Reading Only the Numbers: Reconciling Lakemont Marine's Capstone Plan, Five Places Where Its Sections Disagree and One Missing Figure
Student Name
American College of Education
MGMT5091: MBA Capstone Experience
Module 5 Assignment
Instructor Name
November 1, 2027
Method
Hambrick and Fredrickson (2005) argued that the elements of a strategy must reinforce one another, and Porter (1996) described fit among a firm's activities as the source of advantage that is hardest to copy. Siggelkow (2002), following one firm's activities over several decades, showed that fit is not designed once but built up as elements are added and adjusted around a few core choices. A capstone written in modules is the same kind of system in miniature, and its sections drift apart in the same way.
The reconciliation used two passes. The first read only the numbers in Modules 2, 3 and 4, every price, volume, cost, count and date, and checked each against the governing assumptions register kept since Module 1. The second read the prose of Module 4, the most recent section, and asked of each commitment whether it appeared anywhere in the projections. A commitment that costs money but appears in no projection is a promise the plan has not yet agreed to keep.
Disagreements One and Two: Dealers and Chargers
Module 4 added four Florida dealers to the program, bringing it to 34, but the register still records 30 (A5), and the demand estimate in Module 2 (E4) was built from 30 territories. The Module 4 decision is sound, since those territories include motor-restricted lakes and canals. The correction is A5, version 2, dated November 1, 2027: 34 participating dealers. The volume assumption (A2) is left unchanged, because the added territories have not been surveyed, so any added demand is treated as upside rather than as part of the base case.
Module 4 also promised a portable dock charger with every boat, a sound product decision for owners on shared docks. The charger costs about $2,200, and it appears in no cost figure: the variable cost in A4, $61,500 a boat, was set in Module 1 before the charger existed. This is the largest single disagreement. If the charger stays included at no added price, the line's value falls by about $2.4 million.
Disagreements Three to Five: Warranty, Demonstration Boats and Capacity
Module 4 promises buyers five years of battery coverage. The warranty reserve inside the fixed costs of A7 was sized in Module 3 on the supplier's three-year warranty, which the supplier backs. The two extra years are Lakemont's own risk. Based on the supplier's published failure rates for comparable packs, the reserve for them is about $600 a boat, added to variable cost. The correction is A4, version 2: $62,100 a boat, including the warranty extension but not the charger, whose treatment is decided below.
Module 4 also commits Lakemont to carry the financing charges on the first demonstration boat at every participating dealer for half a year, a sensible way to get boats onto restricted lakes quickly. At 34 boats, $76,000 each and an annual rate near 8 percent, that is about $103,000, a one-time launch cost in year one that no section had counted. It is recorded as A14. Finally, the dedicated bay in Module 4 is designed for about 600 boats a year, but the register's fifth-year volume is 622. The shortfall is small and can be met with overtime at an estimated $33,000 in year five, recorded as A15, but it means a decision on a second shift or a larger bay must be made by year four if growth continues.
The Missing Figure: Promotion
Module 4 describes local promotion in detail, including lake association events, dealer demonstration days and owner videos, but gives it no budget. Reading the numbers alone, the plan promotes nothing. The reconciliation therefore divided the register's $2.1 million annual fixed-cost figure (A7) into its parts to see whether promotion fits inside it: supplier engineering support, $350,000; the product manager and dealer training manager, $300,000; the training course and materials, $250,000; the supplier-backed battery warranty reserve, $600,000; bay supervision and test technicians, $350,000; leaving $250,000 a year for local promotion. That is enough for the program Module 4 describes on 64 lakes, and it is now stated in the register as part of A7 rather than left to be assumed.
The Recalculated Value
With the charger, the warranty extension, the demonstration interest and the overtime all included, and nothing else changed, the line's five-year net present value at 11 percent falls from about $6.8 million to about $3.7 million, and the break-even wholesale price rises from just under $70,000 to about $72,600. The plan is still worth doing, but with a thinner margin for error than Module 3 reported.
Two responses were considered. Raising the wholesale price to about $78,800 would restore the original value but widen the retail premium that Module 2 already found too large for most buyers. Selling the dock charger as a separately priced accessory, stocked by every participating dealer and recommended for shared docks, would keep the base price at $76,000 and restore the value to about $6.1 million, since only the warranty extension, the demonstration interest and the overtime remain as added costs. The reconciliation adopts the second response and records it as A16: the charger is a priced accessory, not standard equipment. The product decision in Module 4 is revised accordingly.
The Register, Version 3
The register changes made by this reconciliation are recorded in one place, each dated November 1, 2027. A4, version 2: variable cost of $62,100 per boat in the first year, including the two-year battery warranty extension. A5, version 2: 34 participating dealers, with volumes unchanged. A14: a one-time launch cost of about $103,000 in year one for demonstration boat interest. A15: about $33,000 of overtime in year five and a capacity decision due in year four. A16: the dock charger sold as a priced accessory rather than included. A7 is unchanged in total but now carries a stated breakdown, including $250,000 a year for local promotion.
Every one of these changes came from a decision made in good faith in a later section that never made its way back into the figures. None of them was an error of arithmetic. That pattern is the main lesson of the reconciliation for the final assembly: the register must be updated at the moment a section makes a commitment, not at the end, because by the end the author has stopped seeing the commitment as new.
What Held
Not every figure drifted. The wholesale price, the volumes, the capital budget, the cost of capital and the launch timeline agree across all four sections, and the approval date in Module 4 matches the decision deadline set in Module 1. The staffing in Module 4 fits inside the fixed costs in Module 3, and the supplier arrangement in Module 4 matches the resource-gap solution Module 3 recommended. The register now stands at version 3, and Module 6 will be written from it alone.
References
Hambrick, D. C., & Fredrickson, J. W. (2005). Are you sure you have a strategy? Academy of Management Executive, 19(4), 51-62. https://doi.org/10.5465/ame.2005.19417907
Porter, M. E. (1996). What is strategy? Harvard Business Review, 74(6), 61-78.
Siggelkow, N. (2002). Evolution toward fit. Administrative Science Quarterly, 47(1), 125-159. https://doi.org/10.2307/3094893
How this MGMT 5091 Module 5 example is structured
MGMT 5091 Module 5 typically reconciles the parts, hunting places where two sections disagree; your classroom's instructions decide whether this is a report, a revised draft or a peer review. This example states the method first, then reports each disagreement in the same pattern: what each section says, which is right, the register change and the effect on the numbers. It ends with the recalculated value and the choice the reconciliation forces.
MGMT5091 Module 5 questions, answered
What does MGMT5091 Module 5 usually ask for?
MGMT5091 Module 5 often asks students to reconcile the capstone's sections, finding and correcting places where they disagree before the final plan is assembled. Some sections frame it as a revised draft or a peer review. Your classroom's instructions decide the form.
How do I find contradictions in my own capstone?
Read only the numbers first, every price, volume, cost and date, and check each against one list of governing assumptions. Then read your latest section and ask whether each commitment appears anywhere in the projections.
Should I report the contradictions or just fix them?
Report them if the module asks for reconciliation. Showing what disagreed, which version was right and how the numbers changed demonstrates the integration the course is designed to measure.
Write yours, or have the desk draft it
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