...6 W. L. Gore & Associates, Inc. Frank Shipper Salisbury State University Charles C. Manz Arizona State University To make money and have fun. W. L. Gore On July 26, 1976, Jack Dougherty, a newly minted MBA from the College of William and Mary, dressed in a dark blue suit and bursting with resolve, reported for his first day at W. L. Gore & Associates. He presented himself to Bill Gore, shook hands firmly, looked him in the eye, and said he was ready for anything. What happened next was one thing for which Jack was not ready. Gore replied, “That’s fine, Jack, fine. Why don’t you look around and find something you’d like to do.” Three frustrating weeks later he found that something, dressed in jeans, loading fabric into the mouth of a machine that laminated the company’s patented Gore-Tex membrane to fabric. By 1982, Jack had become responsible for all advertising and marketing in the fabrics group. This story was part of the folklore that was heard over and over about W. L. Gore. By 1991, the process was slightly more structured. New associates took a journey through the business before settling into their own positions, regardless of the position for which they were hired. A new sales associate in the Fabric Division might spend six weeks rotating through different areas before concentrating on sales and marketing. Among other things, he or she might learn how Gore-Tex fabric was made, what it could and could not do, how Gore handled...
Words: 11345 - Pages: 46
...about management innovation without tipping your hat to W.L. Gore, the venerable maker of Gore-Tex and a host of other pioneering materials and products as diverse as synthetic vascular grafts, Elixir guitar strings, and Glide dental floss. Lauded as "the world's most innovative company" time and time again, Gore's wholly original (and endlessly inspirational) model for creating a true democracy of innovation is firmly rooted in the story of founder Bill Gore. More than half a century ago, in 1958, Bill Gore quit DuPont to start a business aimed at imagining and commercializing new uses for polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE)—the material popularized as Gore-Tex. But he wasn't simply interested in inventing new materials or selling products, he was bent on creating an entirely new kind of company—one that unleashed and inspired every person in it, one that put as much energy into finding the next big thing as milking the last big thing, one that was robustly profitable and uniquely human. Bill Gore concevied of W.L. Gore as a kind of experiment in management innovation—one that is still ongoing. The questions that drove him at founding are crucial questions managers everywhere must grapple with today: Was it possible to build a company with no hierarchy—where everyone was free to talk with everyone else? How about a company where there were no bosses, no supervisors, no managers and no vice presidents? Could W. L. Gore preserve a sense of family and collegiality even as it scaled...
Words: 955 - Pages: 4
...innovation without tipping your hat to W.L. Gore, the venerable maker of Gore-Tex and a host of other pioneering materials and products as diverse as synthetic vascular grafts, Elixir guitar strings, and Glide dental floss. Lauded as "the world's most innovative company" time and time again, Gore's wholly original (and endlessly inspirational) model for creating a true democracy of innovation is firmly rooted in the story of founder Bill Gore. More than half a century ago, in 1958, Bill Gore quit DuPont to start a business aimed at imagining and commercializing new uses for polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE)—the material popularized as Gore-Tex. But he wasn't simply interested in inventing new materials or selling products, he was bent on creating an entirely new kind of company—one that unleashed and inspired every person in it, one that put as much energy into finding the next big thing as milking the last big thing, one that was robustly profitable and uniquely human. Leadership and organisational behaviour issues: W L gore is a recognized company and their leaders and associates are skilful innovative professional fields. There are core competences which I am looking for W L gore. These are communication abilities, leadership and teamwork abilities, Decision making abilities knowledge, initiative and will power. These are core competence which are important for W L gore organisation because leaders are the main part in W L gore who lead teams, make plans, set goals and objectives...
