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Books > Business & Economics > Business & management > Business strategy
This book is a pioneering work that maps out the ideological evolution of HRM research and practices, with a particular focus on our contemporary era of multinational corporations. It explores the ideological evolution of Human Resource Management (HRM) from the 1950s to the present day and maps out the development of HRM research and practices from a Critical Theory perspective. Its findings open up avenues for metatheoretical development within the HRM research field and provide employees under modern capitalism with emancipatory awareness. Both the theoretical framework and the empirical findings of this study will be of interest to HRM researchers as well as management researchers of all epistemological backgrounds, particularly those working within Critical Management Studies. This work will also appeal to teachers and students, and it could serve as a textbook for a number of postgraduate level courses, including Organization Theory, Critical Management Studies, Human Resource Management, Business History, Sociology of Management, and Critical Theory.
The challenges facing a solo entrepreneur when calamity strikes are unique in the realm of disaster planning, and the only effective strategy for preventing a business failure after an unexpected major setback is to have a clearly thought-out emergency backup plan. This book guides you to being 100 percent ready for the worst-case scenario. Disasters are sudden, calamitous events that can bring about great loss and failure to a business. Some disasters can be prevented through good judgment and careful planning; others-whether "acts of God" such as flood or fire or a personal health crisis-cannot be. What will happen if the one person responsible for the day-to-day operations of a solo entrepreneurship is suddenly incapacitated and unable to manage the business? In cases of small businesses that do not have a clear backup or disaster recovery plan, the outcome is often the total failure of the business. This book is both a wakeup call and an action plan for small business owners. It will guide readers toward creating a backup system that will enable a business to "run itself" without the immediate presence of its owner-for a week, a month, or even longer. The author presents a tested strategy that has its roots in preparing for natural disasters, and replaces the all-too-common refusal to believe that bad things can and do happen with hard facts and realism. Clearly, solopreneurs cannot afford to take risks of failure when it comes to their businesses-the most important thing in their lives aside from family and health. Asks a critical question: "How prepared is the average solopreneur to withstand a sudden crisis, like a serious medical emergency?", addresses the likely consequences of being unprepared, and provides a practical strategy for building an emergency backup plan Presents guidance for choosing a person or team of people to immediately step in and manage the business during a crisis Stresses the importance of building a comprehensive communication plan that serves to keep people informed on a daily basis Offers information for keeping computers and other vital equipment in good working order and protected from cyber attacks
In response to the world's rapidly growing social, economic and environmental challenges, a growing wave of "social intrapreneurs" are harnessing the power of large companies to create new business solutions to address societal problems. Social Intrapreneurism and All That Jazz reveals how these highly creative social innovators are improvizing alliances across, as well as beyond, their companies to create micro-insurance products for low-income people; offer delivery services to millions of small businesses in slums around the world; develop alternative-energy solutions inside a major gas and oil corporation; partner with a Brazilian community to produce new natural care products; establish a green advertising network within a major media company; apply engineering expertise to help alleviate poverty and much more - all while generating commercial value for their companies. Distilling insights from interviews with social intrapreneurs, their colleagues and experts around the world, the authors bring to life how business can be about more than just maximizing profit. They identify the mind-sets, behaviours and skills that have helped successful social intrapreneurs journey from initial idea to roll-out by their company - and some of the pitfalls. Although their journeys may be lonely at times and require considerable hard work while working "against the grain" of large conventional businesses, successful social intrapreneurs are, above all, great communicators who inspire others to join them in achieving a higher purpose beyond the realms of conventional business. Drawing on the metaphors of ensemble jazz music-making, the authors describe how "woodshedding", "jamming", "paying your dues", being a "sideman", joining and building a "band" but, above all, "listening" to what is happening in business and the wider world - are all part of the life of a successful social intrapreneurism project. Whether you're an aspiring social intrapreneur who wants to change the world while keeping your day job, or want to renew the entrepreneurial spirit of your own company, this book is for you.
Economic and business growth is driven by the continuous re-evaluation and optimization of current policies and practices. By implementing more effective procedures, businesses can increase their levels of competitiveness. Factors Affecting Firm Competitiveness and Performance in the Modern Business World is an authoritative reference source for the latest scholarly research on the most appropriate measures and initiatives for firms to become more competitive within various sectors. Incorporating interdisciplinary perspectives through theoretical foundations and real-world case studies, this book is ideally designed for professionals, practitioners, upper-level students, policy makers, and managers interested in the optimization of business performance.
