...3M1: Rethinking Innovation Background Large (70K employees, $15bn sales), global operations (200 countries), multi-product (50K range), multi-market business. Innovation ‘Claim to Fame’ This company has been around for just over 100 years and during that period has established a clear reputation as a major innovator. Their technical competence has been built up by a long-term commitment to R&D on which they currently spend around $1bn p.a.; this has yielded them a regular position in the top 10 in US patents granted. They have launched a number of breakthrough products which have established completely new markets and they have set themselves a consistent stretch target of getting 30% of sales turnover from products launched during the past four years. How Do They Manage Innovation? The company presents a consistent picture in interviews and in publications – innovation success is a consequence of creating the culture in which it can take place – it becomes ‘the way we do things around here’ in a very real sense. This philosophy is borne out in many anecdotes and case histories – the key to their success has been to create the conditions in which innovation can arise from any one of a number of directions, including lucky accidents, and there is a deliberate attempt to avoid putting too much structure in place since this would constrain innovation. Innovation Strategy and Leadership The company has always valued innovation and this has been a consistent and key theme...
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...Answer the following questions for the arrow diagram below: 1. Does the diagram above represent a function f: X Y? Explain why or why not ------------------------------------------------- No, the diagram above does not define a function. The element a is not sent to a unique element of Y; there are two arrows coming out of a, one pointing to 1 and the other pointing to 2. Answer the following questions for the arrow diagram below: 1 2 3 w x y z X Y 2. Does the diagram above represent a function f: X Y? Explain why or why not Yes, the diagram above represents a function. All elements of X have an arrow coming out of it also, no element of X has two arrow coming out of it that point to two different elements of Y. Functions also may have elements of the co-domain with no matching elements in the domain (z). 3. If so, what is the Domain? Domain = {1, 2, 3} 4. If so, what is the Co-Domain? Co-Domain = {w, x, y, z} 5. If so, what is the Range? Range = {w, x, y} 6. If so, what is the value of f (3)? F (3) = y 7. If so, what is the Inverse Image of x? Inverse image of x = {2} 8. If so, is the function one-to-one? Explain why or why not Yes, the function above is a one-to-one function. There are distinct points in the domain that map to distinct points in the co-domain. 9. If so, is the function onto? Explain why or why not No, the function is not onto. This is because z ≠ F(x) for any x in x. 10. Represent the arrow...
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...Understanding a company’s business model is crucial to investing in individual securities if the purpose is to invest with the objective of outperforming a benchmark return or for a high absolute return. A key point is that the numbers are a result of the business operations; the business operations are not the result of the numbers. By this I mean that trying to make investment decisions on an individual security needs analysis that goes further than spitting back what a company’s net income might be and how that translates into a higher or lower multiple of earnings. The security I am discussing today is Starbucks (SBUX) common equity (SBUX also has corporate bonds). Starbucks Corp. is a seller of coffee, tea, and related products and beverages. Starbucks is a retailer, a licensor, and a wholesaler, which are all completely different kinds of businesses in that they have economic characteristics that result in vastly different operating margins. In analyzing the common stock of SBUX, the investor must understand what drives top line growth, operating income, and bottom line earning power of the company. During the second quarter of 2008, SBUX suffered their worst operating performance since the company went public in June of 1992. Top line revenue was up 12% to 2.526 billion, operating income fell 26.1% to 178.2 million and net income fell 21% to 108.7 million. However, these numbers do not stand alone. One must analyze the financial information further to get a better understanding...
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...Your firm usually uses about 200 to 300 tons of steel per year. Last year, you purchased 100 tons more steel than needed (at a price of $200 per ton). In the meantime, the price of steel jumped to $250 per ton delivered (which means that any firm selling the steel must pay any shipping costs), and the price has since stabilized at that price. The cost of shipping steel to the nearest buyer would be $20 per ton. In the meantime, a business next door just went bankrupt and the bank is offering a special deal where you can buy another 100 tons of steel for $180 per ton. Assume that the interest rate is 0%. Which of the following are correct? a. Sell your 100 tons at the going market price of $250 and make a profit of $30 per ton ($50 less $20 cost of shipping). b. Buy the 100 tons next door at $180 and resell at a price of $250 less $20 shipping, for a net profit of $50 per ton. c. Hold onto your 100 tons and wait until it is needed for production. d. Buy the 100 tons next door at $180 and hold onto it until it is needed in production. Answer: The answer requires us to identify the hidden costs of transporting the steel. Both C and D are correct. Answer A is incorrect because you would have to buy steel in the future for your own production needs, so if you sold now and repurchased in the future would never recover the $20 shipping cost. Answer B is incorrect for the same...