Words: 3972 - Pages: 16
...Integrating Culture and Diversity in Decision Making: The CEO and Organizational Culture Profile Trinna Filbert Dr. Elizabeth Delone BUS 520 May 8, 2014 W. L. Gore and Associates is a company founded in 1958 by Bill and Vieve Gore. It is an inventive technology enterprise who works to discover innovative products. Numerous products from GORE-TEX fabric, cable wiring, electronics, medical devices, pharmaceutical, tubing, and sealants. The organization is referred to as a team-based and flat lattice organization. There is no chain of command; employees are referred to as associates. Associates and Professional staff are free to speak to one another in their multi-disciplined team. It provided electrical products until the discovery of polymer fabric that is now used as a basis for all the products in the medical and industrial markets. There are four practices the Gore utilizes to hire such associates. The associates networks various self organized groups such as Native American, Asia, Latino-Hispanic, LGBT, physically challenged, veterans, African-American, female associates and white male. Next is their recruiting strategy. The company targets certain universities, career fields and organizations. They choose the brightest and the best. The internet in addition to diverse publications and firms are also tools for finding quality. Third is diverse awareness. All associates are given the opportunity for growth and advancement in the company. They are encouraged...
Words: 830 - Pages: 4
...several sections. Table 15-1 Elements of Organizational Structure 15.2 What are the major elements of an organizational structure? WORK SPECIALIZATION. Work specialization is the way in which tasks in an organization are divided into separate jobs. In some organizations, this categorization is referred to as a company’s division of labor. How many tasks does any one employee perform? To some degree, work specialization is a never-ending trade-off among productivity, flexibility, and worker motivation. Take an assembly line worker at Ford as an example. Henry Ford was perhaps the earliest (and clearly most well-known) believer in high degrees of work specialization. He divided tasks among his manufacturing employees to such a degree that each employee might only perform one single task, over and over again, all day long. Having only one task to perform allowed those employees to be extremely productive at doing that one thing. It also meant that training new workers was much easier when replacements were needed. However, there are trade-offs when organizations make jobs highly specialized. Highly specialized jobs can cause organizations to lose the ability associated with employees who can be flexible in what they do. By spending all their time performing specialized tasks well, employees fail to update or practice other skills. Accounting majors, for example, might specialize in taxes or auditing. Some larger companies might hire these graduates for their ability to do...
Words: 5802 - Pages: 24
...empLOyee and LaBOr reLatiOnS STUDENT WORKBOOK Case Study Series on Work-Life Balance in Large Organizations By Gill Maxwell Project team Author: SHRM Project contributors: External contributor: Editor: Design: Gill Maxwell Bill Schaefer, SPHR Nancy A. Woolever, SPHR Sharon H. Leonard Courtney J. Cornelius, copy editor Scott Harris, senior graphic designer © 2008 Society for Human Resource Management. Gill Maxwell Note to Hr faculty and instructors: SHRM cases and modules are intended for use in HR classrooms at universities. Teaching notes are included with each. While our current intent is to make the materials available without charge, we reserve the right to impose charges should we deem it necessary to support the program. However, currently, these resources are available free of charge to all. Please duplicate only the number of copies needed, one for each student in the class. For more information, please contact: SHRM Academic Initiatives 1800 Duke Street, Alexandria, VA 22314, USA Phone: (800) 283-7476 Fax: (703) 535-6432 Web: www.shrm.org/hreducation 08-0753 Case Study Series on Work-Life Balance in Large Organizations By Gill maxwell Student Workbook employee and Labor relations Overview Introduction..........................................................................................................2 Format ..................................................................................................................3 Learning Objectives...
Words: 7754 - Pages: 32
...Ingredient Branding Philip Kotler· Waldemar Pfoertsch Ingredient Branding Making the Invisible Visible Professor Philip Kotler Kellogg Graduate School of Management Northwestern University Evanston, IL 60208, USA p-kotler@kellogg.northwestern.edu Professor Waldemar Pfoertsch China Europe International Business School 699 Hongfeng Rd. Shanghai 201206, China wap@ceibs.edu e-ISBN 978-3-642-04214-0 ISBN 978-3-642-04213-3 DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-04214-0 Springer Heidelberg Dordrecht London New York Library of Congress Control Number: 2010926489 © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010 This work is subject to copyright. All rights are reserved, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilm or in any other way, and storage in data banks. Duplication of this publication or parts thereof is permitted only under the provisions of the German Copyright Law of September 9, 1965, in its current version, and permission for use must always be obtained from Springer. Violations are liable to prosecution under the German Copyright Law. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. Cover design: WMXDesign GmbH, Germany Printed...
