Billions of people create trillions of connections through social media each day, but few of us consider how each click and key press builds relationships that, in aggregate, form a vast social network. Passionate users of social media tools such as email, blogs, microblogs, and wikis eagerly send personal or public messages, post strongly felt opinions, or contribute to community knowledge to develop partnerships, promote cultural heritage, and advance development. Devoted social networkers create and share digital media and rate or recommend resources to pool their experiences, provide help for neighbors and colleagues, and express their creativity. The results are vast, complex networks of connections that link people to other people, documents, locations, concepts, and other objects. New tools are now available to collect, analyze, visualize, and generate insights from the collections of connections formed from billions of messages, links, posts, edits, uploaded photos and videos, reviews, and recommendations. AsContinue reading
Modern Management Concepts
Discontinuous Improvement – Abernathy and Utterback Model
The common innovation process happens in a set frame, following certain rules and ways of thinking. This ‘game played’ by competitors is to innovate by doing what has been done before like product or process innovations or even position and paradigm innovations, but doing it better. In this competition of ‘playing the same game’ some firms manage to do better than others and can gain a competitive advantage through these innovations, but the ‘set of the game’ is accepted and do not change. Very rare something happens that breaks up this framework and changes how the game is played. This will not happen every day but when this arises the rules and boundaries of a market change rapidly. This will result in upcoming new opportunities and challenge the existing players in their way of working, thinking and doing business. A discontinues improvement occurs out of a technological and conditions stableContinue reading
How to Manage Innovation?
When we think about innovation one question arises in the mind: Does the innovation come naturally? Or it may be taught. The answer is that everyone can be creative and innovative the only requirement is to encourage the innovation among people. Innovation is real work and it can & should be managed like any other corporate function but that does not mean it is the same as other business activities. Indeed, innovation is the work of knowing rather than doing. Buzz today is to encourage and manage innovation through innovation management. One strategy to build up an innovative organization is getting people to accept that the way they work just might not be the best. The most important thing is to help people broaden their perspective. Innovation is like a sky with horizons defined. These horizons can only be broaden through innovation. There is no agreed definition of Innovation Management.Continue reading
Blue Ocean Strategy – Summary and Examples
Strategy involves standing out from the competition and making choices that give the company a unique and valuable position by offering distinctive products and services. Competitive advantage and profitability can be achieved simultaneously by approaches that create consistent internal synergies and combine a company’s operational activities efficiently. Strategies are formed at various levels of the organization. However, a typical organizational structure incorporates strategies at 3 specific levels: corporate, business and functional. Corporate strategy defines a company’s holistic growth and management direction pertaining to its various businesses, products and services. Business strategies, on the other hand, are established at the divisional levels and typically focus on enhancing the strategic business unit’s competitive position in its industry. Functional strategies aim to maximize resource productivity and are typically set by functional departments within each SBU to improve competencies and performance. The profitability of a company depends on three primary factors which include theContinue reading
Blue Ocean Strategy – Shift from Red Oceans to Blue Oceans
“Blue Ocean Strategy” by W. Chan Kim and Renee Mauborgne is a strategy that challenges companies to distance itself away from fierce competition by establishing uncontested market space that makes existing competition irrelevant. One of the reasons why the authors have used the colors red and blue is to describe the market. Red ocean is the market space where industry boundaries are defined and known. The red ocean contains a massive conflict between companies where they are constantly trying to outperform each other to achieve a greater share or demand. When market spaces become crowded with competitors, companies try out perform each other and profits and growth is greatly reduced due to cutthroat style competition which turns the red ocean bloody. In contrast, blue oceans is the unknown market space where it is unaffected by competition and demand is created rather than fought for. In blue oceans, competition is notContinue reading
eGovernment – Definitions and Benefits
EGovernment is one more of the recent years “buzzwords”. It is usually either paired with the word “services” at the end or other words like eGovernance and Digital Government. Like every other (relatively) new and cool “buzzword” they are used widely by a broad spectrum of individuals who represent mostly two different backgrounds. Information technology and politics. The first because it is a technological issue, the later because they have come to realize, even though a little late, that they represent an excellent vehicle for them to provide a better experience to anyone who interacts with the Government. But, what do these terms mean? Do they collide or conflict each other? How about covering or including one another? EGovernment is in the first stages of development. Most governments have already taken or are taking initiatives offering government services online. However, for the true potential of eGovernment to be realized, governmentContinue reading