...or write: Prentice Hall PTR, Corp. Sales Dept., One Lake Street, Upper Saddle River, NJ 07458. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher. Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 ISBN 0-13-008754-8 Pearson Education LTD. Pearson Education Australia PTY, Limited Pearson Education Singapore, Pte. Ltd. Pearson Education North Asia Ltd. Pearson Education Canada, Ltd. Pearson Educación de Mexico, S.A. de C.V. Pearson Education—Japan Pearson Education Malaysia, Pte. Ltd. Pearson Education, Upper Saddle River, New Jersey A D V I S O R Y C O M M I T T E E Arnold H. Kaplan (Chairman) Chief Financial Officer UnitedHealth Group Peter G. M. Cox Chief Financial Officer United Grain Growers Limited Gracie F. Hemphill Director—Research Financial Executives Research Foundation, Inc. Karl A. Primm General Auditor Unocal Corporation William M. Sinnett Project Manager Financial Executives Research Foundation, Inc. III...
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...leadership has the management scope and their communications has a tremendous effect on the performance of the employees. Eventually, this further gets identified as a strong leadership foundation to manage organization communications effectively. An effective leader is an inspiring person who focuses strategically (Richmond, 2011), analyze problems and honor customer commitments on time. Many people believe that leaders are born to be strong and influential. Good leaders are made, not born. However, anyone can be a strong leader as long as determination, open-mindedness, and optimism are learned and developed. If you have the desire and willpower, you can become an effective leader. Good leaders develop through a never ending process of self-study, education, training, and experience (Jago, 1982). To inspire your workers into higher levels of teamwork, there are certain things you must be, know, and, do. These do not come naturally, but are acquired through continual work and study. Good leaders are continually working and studying to improve their leadership skills; they are not resting on their laurels. Leadership is a process by which a person influences others to accomplish an objective and directs the organization in a way that makes it more cohesive and coherent. This definition is similar to Northouse's (2007) definition — Leadership is a process whereby an individual influences a group of individuals to achieve a common goal. In most of the organizations, the influence...
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...If you wanted to get rich, how would you do it? I think your best bet would be to start or join a startup. That's been a reliable way to get rich for hundreds of years. The word "startup" dates from the 1960s, but what happens in one is very similar to the venture-backed trading voyages of the Middle Ages. Startups usually involve technology, so much so that the phrase "high-tech startup" is almost redundant. A startup is a small company that takes on a hard technical problem. Lots of people get rich knowing nothing more than that. You don't have to know physics to be a good pitcher. But I think it could give you an edge to understand the underlying principles. Why do startups have to be small? Will a startup inevitably stop being a startup as it grows larger? And why do they so often work on developing new technology? Why are there so many startups selling new drugs or computer software, and none selling corn oil or laundry detergent? The Proposition Economically, you can think of a startup as a way to compress your whole working life into a few years. Instead of working at a low intensity for forty years, you work as hard as you possibly can for four. This pays especially well in technology, where you earn a premium for working fast. Here is a brief sketch of the economic proposition. If you're a good hacker in your mid twenties, you can get a job paying about $80,000 per year. So on average such a hacker must be able to do at least $80,000 worth of work per year...
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...Note: Answer any 4 Case Studies CASE 1: GE, Dell, Intel, and Others: The competitive Advantage of Information Technology CASE 2: Celanse Chemicals and Others: Wireless Business Applications CASE 3: Wal-Mart, Bank Financial, and HP: The Business Value of AI CASE 4: The Rowe Cos. and Merrill Lynch: The ROI Process in Business/IT Planning CASE 5: F-Secure, Microsoft, GM, and Verizon: The Business Challenge of Computer Viruses CASE – 1 GE, Dell, Intel, and Others: The competitive Advantage of Information Technology There’s nothing line a punchy headline t get an article some attention. A recent piece in the Harvard Business Review (May 2003), shockingly labeled “IT Doesn’t Matter,” has garnered the magazine more buzz than at any time since Jack Welch affair. The article has been approvingly cited in The New York Times, analyzed in Wall Street reports, and e-mailed around the world. But without such a dramatic and reckless title, I doubt the article would have been much noticed. It’s a sloppy mix of ersatz history, conventional wisdom, moderate insight, and unsupportable assertions. And it is dangerously wrong. Author Nicholas Carr’s main point is that information technology is nothing more than the infrastructure of modern business, similar to railroads, electricity, or the internal combustion engineering advances that have become too commonplace for any company to wangle a strategic advantage from them. Once-innovative applications of information technology have...