Words: 106805 - Pages: 428
...Organisation Culture Research Commonwealth Bank Australia Executive Summary Organisation culture is a unique combination of the set of values that the members of an organisation believe in. It is a very important determinant of the conditions prevailing in an organisation and the culture says a lot about the values, beliefs and structure of a company. The essence of the culture of an organisation is captured by seven primary characteristics. These are measured on a high to low scale and they are very commonly used to provide a synthesized picture of an organisation’s culture. Eventually, this serves as a basis for the feeling of the shared understanding that members have about the organisation at hand, the way in which the members are expected to behave and the way in which things are done (Lok & Crawford, 1999). Commonwealth Bank has a good employee friendly organisation culture and is more or less a blend of the seven characteristics of organisation cultures. However, it is always better to avoid the flaws in each type of culture and adapt to only the meritorious attributes of these cultures. For this purpose, it is significant to analyse one’s own corporate environment and then figure out which blend of cultures suits best to the organisation as whole. The Bank focuses greatly on the incentivising the performance of the employees, in making the organisation more people oriented, getting a perfect mix of both innovative and stable organisation, in improving the collaboration...
Words: 5655 - Pages: 23
...Such phenomenon, known as “delocalization of production”, can be defined as the social/ managerial/ organizational process through which firms not only deploy their sales on foreign markets, but they also draw supplies like raw materials, technology, facilities, equipment, financial resources and manpower. The aim of this paper is to provide an analysis on winning internationalization strategies, that will help a company to successfully penetrate a new market. Further on we will see a little case study on the shoes and accessories company Geox, performing an overview of its presence on international markets, providing a little historical background of the company and evaluating its competitiveness. Competition intensification on the global scale has lead an increasing number of companies, in the last decade, to seek new job opportunities on international markets. Internalization, today, is not only a way to increase the firm’s value, extends its competitive advantage and access to new opportunities. In our current economic environment it has become an useful and practically necessary way that may guarantee a firm’s outliving. Going international for a company means going through a tough and long process, that will change its assets completely and with no coming back. It involves quite a bit of transformations in several areas, like the financial layout, organizational and technical structure, position on the market and human resources management. In the past years...
Words: 3935 - Pages: 16
...Management Principles for Continuous Innovation 2 This section is about global changes—why they are bigger, come more often, and are becoming more difficult to predict. It’s also about what companies have done, and are doing, in order to take advantage of the opportunities and avoid the threats embedded in these ever accelerating changes. Certain changes are products of shifting technologies. One established technology is replaced by something new. We’ve seen this before. Steam engines were replaced by internal combustion engines and electricity, electricity grew into electronics, landlines are being replaced by mobile telephones, and newspapers and paper books are increasingly being supplied as digital files for tablets and e-book readers. These changes also affect how people live their lives. Even when they are staying home with their sick child, they are now expected to be accessible by phone and to answer your e-mail. Some experience this as a source of stress, while others find greater freedom. Most of us experience both these feelings as a result of the changes that follow in the wake of innovations. When something new appears, whether a technological solution or a change in social norms, things generally start manageably. As the innovation gains adherents, development accelerates, and finally, when the change has become widespread, the rate of change tapers off. Subsequently, a new innovation appears, and the process begins again. We often depict this process as an S-curve...
Words: 10264 - Pages: 42
...(1) What is The Definition of a Marketing Trend The market going in a different direction over a period of time. There are long time frames, medium time frames, and short time frames. The long ones are often called “secular”; the ones which are in the middle are “primary”, and any others that last for only a short time are “secondary”. To figure out which trend is which most people use a technical analysis. A technical analysis takes the price support and resistance over time. Marketing trends fluctuate because of technology and demographics. Also in the economic view demographics in a particular market will affect the advancement of businesses and organizations. The internet has let buyers have the ability to access to multiple merchants. That being said it is still thought of that marketing trends change due to the new technology available. It is safe to assume the market very much relies on the advancement of technology. The nature and scope of marketing research are rapidly changing to keep pace with a changing marketplace. In the face of global competition, research that measures product quality and consumer satisfaction is the fastest growing form of marketing research. (2) http://www.slideshare.net/dipalij07/porters-generic-strategies-with-examples Porter's Generic Competitive Strategies (ways of competing)A firm's relative position within its industry determines whether a firm's profitability is above or below the industry average. The fundamental basis of...