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...Organizational Behavior Organizational Behavior Organizational behavior is term that one does not hear often in day-to-day life. But organizational behavior is something that is seen and heard many times over throughout the work-day. The reason why one would see and hear organizational behavior but not be aware is because most people are not aware of what comprises the field of organizational behavior. This paper will cover the important terminology used in organizational behavior, the observable aspects of said important terminology and provide a brief analysis of the culture and behavior of Speedy Cash, a nation-wide financial services organization that provides payday loans to the general public. Important Terms and Observable Aspects There are four important terms in the field of organizational behavior. They are organizational behavior, organizational culture, diversity and communication. Organizational behavior is “a field of study that investigates the impact that individuals, groups and structure have on behavior within organizations, for the purpose of applying such knowledge toward improving an organization’s effectiveness” (Robbins & Judge, 2009, pg. 10). The observable aspects of organizational behavior would be the ethics used by employees, teamwork, IT usages, absenteeism, diversity of employees, turnover, and the importance of human capital. These are just a few items that can be witnessed within an organization. Organizational culture can be confused...
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...Organizational Behavior Terminology & Concepts Organizational Culture An organization’s culture can be both corporeal and mental in nature. What does this mean? Well, organizational culture is shared by members of the group, and as such, guides the day-to-day activities of the work environment. Organizational culture is made up of values, assumptions, attitudes, experiences, beliefs, norms and artifacts of an organization’s members and their behaviors. Organizational culture is created through the sharing of values between people and groups in an organization. This sharing controls the way the individuals or groups interact with each other as well as with external stakeholders. Organizational culture is comprised of those items that guide action; including the written value statements of visions set forth by the organization. This is an example of the physical aspect of organizational culture. The mental components of organizational culture include behavior norms; how people relate to co-workers and customers during the business day (Schein, 2004). Organizational Behavior Organizational behavior, in its simplest definition, is how people act within organizations. This concept is closely related to organizational culture, since an aspect of the organizational culture can guide an employee’s behavior in the work environment. Organizational behavior as a field is the systematic study of the individual and their behavior within the organizational context. Diversity ...
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...Homework 3 Organizational Behavior Case Study Brownloaf MacTaggart: control & power in a management consultancy 1. How is motivation managed at Brownloaf MacTaggart? Do you think it is the best way to motivate consultants? Which recommendations would you suggest? Justify your answer. At Brownloaf Mac Taggart motivation of staff is not given much consideration as well as their well-being. The approach to staff management is cool and calculating. Promotions are rare occasions and the turnover rate is high. The environment is automated, tightly regulated and, above all, fiercely competitive. Managers use a punishment and reward system to motivate employees. Moreover, they conduct periodic quality audits, which threaten consultants. Surprisingly, skills and abilities are not the key to career success in the company. Advancement, if it comes at all, may occur by a combination of conformity, compliance and dependency that can be demonstrated in several ways (e.g. undertaking more tasks than assigned; completing projects before schedule and under budget etc.). All of these make the working environment uncertain, mistrustful and intimidating. There are few incentives for the employees to work. Managers assume that staff are extrinsically motivated by money and fear of punishment and, thus, should be controlled and directed from above. In my opinion, managers should use a more contemporary style of leadership (instead of reward and punishment system). They should believe...