Issues a bold challenge to business managers to commit their companies to sustained measurable growth and enduring success. Noted business author and management consultant Robert M. Tomasko details five distinct paths that can take any company, large or small, to higher levels of productivity and prosperity. Important points are fully illustrated with examples drawn from a wide variety of companies in a broad range of markets. Using a dynamic "people-centered" approach, he shows how to match these paths or game plans with the specific characteristics of your business and its key employees. These five paths include: Breaking the Rules: Destabilizing an industry to create new markets describes how to expand your business by violating rules or standards that are obsolete or so entrenched that no one questions them anymore, leaving the market wide open to astute individuals who can spot the telltale signs. Go for Growth tells how to identify these markets and how to seize the initiative, along the lines of Silicon Graphics and Southwest Airlines. Playing the Game: Excel by satisfying existing needs in growing markets explains the inherent strengths and weaknesses of market-driven companies that succeed by knowing and serving an existing market better than anyone else. Go for Growth tells you when and how to apply this game plan so effectively used by Marriott, PepsiCo, and Procter & Gamble. Making the Rules: Dominate the market by controlling its standards describes the strategies of the handful of companies that have managed to control, through research, market share, and product positioning, the markets in which they compete. This is the path of Disney, Intel, and Microsoft. Specializing: Thrive in niche markets details the ways companies such as Nordic Track, Rolex, and Union Carbide can seal off a portion of a market from other competitors by focusing on meeting very specific needs. Go for Growth shows the ways specialization can restore growth to companies undergoing wrenching change. Improvising: Profit from change by rolling with the punches describes the role of improvising as a growth path when no other good choices are available, and explains the numerous ways improvisers like IBM, Kodak, and many regional phone companies can capitalize on their flexibility to achieve profitability. Go for Growth drives home the point that there is no single best approach to growth for everyone by including lively, first-person accounts from managers thriving, and stumbling, in businesses following each path. Go for Growth fully demonstrates the opportunities awaiting businesses that can successfully follow the right path for their markets and capabilities. In addition, this invaluable book explores ways managers can help focus their entire organizations on sustaining growth and increasing profitability well into the future. With its combination of stimulating ideas and specific action plans, Go for Growth offers forward-looking managers five unique paths toward business and personal growth. The author of the best-selling Rethinking the Corporation shows how companies of any size can achieve new growth and greater success Five Paths to Profit and Success--Choose the Right One for You and Your Company Go for Growth challenges business leaders to move their organizations toward sustainable growth and enduring prosperity. Written by noted author and business consultant Robert M. Tomasko, this timely book offers a detailed rationale for steady, responsible growth and outlines five energizing, "people-centered" ways to introduce a new, growth-oriented dynamic into an organization. Supported by numerous examples of how successful companies have managed growth, Go for Growth shows how to match specific options with the resources and needs of specific companies, and how to focus the entire organization on the business of success. "Go for Growth is an important book because of the powerful, insightful way Bob Tomasko integrates personal growth, organizational change, and positive business strategy. It's a thoughtful, practical book--hard to put down, easy to apply. I think his best line is: 'Growth only happens when people grow'; that's a line I'd put on the wall of every executive's office " --Robert J. Lee, Ph.D. President, Center for Creative Leadership "At a time when so many pundits advocate their pet silver bullet to growth, Tomasko refreshingly shuns the 'one size fits all' panacea by setting forth five sensible paths to profitable growth. He stresses that it is up to each management to sort out which path really makes sense given each company's unique situation." --Samuel M. Felton Strategic Leadership Forum "Go for Growth will help managers to determine what they need to do and what they need to avoid." --Michael Maccoby Author of Why Work? Motivating the New Workforce
This book examines key aspects of the increasingly important phenomenon of reshoring - the decision of companies to reverse offshoring by bringing manufacturing back from overseas. The aim is to equip readers with a full understanding of the current extent of reshoring, its drivers, and the associated opportunities and challenges. The impact of governments' economic policies on the location choices of entrepreneurs in an era of globalization is carefully analyzed, drawing on experiences in the United States and Italy, where contrasting encouragement is provided for reshoring decisions. The effect on reshoring of recent developments regarding technology, the environment, and other factors is assessed in depth, and readers will also find close scrutiny of the relationship between reshoring and manufacturing performance. The book will be of interest to all academics, researchers, and practitioners with an interest in the manufacturing industry and will be an excellent teaching aid for a variety of courses in different disciplines at both undergraduate and postgraduate level.