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...Development), Ahmedabad. ABSTRACT Many progressive Indian organizations are seen to annually lead a practice of weeding out their lowest-performing manpower, with the strategic intent of increasing their performance capability and competence. The genesis of this practice lies in the “20-70-10 principle” which states that the top 20% of workforce is productive, 70% work adequately and the remaining bottom 10% do not deliver and should be fired. During the annual appraisal, the head of every business team within the organization is asked to classify his/her team-members into top, medium and bottom performers. Those in the bottom bucket are asked to resign. This reportedly creates tremendous dissonance and unhappiness across the organization. There seems to be no evidence of the expected theoretical result of a continuously improving highperforming business unit. Even short-run competence is not reported to increase perceptibly. Notable is the expensive attrition and erosion of precious employee-engagement among residuals, with consequent burn-outs and reduced productivity. The significant negative outcomes of this practice seem to outweigh any positive potential. Literature studied and industry leaders decry it as inappropriate. Yet, paradoxically, it is followed in many progressive organizations. Why would organizations waste resources on a process that is detrimental to their own strategy? To understand the practice and the factors behind this apparent paradox, existing literature was studied...
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...MIS Mini-cases -- 1 of 30 Cases for Use in Management Information Systems MIS Mini-cases -- 2 of 30 MIS Mini-cases -- 3 of 30 Case 01 -- Freeway Ford You are a management consultant working for Franklin Absolom, the majority stockholder for a group of 10 automobile dealerships. He has asked you to spend several days at Freeway Ford, a dealership that is not performing up to its potential. You are not to go ―looking for trouble‖: instead, your assignment is to find ways to help management at the dealership take advantage of opportunities. One day while you are talking with James Kahler, the sales manager for Freeway Ford, you realize that the dealership only uses transaction processing systems—it is not realizing the full potential of the information it has gathered for managerial decision making. For example, Freeway Ford knows the purchase date and owner of every car it sells, but it never contacts owner about routine maintenance. Freeway Ford know that people who purchase a new car generally trade it in for another new car 3 to 4 years later, but the dealership does not contact these previous customers. Another opportunity comes from used car purchasing and sales. Every car has a vehicle identification number (VIN), and the dealership uses this number to check for known problems with a used car before it makes a purchase. A data bank of car insurance claims histories and major repairs is kept on a set of CDs that is sent to the dealership each month. At the...
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...Employers, job seekers, and puzzle lovers everywhere delight in William Poundstone's HOW WOULD YOU MOVE MOUNT FUJI? "Combines how-to with be-smart for an audience of job seekers, interviewers, Wired-style cognitive science hobbyists, and the onlooking curious. . . . How Would You Move Mount Fuji? gallops down entertaining sidepaths about the history of intelligence testing, the origins of Silicon Valley, and the brain-jockey heroics of Microsoft culture." — Michael Erard, Austin Chronicle "A charming Trojan Horse of a book While this slim book is ostensibly a guide to cracking the cult of the puzzle in Microsoft's hiring practices, Poundstone manages to sneak in a wealth of material on the crucial issue of how to hire in today's knowledge-based economy. How Would You Move Mount Fuji? delivers on the promise of revealing the tricks to Microsoft's notorious hiring challenges. But, more important, Poundstone, an accomplished science journalist, shows how puzzles can — and cannot — identify the potential stars of a competitive company.... Poundstone gives smart advice to candidates on how to 'pass' the puzzle game.... Of course, let's not forget the real fun of the book: the puzzles themselves." — Tom Ehrenfeld, Boston Globe "A dead-serious book about recruiting practices and abstract reasoning — presented as a puzzle game.... Very, very valuable to some job applicants — the concepts being more important than the answers. It would have usefulness as well to interviewers with...