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...Minority Research Paper Introduction (comments) AFRICAN AMERICAN Total numbers in the U.S. 42,020,743 Information: http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-06.pdf Percent of the total U. S. population 13.6 % Information (http://www.census.gov/prod/cen2010/briefs/c2010br-06.pdf) Rate of growth 15% Information (source) Average household size 2.7 Information (source) Average age Information (source) % with college degrees Information (source) Average or median income levels Information (source) Geographic location(s) – metro, states, etc. Information (source) Brands that have higher than average purchase for each group Information (source) Identify specific products which have above average usage for each group Information (source) Best media to use to target each group Information (source) ASIAN AMERICAN Total numbers in the U.S. Information (source) Percent of the total U. S. population Information (source) Rate of growth Information (source) Average household size Information (source) Average age Information (source) % with college degrees Information (source) Average or median income levels Information (source) Geographic location(s) – metro, states, etc. • Tier 1 States: CA, NY, TX: contain cumulative 52% of all Asians • If add tier 2 states: NJ, IL, MA, WA, VA, FL, cum increases to 76% of all Asians • If add tier 3 states: PA, MD, OH, NC, GA, MI...
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...Guidance, discipline, inspiration, and influence. As these words are looked at, one might ask what these four words have to do with anything. The answer is leadership. In the book “Essentials of Organizational Behavior” by Stephen P. Robbins and Timothy A. Judge, leadership is classified as an “ability to influence a group toward the achievement of a vision or set of goals”. Although it is apparent that a leader is needed in order to guide others, it is not to be confused with the term of management. It is management’s responsibility to execute proper order and monitor outcomes of different situations. Leaders set the examples for others. By setting examples for others, it allows motivation to take place. In the long run, this motivation will pay off and tasks will be completed so that goals are met. Leaders are there to extend a helping hand despite obstacles and to show they care. Additionally, a leader must be able to gain the trust of his or her followers. Simply put, with no trust, there is no relationship. In any organization, there must be an apparent leader who is taking charge and directing employees. Without a leader, there is a good chance that there could be a downfall in the organization. At my employer, there are approximately fifteen people in my department. Due to budget cuts, there have been many discussions about the scheduling of staff and how we will be scheduled for work within the upcoming months. Of the fifteen people in my department, only five full-time...
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...Chapter 01 – What is Organizational Behavior Behaving Ethically Most organizations stress the importance of ethics in their environment. What interests me is, where do we draw the line between ethical and unethical behavior. If a working environment is not motivating for a person, he would have no issues with calling in sick or being absent. He would even have no problems with throwing his tasks to his colleagues and later on taking on all credit for something he has not done. No one would think this attitude is unethical as long as he gets a break and the task is being completed. A student who has not studied for the finals will resort to cheating during the exams and not have a second thought about ethics. The reason is because ethical behavior is not being properly stressed at organizations and mostly everyone cares about making money regardless of the way they do it. Making money is not wrong, but the topic of debate is, is it unethical to bend the rules a little bit to achieve one’s momentarily happiness. Helping Employees with Work-Life Balance We are often being told to separate work life from our personal life. But is this really possible? Can you achieve your career goal if you do this? I believe the answer is no. The more effort you put in your work, the more successful you become. Until one day you realize you don’t even have a personal life anymore and the only people you have real relation with are your colleagues. Not many organizations are being considerate...
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...Globalization and Organization Behavior Globalization is something that affects us all from our clothes, to our food, and shoes. It has changed the world permanently, for both better and worse. The word Globalization has had numerous meanings throughout history; it was also acknowledged at one point in 1930 as an interpretation of human experience (“Oxford English Dictionary”, 2010). There have been disagreement by scholars with the roots of globalization for some time; however, critics claimed that globalization was created in the modern era as some scholars believe that the origin can be followed through a history of events. A perfect illustration of this is the economist Andre Frank, who asserted that there were traces of globalization in the third millennium B.C. during the imperialist age. Other scholars dispute that there were globalization economies that occur throughout the Hellenistic Era and Islamic Golden Age (Moore & Lewis, 2009). It is believed, by economists, that the spread of the Greek culture in the Hellenistic Era was an early practice of economic globalization. Globalization was influenced by culture with a diversity of food that was found in many different areas. The Jews and Muslims resulted in the globalization of crops, trade, knowledge, and technology in the Islamic Golden Age. Then, Christopher Columbus, in the Age of Discovery, discovered the New World in 1492 and a globalization of trade of gold, spices, and timber were all traded between Africa...