Technological advances in the last five years have allowed organizations to use Business Analytics to provide insights, increase understanding and it is hoped, gain the elusive 'competitive edge'. The rapid development of Business Analytics is impacting all enterprise competences profoundly and classical business professions are being redefined by a much deeper interplay between business and information systems.As computing capabilities for analysis has moved outside the IT glass-house and into the sphere of individual workers, they are no longer the exclusive domain of IT professionals but rather accessible to all employees. Complex open-source data analytics packages and client-level visualization tools deployed in desktops and laptops equip virtually any end-user with the instruments to carry out significant analytical tasks. All the while, the drive to improve 'customer experience' has heightened the demand for data involving customers, providers and entire ecosystems.In response to the proliferation of Business Analytics, a new Center and Masters of Science Program was introduced at the National University of Singapore (NUS). The Center collaborates with over 40 different external partner organizations in Asia-Pacific with which all MSBA students undertake individual projects. Business Analytics: Progress on Applications in Asia Pacific provides a useful picture of the maturity of the Business Analytics domain in Asia Pacific. For more information about the Business Analytics Center at NUS, visit the website at: msba.nus.edu/
Fun to read yet full of powerful business information, this guide provides a comprehensive toolkit for crafting winning strategies in today's competitive environment. Mastering Strategy: Workshops for Business Success uses a series of workshops to strip away confusion and present popular and proven strategy frameworks in an easy-to-understand, straightforward, and entertaining manner. Using everyday language that avoids jargon, the workshops in this comprehensive toolkit help readers identify the competitive patterns of any industry, understand any company's competitive position in its market, formulate a set of strategic solutions for a company, and recognize the risk-return trade-offs of those strategic solutions. The authors cover introductory competitive strategy concepts while also providing guidance for business people intent on taking their strategic thinking skills to the next level. From business professionals seeking to quickly grasp and employ strategy essentials, to would-be entrepreneurs sizing up the potential of their business opportunity, to scientists pursuing commercialization of their inventions, this book is the ideal resource to make each a more effective strategic thinker. Presents the most effective and useful strategy concepts and frameworks in a condensed, easy-to-grasp and entertaining manner that anyone or any business can benefit from Provides many current and classic examples to show the application of the frameworks, making key concepts easy to understand Organizes information in a logical order where concepts presented in previous workshops provides the base for additional ideas or strategies, giving readers a synergistic, comprehensive picture of strategic challenges and opportunities Shows readers not just how to craft marketing strategy but also how to advocate for their strategic ideas
This proceedings volume presents the latest on the theoretical approach of the contemporary issues evolved in strategic marketing and the integration of theory and practice. It highlights strategic research and innovative activities in marketing. The contributed chapters are concerned with using modern qualitative and quantitative techniques based on information technology used to manage and analyze business data, to discover hidden knowledge and to introduce intelligence into marketing processes. This allows for a focus on innovative applications in all aspects of marketing, of computerized technologies related to data analytics, predictive analytics and modeling, business intelligence and knowledge engineering, in order to demonstrate new ways of uncovering hidden knowledge and supporting marketing decisions with evidence-based intelligent tools. The chapters from the proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Strategic Innovative Marketing 2016 cover areas such as social media marketing innovation, sustainable marketing, customer satisfaction strategies, customer relationship management, marketing research and analytics. The papers have been written by scientists, researchers, practitioners and students that demonstrate a special orientation in strategic marketing, all of whom aspire to be ahead of the curve based on the pillars of innovation. This proceedings volume shares their recent contributions to the field and showcases their exchange of insights on strategic issues in the science of innovation marketing.
There is a high demand in our society to adopt emerging technologies in all aspects of business and economic activity. As traditional business practices and economic activity are occurring in a global context, new areas of economic development are being recognized as the key enablers of wealth and income production. International Business Strategy and Entrepreneurship: An Information Technology Perspective discusses innovative solutions to research problems and high performance systems while emphasizing the role of IT and management for sustainable development. This book brings together academics, researchers, entrepreneurs, policy makers and government officers aiming to contribute to the debate of technology related to international business and strategic management.
Higgins makes clear that corporate strategy, regardless of how elegantly conceived, how comprehensive its scope or how forward-looking its thrust, does not provide competitive advantage until it is communicated, understood, valued, and acted upon by a variety of key corporate stakeholders. His book is thus developed to advance the theory and practice of corporate strategy communications. With two chapters devoted to conceptual foundations and empirical research, plus five new case studies illustrating his points, Higgins's book not only builds on existing research in strategic planning and management and reputation management, but offers new research findings as well. Interdisciplinary, integrative, and international in scope, the book will be of special interest to corporate management, strategic planners, corporate communications and investor relations executives, and other professionals in the investment community, and to academics with similar research and teaching interests. Higgins argues that companies that communicate effectively to key constituencies risk less by making their strategies known than by hiding them. Among the important payoffs Higgins identifies are an improved climate within the investment community; better relationships with suppliers, customers, and strategic partners; improved employee morale and motivation; and, in some cases, a boost to share price and the enhancement of shareholder value. He begins with an overall strategic framework, illustrating how effective corporate strategy communications can improve a firM's strategic credibility, then follows with case studies--unavailable until now--each written specifically for this book, and covering such situations as a merger, a failed takeover attempt, and a management campaign to elevate share price and shareholder value at a major chemical company. He ends with an examination of the international challenges and opportunities involved in cross-cultural strategy communications. The book also presents for the first time, the results of a major international study of corporate strategy communications. Included in this study were 1800 executives and analysts from the U.S., Europe, and Japan. The job of strategy communications is never done, concludes Higgins. Communications during bad times, as well as good, are critically important.