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...What are the different types of decisions and how does the decision-making process work? 2. How do information systems support the activities of managers and management decision making? 3. How do decision-support systems (DSS) differ from MIS and how do they provide value to the business? 4. How do executive support systems (ESS) help senior managers make better decisions? 5. What is the role of information systems in helping people working in a group make decisions more efficiently? CHAPTER OUTLINE 12.1 DECISION MAKING AND INFORMATION SYSTEMS Business Value of Improved Decision Making Types of Decisions The Decision-Making Process Managers and Decision Making in the Real World 12.2 SYSTEMS FOR DECISION SUPPORT Management Information Systems (MIS) Decision-Support Systems (DSS) Data Visualization and Geographic Information Systems Web-Based Customer Decision-Support Systems Group Decision-Support Systems (GDSS) 12.3 EXECUTIVE SUPPORT SYSTEMS (ESS) AND THE BALANCED SCORECARD FRAMEWORK The Role of Executive Support Systems in the Firm Business Value of Executive Support Systems 12.4 HANDS-ON MIS PROJECTS Management Decision Problems Improving Decision Making: Using Pivot Tables to Analyze Sales Data Improving Decision Making: Using a Web-Based DSS for Retirement Planning LEARNING TRACK MODULE Building and Using Pivot Tables Interactive Sessions: Too Many Bumped Fliers: Why? Business Intelligence Turns Dick’s Sporting Goods into a Winner EASTERN MOUNTAIN SPORTS FORGES A TRAIL TO...
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...Middleware for Distributed Systems Evolving the Common Structure for Network-centric Applications Richard E. Schantz BBN Technologies 10 Moulton Street Cambridge, MA 02138, USA schantz@bbn.com Douglas C. Schmidt Electrical & Computer Engineering Dept. University of California, Irvine Irvine, CA 92697-2625, USA schmidt@uci.edu 1 Overview of Trends, Challenges, and Opportunities Two fundamental trends influence the way we conceive and construct new computing and information systems. The first is that information technology of all forms is becoming highly commoditized i.e., hardware and software artifacts are getting faster, cheaper, and better at a relatively predictable rate. The second is the growing acceptance of a network-centric paradigm, where distributed applications with a range of quality of service (QoS) needs are constructed by integrating separate components connected by various forms of communication services. The nature of this interconnection can range from 1. The very small and tightly coupled, such as avionics mission computing systems to 2. The very large and loosely coupled, such as global telecommunications systems. The interplay of these two trends has yielded new architectural concepts and services embodying layers of middleware. These layers are interposed between applications and commonly available hardware and software infrastructure to make it feasible, easier, and more cost effective to develop and evolve systems using reusable software. Middleware...
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...Entrepreneurship Strategy Implementation Organizing: Building a Dynamic Organization • Organization Structure • Organizational Agility • Human Resources Management • Managing the Diverse Workforce Leading: Mobilizing People • • • • Leadership Motivating for Performance Teamwork Communicating Controlling: Learning and Changing • Managerial Control • Managing Technology and Innovation • Creating and Managing Change PART ONE Foundations of Management The three chapters in Part One describe the foundations of management. Chapter 1 discusses the imperatives of managing in today’s business landscape and introduces the key functions, skills, and competitive goals of effective managers. In other words, it discusses what you need to do and accomplish to become a high-performing manager. Chapter 2 describes the external environment in which managers and their organizations operate— the context that both constrains and provides opportunities for managers. It also discusses what can be described as the organization’s internal environment: its culture. Chapter 3 discusses the most fundamental managerial activity: decision making. Because managers make decisions constantly, sound decision-making skills are essential for good performance. 3 CHAPTER 1 Managing Management means, in the last analysis, the substitution of thought for brawn and muscle, of knowledge for folklore and tradition, and of cooperation for force. —Peter Drucker LEARNING OBJECTIVES After studying Chapter...
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...Microsoft Corporation Future Business and Economic Prospects Analysis by Team 4 Group Members: Lewis Bullock Daniel Fuller Erica Jaume Tim Trenkle Rebekah Vandegrift Date of Submission: April 21, 2013 Table of Contents 1. Executive Summary 5 2. Company Introduction 6 3. Financial Analysis 7 3.1. Statement of Cash Flow Analysis 7 3.2. Liquidity Ratios 12 3.3. Asset Management Ratios 13 3.4. Debt Management Ratio 14 3.5. Profitability Ratios 15 3.6. Market Value Ratios 17 3.7. Du Pont Equation 18 3.8. Microsoft to Industry Analysis 18 4. Weighted Average Cost of Capital (WACC) 19 5. Future Cash Flows 22 Net Income before Extraordinaries 25 Net Income Growth 25 Depreciation, Depletion & Amortization 25 Depreciation and Depletion 25 Deferred Taxes & Investment Tax Credit 25 Deferred Taxes 25 Other Funds 25 Funds from Operations 25 Extraordinaries 25 Changes in Working Capital 25 Receivables 25 Accounts Payable 25 Other Assets/Liabilities 25 Net Operating Cash Flow 26 Net Operating Cash Flow Growth 26 Net Operating Cash Flow / Sales 26 2010 – 2012 Investing Activities 26 Capital Expenditures 26 Capital Expenditures (Fixed Assets) 26 Capital Expenditures (Other Assets) 26 Capital Expenditures Growth 26 Capital Expenditures / Sales 26 Net Assets from Acquisitions 26 Sale of Fixed Assets & Businesses 26 Purchase/Sale of Investments 26 Purchase of Investments 26 Sale/Maturity...
