim Jim at, has lost a pound and a half on this diet, which is a record for her and proves how effective this breakthrough diet concept is. Plus, this diet has been mentioned in several major newspapers and you can see dozens of ads for it each evening on late-night cable TV shows, which means it must be legit. The concept of using your car to run down your own food and eat it raw on the spot is an incredible breakthrough that none of those hoity-toity think-tank researchers has managed to come up with, despite the claims of all the fundraising junk mail they send out every year! In fact, I heard that four out of five research scientists have never heard of this diet, which goes to show that research is useless and we should stop making contributions to those do-nothing medical research organizations. Sure, there may be some folks out there who lack the driving reflexes to be able to run down a deer at night with their Toyota; but the beauty of this diet is that they can lose weight by optional alternative methods, like hiding in the weeds and jumping out to steal somebody else’s road kill before they can get to it. Or simply by getting out of their car and chasing deer on foot, even if they don’t catch them! Anyway, people really need to get onto this diet; if they don’t, the whole country is going to be couch potatoes before too long. One great aspect of this diet is that you don’t have to keep track or what you eat, or weigh yourself, or do much of anything, unless you want to, which is terrific because everybody wants freedom from having to worry about their weight. Also, did I mention that this diet book is really cheap to buy, which is the most important thing people care about in terms of choosing a diet? Anyway, do this diet—you’ll be glad you did. It’s the greatest. ”
You don't need to apply all of Browne & Keeley’s 10-critical thinking steps, but you must include at least the following three:
1. What is the issue and what is the conclusion?
2. Identify at least three reasoning fallacies, by name, and explain why they are fallacies in this argument.
3. Identify a value assumption in the argument and explain why it is a value assumption.

Issue 4 – Business Associations, Agency, and Torts – 15 points (600-word limit)
You plan to open “Crane City,” a full-service origami training center for extreme paper-folding enthusiasts. You currently have $50,000 available. You estimate you will need $100,000 to start and operate the center for 1 year. You also estimate you will need $50,000 a year for re-investment, assuming no growth. You plan on being the sole owner if possible, and having two managers: one for the technical side and one for the business side. You are well known in the community and could obtain a loan since you have successfully been in business before. You could also find people to invest in your center, but you don't like the idea of losing control. You have already started finding suppliers and buying equipment for your new venture. Your friend, Alfie, has agreed to do much of the footwork, in terms of applications and filings with the relevant government agencies, for a fee. So far, all has gone well except that last week Alfie forgot to set the brake on his van while dropping off a check to the printing firm that’s doing the marketing materials for your new venture. Alfie’s van rolled down a hill and crashed through six feet of redwood fence fronting a local landscaping company run by an old friend of yours, Sascha. Sascha has told you that, because of Alfie, you have really put her in a bind, as now she has to pay to fix the fence even though business has been terrible for the last few months and she is short on income. Now, with a shabby-looking front fence, she fears she’ll get fewer walk-in customers. She’s asking you to pay for the fence damage.
Use the above fact scenario to answer the following questions:
1. What form of business should you choose for Crane City, and why? Justify your choice in relation to the other reasonable alternatives available to you.
2. Are you and/or Alfie responsible, legally or ethically, for Sascha’s fence repairs? Explain why or why not.

Issue 1 - Ethics and Legal Environment - 30 points (1,000-word limi...