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...Part A 1. A large project engineering company assigns engineering, purchasing, marketing and support staff to client-based projects, which last anywhere from four months to one year. These project staff report to both the project leader and the manager of their functional specialization. For example, a marketing employee in Project Z would receive day-to-day instructions from the Project Z manager but would receive career development guidance from the company's director of marketing. The functional manager also places employees in future projects. In the past, a project employee was evaluated by the employee's project leader at the time of the annual performance evaluation. However, some employees complained that they had just started the project, so the project leader didn't know their performance. The company wants to introduce a 360-degree feedback process to overcome this and other problems with the performance evaluation system. Describe the specific characteristics of a 360-degree feedback process and how it might be applied for project staff at this company. Identify two problems that the company should know about 360-degree feedback systems. A 360-degree feedback system (McShane & Steen, 2012, pp. 140) is an employee performance feedback system where information is collected from multiple sources including the employee’s peers, subordinates, supervisors, managers and customers. This method of employee performance feedback is employed by many organizations...
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...on the internet as a student is very important and many students use this information for papers or other assignments. Without the ability of identifying credible a student runs the risk of basing an assignment around information that is misguided, disproven, or flat out untrue. This is why students should learn how to not only gather information but also evaluate it for accuracy and credibility. * * Describe three strategies that students can use to identify which search results are worth exploring when using the Internet to research a topic? There are quite a few strategies students can use to identify which search results are worth exploring. Firstly, looking at the URL is the most important strategy to me. Looking for ".org", ".gov", or ".edu" in the URL is very important. The website name is also important when doing research, remembering that sites like Wikipedia are not as credible as TheNationalGeographic.com, for example. Most things ending in “.com” may not be the most credible in all cases but there are a few. That is why you must also check the summary or description of the search results. Looking at the synopsis and examining the related searches listed is very important. The summary may show signs of bias, which can show whether the site is personal, political, or research oriented. At times the synopsis may be vague but this does not mean the search is...
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...Resolving Morale and Turnover Issues within a Vital Organization Tierzah Lyon 10662 Crystal Lake Rd. Farmersville Station, NY 14060 tierzahjane@yahoo.com Keller Graduate School of Management at DeVry MGMT-591-20618 Leadership & Org Behavior Professor Joseph Neptune February 22, 2015 Abstract The organization discussed in this work of literature is Cuba Memorial Hospital, located in Cuba, NY. Cuba Memorial Hospital is named as a Critical Access Hospital through a federally supported program. This allows the hospital to choose which services best meet the needs of the community with 50+ employees. Cuba Memorial provides mostly long-term care treatment as the main bulk of their income. Like many other hospitals, Cuba Memorial Hospital (Cuba Memorial Hospital) went thru a significant downturn around 2008 due to fraud and theft of education funding and much more. Not only do they lose funding, but also they also almost get shutdown every six months due to not meeting regulations in controlling heat and air-conditioning, as well as having asbestos in the pipes, and a lack of food as they have maxed out their credits with many companies. It has been a roller coaster for many years. The main contributor for many issues among the organization is lack of morale and ethics within the company and this contribute to a very high turnover rate overall. Employees are not very good as well due to the lack of appreciation of everyone’s hard work...
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...MAN 5246 Organizational Behavior Module 2, Fall 2015 Pluto Candy Company Team Case Exercise Pluto Candy Company Memorandum Date: December 11th, 2015 To: Judith Callahan, PhD Vice-President, Operations From: Employee Attitudes Task Force Re: Employee Attitudes Cc: Clyde Tombaugh, President This memorandum is a response to Judith Callahan’s Pluto Strategic Initiative Program. Our Employee attitude task force has worked diligently and precisely to determine where the Pluto Candy Company stands in terms of achieving a satisfied and committed workforce. Our results and analysis are based off the Employee Attitude Survey and can be found below. Please feel free to contact any member of our Employee Attitudes Task Force for further questions or clarifications. Question 1: One question I’d like your team to consider is whether we should care about employees’ attitudes. Although a satisfied workforce is one of our strategic goals, we need to be sure, before we contemplate specific actions, that such actions are warranted. In order to determine whether we should care about employees’ attitudes, our group conducted a correlation between overall job satisfaction and average performance. We found that there was a statistically significant correlation of 0.359 between the two. Therefore, it is important that Pluto Candy Company should care about its employees’ attitudes. Refer to appendix A for detailed data analysis. Question...
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