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...Discuss the requirements for achieving process integration. • Describe the barriers to internal and external process integration, and what can be done to overcome them. • Understand the importance of performance measurements in achieving internal and external process integration. • Understand why it is important to align supply chain strategies with internal process strategies. • List and describe the eight key supply chain processes, and how trading partners integrate these processes. • Discuss a number of the latest trends in the areas of process management and process integration. CHAPTER OUTLINE Introduction Achieving Internal Process Integration Extending Integration to Supply Chain Trading Partners A Look at Trends and Developments in Integration and Process Management PROCESS MANAGEMENT IN ACTION—An Interview with Zack Noshirwani, Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain for Raytheon The Raytheon Company is a major defense contractor; its major customer is the U.S. Department of Defense. Mr. Zack Noshirwani, vice president of integrated supply chain, joined Raytheon in 2001, and prior to his current post served as vice president for operations for both the Air/Missile Defense Systems and for Integrated Defense Systems. Previously, he worked in operations...
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...rules in the first place. Empirical Science is based purely around observation and measurement, and the vast majority of research involves some type of practical experimentation. This can be anything, from measuring the Doppler Shift of a distant galaxy to handing out questionnaires in a shopping center. This may sound obvious, but this distinction stems back to the time of the Ancient Greek Philosophers. Cutting a long story short, Plato believed that all knowledge could be reasoned; Aristotle that knowledge relied upon empirical observation and measurement. This does bring up one interesting anomaly. Strictly speaking, the great physicists, such as Einstein and Stephen Hawking, are not scientists. They generate sweeping and elegant theories and mathematical models to describe the universe and the very nature of time, but measure nothing. In reality, they are mathematicians, occupying their own particular niche, and they should properly be referred to as theoreticians. Still, they are still commonly referred to as scientists and do touch upon the scientific method in that any theory they have can be destroyed by a single scrap of empirical evidence. The Scientific Method Relies Upon Data The scientific method uses some type of measurement to analyze results, feeding these findings back into theories of what we know about the world. There are two major ways of obtaining data, through measurement and...
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...Discuss the requirements for achieving process integration. • Describe the barriers to internal and external process integration, and what can be done to overcome them. • Understand the importance of performance measurements in achieving internal and external process integration. • Understand why it is important to align supply chain strategies with internal process strategies. • List and describe the eight key supply chain processes, and how trading partners integrate these processes. • Discuss a number of the latest trends in the areas of process management and process integration. CHAPTER OUTLINE Introduction Achieving Internal Process Integration Extending Integration to Supply Chain Trading Partners A Look at Trends and Developments in Integration and Process Management PROCESS MANAGEMENT IN ACTION—An Interview with Zack Noshirwani, Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain for Raytheon The Raytheon Company is a major defense contractor; its major customer is the U.S. Department of Defense. Mr. Zack Noshirwani, vice president of integrated supply chain, joined Raytheon in 2001, and prior to his current post served as vice president for operations for both the Air/Missile Defense Systems and for Integrated Defense Systems. Previously, he worked in operations...
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...Discuss the requirements for achieving process integration. • Describe the barriers to internal and external process integration, and what can be done to overcome them. • Understand the importance of performance measurements in achieving internal and external process integration. • Understand why it is important to align supply chain strategies with internal process strategies. • List and describe the eight key supply chain processes, and how trading partners integrate these processes. • Discuss a number of the latest trends in the areas of process management and process integration. CHAPTER OUTLINE Introduction Achieving Internal Process Integration Extending Integration to Supply Chain Trading Partners A Look at Trends and Developments in Integration and Process Management PROCESS MANAGEMENT IN ACTION—An Interview with Zack Noshirwani, Vice President of Integrated Supply Chain for Raytheon The Raytheon Company is a major defense contractor; its major customer is the U.S. Department of Defense. Mr. Zack Noshirwani, vice president of integrated supply chain, joined Raytheon in 2001, and prior to his current post served as vice president for operations for both the Air/Missile Defense Systems and for Integrated Defense Systems. Previously, he worked in operations...
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