The international tourism industry has seen increased growth in the past few years as millions of individuals continue to travel worldwide. As one of the world's largest economic sectors, creating jobs, driving exports, and generating prosperity worldwide, hospitality and tourism management needs to continually be explored in order to update best business models and practice. Strategic Business Models to Support Demand, Supply, and Destination Management in the Tourism and Hospitality Industry is an essential reference source that emphasizes emergent and innovative aspects and new challenges and issues within the industry with a particular focus on demand, supply, and destination management. Featuring research on topics such as circular economy, consumer behavior, and social networking, this book is ideally designed for business professionals, executives, hotel managers, event coordinators, restaurateurs, travel agents, tour directors, policymakers, government officials, industry professionals, researchers, students, and academicians.
The 'Resource-Based View of the Firm' has emerged over the last
fifteen years as one of the dominant perspectives used in strategic
management. It addresses the fundamental research question of
strategic management: Why it is that some firms persistently
outperform others?
Are you happy?
The sustainable development goals (SDGs) were launched in 2015, as a global agenda for addressing the multiplicity of social and environmental challenges that face communities around the world. But what role might entrepreneurship play in reaching these goals? In the first book of its kind, Entrepreneurship and the Sustainable Development Goals will encourage you to think about the critical role that entrepreneurship and entrepreneurs might play in supporting sustainable development. More than twenty authors from across Africa, Asia, North America, and Europe explore a fascinating mix of enterprises and sustainable development initiatives to illustrate the capacity of entrepreneurship as the engine for transforming our world and overcoming the diverse nature of these global challenges. Structured into three provocative sections this book explores: * Social change and entrepreneurship through the lens of the SDGs; * Organisational practices and innovation towards the SDGs; * Entrepreneurship, gender equality and empowerment towards the SDGs Journey through the stories of tribal enterprises in India, to cacao framers in Ghana, small and medium sized businesses in Greece, social enterprises in Kenya, Zambia and the USA and many others to see the powerful force that entrepreneurship can be for promoting poverty alleviation and sustainable development.
India is still perceived by some as a developing country that has yet to create world-class products of its own. However, this book shows that in recent years India has emerged as a lead market for frugality-driven innovations that are affordable, robust and successful even outside its geographic boundaries. Many global companies have recognized these changes and are ramping up their local R&D capabilities. At the same time, several Indian firms are venturing out to international shores and gaining access to new markets. Using a top-down approach, the book takes a closer look at systems of innovation at work and presents examples of successful, corporate innovations in multiple industries and their contextual conditions.
This book presents the full scope of Design Thinking in theory and practice, bringing together prominent opinion leaders and experienced practitioners who share their insights, approaches and lessons learned. As Design Thinking is gaining popularity in the context of innovation and information management, the book elaborates the specific interpretations and meanings of the concept in different fields including engineering, management, and information technology. As such, it offers students and professionals a sourcebook revealing the power of Design Thinking, while providing academics a roadmap for further research.
Making Innovation Las t considers the long term success of a firm. Authored by a trio of top international scholars who present pioneering new work on what it takes to create long term growth, the book examines the internal conditions that are likely to encourage sustainable innovation, as well as what a culture of innovation should look like.
This is a book about the modernization of public governance and the development of strategic states. It focuses on six Gulf countries (United Arab Emirates, Oman, Qatar, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and Kuwait) and presents research findings from quantitative data analysis and comparative analysis of the trends and developments of the six Gulf states. The book analyses the workings of the governments of the Gulf States, including the way that they have tackled national development since the mid 1990s. This includes how their strategies for economic diversification have been reflected in trends in revenues from "oil rents" and whether they are still rentier states or not. Evidence is presented on key topics such as government strategies and long-term strategic visions. Careful consideration is given to reputational evidence and to the strategic process capabilities of the governments: integration and coordination of government machinery, mobilizing public and private stakeholders, evaluating, and adapting - all defined as strategic process capabilities. This examination of government is also used to study their performance in strategic results areas: the economy, the natural environment, and the happiness of their citizens. The countries emerge from this analysis as far from identical in terms of capabilities or in term of performance. |
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