Words: 4467 - Pages: 18
...Miraculously, he was still alive within the 20-inch pancake of crushed steel and shattered glass that remained of his car. Also miraculously, his company, Semco Group, of São Paulo, Brazil, carried on seamlessly during the months he spent lying in intensive care and recuperating from the multiple surgeries he needed to repair his broken neck and battered face. Numbers were met, deals were closed, and business continued pretty much as usual. Mr. Semler, 46, is the leading proponent and most tireless evangelist of what has variously been called participative management, corporate democracy, and “the company as village.” As proposed 45 years ago in a book called The Human Side of Enterprise, by Douglas McGregor, one of the founders of the field of organizational development, participative management says that organizations thrive best by trusting employees to apply their creativity and ingenuity...
Words: 6071 - Pages: 25
...Miraculously, he was still alive within the 20-inch pancake of crushed steel and shattered glass that remained of his car. Also miraculously, his company, Semco Group, of São Paulo, Brazil, carried on seamlessly during the months he spent lying in intensive care and recuperating from the multiple surgeries he needed to repair his broken neck and battered face. Numbers were met, deals were closed, and business continued pretty much as usual. Mr. Semler, 46, is the leading proponent and most tireless evangelist of what has variously been called participative management, corporate democracy, and “the company as village.” As proposed 45 years ago in a book called The Human Side of Enterprise, by Douglas McGregor, one of the founders of the field of organizational development, participative management says that organizations thrive best by trusting employees to apply their creativity and ingenuity...
Words: 5943 - Pages: 24
...SIXTH EDITION STRATEGIC MANAGEMENT IN ACTION Mary Coulter Missouri State University Boston Columbus Indianapolis New York San Francisco Upper Saddle River Amsterdam Cape Town Dubai London Madrid Milan Munich Paris Montréal Toronto Delhi Mexico City São Paulo Sydney Hong Kong Seoul Singapore Taipei Tokyo Editor in Chief: Stephanie Wall Senior Acquisitions Editor: April Cole Editorial Project Manager: Claudia Fernandes Director of Marketing: Maggie Moylan Senior Marketing Manager: Nikki Ayana Jones Marketing Assistant: Gianna Sandri Senior Managing Editor: Judy Leale Production Project Manager: Kelly Warsak Senior Operations Supervisor: Arnold Vila Operations Specialist: Cathleen Petersen Creative Director: Blair Brown Senior Art Director: Kenny Beck Text Designer: LCI Design Cover Designer: LCI Design Cover Art: Svetoslav Iliev/Shutterstock.com Permission Specialist: Brooks Hill-Whilton Media Project Manager, Production: Lisa Rinaldi Senior Media Project Manager, Editorial: Denise Vaughn Full-Service Project Management and Composition: Integra Printer/Binder: RRD/Willard Cover Printer: Lehigh-Phoenix Color Text Font: 10/12, Times LT Std Credits and acknowledgments borrowed from other sources and reproduced, with permission, in this textbook appear on appropriate page within text. Copyright © 2013, 2010, 2008 Pearson Education, Inc., publishing as Prentice Hall, One Lake Street, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey 07458. All rights...
Words: 154599 - Pages: 619
...Chapter Two The Production Possibility Model, Trade, and Globalization Learning Objectives After you teach the material in this chapter, your students should be able to do the following: 1. Demonstrate opportunity cost with a production possibility curve. 2. State the principle of increasing marginal opportunity cost. 3. Relate the concept of comparative advantage to the production possibility cure. 4. State how, through comparative advantage and trade, countries can consume beyond their production possibilities. 5. Explain how globalization and outsourcing are part of a global process guided by the law of one price. Chapter Outline This is meant to be an outline and summary of what your students read in this chapter in the text, both in terms of concepts and examples. Headings and subheadings are tagged with the number of the learning objective (LO) to which the material in that section most closely relates and the associated PowerPoint slide numbers, so you may also use this to help you outline your lecture. Material followed by a ( is new to the 8th edition. • The Production Possibility Model, Trade, and Globalization • The three main coordination problems are reviewed, and students are reminded about the concept of opportunity cost, which will be central in this chapter to understand production possibilities. • The Production Possibilities Model (LO1) [PPT Slides 3 & 4] • Production...
Words: 13018 - Pages: 53
