A dynamic capability refers to company’s ability to integrate, build and transform internal and external competencies. They can help an organization to achieve innovative forms of competitive advantage through integration, building and transformation of internal and external competencies, as to respond to changes in the environment. This management theory was defined by David Teece, Gary Pisano, and Amy Shuen in their 1997 paper Dynamic Capabilities and Strategic Management. In the context of achieving organizational change, aligned to the external pressure: namely, these capabilities are perceived as business processes that use resources – specifically the processes of integration, restructuring, acquisition and release resources – to adapt or create market changes. Dynamic capabilities are especially helpful in explaining the sources of competitive advantage in extremely volatile markets.

Dynamic capabilities are determined by organizational and managerial processes, positions and paths. The organizational and managerial processes refer to the routines, i.e. current practices in an organization, such as coordination, integration, learning, transformation, etc. This is especially important, since most organizations engage in repetitive processes, such as production and/or service delivery, which require standardized performance of specialized tasks, in order to achieve adequate performance. Routines have developed over time and, at the moment of analyzing an organization, they represent successful solutions to common problems.

Organizational knowledge, accumulated through learning activities, results in new routines, which can, nevertheless, be shaped by future decisions and development directions. In the dynamic capability perspective, the strategic alternatives available to an organization are referred to as paths.… Read the rest

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After two years, Nick Leeson moved to Morgan Stanley, one of the US investment bank. Nick Leeson be a settlements clerk at that bank. Nick Leeson can absorb more knowledge about new derivatives market from that bank. In 1989, Nick Leeson was applying a for job at Baring Securities due to his own knowledge with trading in Japan, that time Nick Leeson was 22 years old . In the same year, the Bank just begin to trade Japanese Futures and options.

Nick Leeson was lucky, he had a chance to overcome severe settlement problems in Jakarta Indonesia because Ian Martin, the finance director was appointed him and give him a chance to settle this problem. That time Baring Securities scared their losses running into million and million and sent out four-man team to settle this problem. One of the member in Four-man team was Lisa, Lisa become Nick Leeson wife at 1992. That time, Nick Leeson feels unsatisfied that he need spending whole life in sorting out share certificates.… Read the rest

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Strategy development is a crucial step in attaining competitive advantage but a strategy is only as successful as its implementation. The process of leveraging core competencies therefore is vital and requires careful consideration since it forms the basis of implementation.

Identifying Core Competencies

Formulating strategies is a cyclical process in which an internal analysis of an organisation plays a crucial part. This analytical process involves taking a theoretical approach known as a resource-based view in which an organisation objectively looks at all its resources and capabilities to see how best they can give an organisation competitive advantage. An organisation’s resources can be tangible, intangible or human and that these can be matched to its capabilities to eventually provide competitive advantage. This process of exploiting the unique combination of resources and capabilities has given rise to the term of core competencies which have been defined as the ability of an organisation to coordinate all its technologies and production skills in order to deliver its strategy.… Read the rest

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Although people often mix up replacement planning and succession planning, the latter goes beyond former planning because its focus is larger than one position or department. While often related to planning for senior executive replacements only, it is really broader than that can extend as far down the organization chart as managers want to go. It also differs from replacement planning because successors are considered by level on the organization chart. A talent pool is identified based on each level of management and a typical goal is to prepare as many successors as possible to be 80 percent ready for promotion to any position at the next level on the organization chart. The remaining 20 percent of development is provided when individuals have been promoted to higher level responsibility.

Succession planning is usually based on the assumptions that:

1. A goal is to identify a talent pool of many people who are willing to be considered for promotion and work to be developed for it.

… Read the rest

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Is Workplace Flexibility the ‘Solution’ to Work-Life Balance Problems?

In the context of human resource management, workplace flexibility refers to the ability of an organization to adapt according to its various human resource needs. In the contemporary business organization, there are four main sources of workplace flexibility. Functional flexibility refers to employees being multi skilled and able to undertake a range of tasks, thereby making the organization immune to the absence of any key person in the workforce because his duties can be delegated to someone else. Numerical flexibility is more a short term approach that enables management to increase or decrease the workforce strength depending on the requirement. Temporal flexibility requires changing patterns of hours that are worked and wage flexibility refers to using a non-standardized pay structure, such as performance related pay.… Read the rest

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For example, long hours at work and increased work intensity both contribute to adverse physical and psychological conditions and lead to negative family functioning. Workplace stress can be caused by long working hours, excessive workloads, weekend duties, inadequate physical activity and an unhealthy lifestyle. All these lead to a reduction in the quality of health. When employees are severely overworked and excessively strained, they experience symptoms of fatigue, depression, musculo-skeletal pains, sleeping disorders and an increase in chronic diseases. When the situation becomes too stressful, employees leave their jobs, even opting for those that pay far less but involve less stress.

If workplace stress is prolonged, it leads to burnout. The psychological dimensions of job burnout consisted of three components namely emotional exhaustion, de-personalization and diminished personal accomplishment. Burnout is potentially fatal as it increases the risk of coronary diseases, stroke and suicidal tendencies. Employees who lack time to spend with their family or maintain a social life are more likely to be emotionally exhausted, which impact negatively on their job satisfaction and eventually cause them to leave their organizations.

Also, employees quit their jobs because of dissatisfaction.… Read the rest

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Many reasons are cited for the introduction of work-life balance programs at the workplace, the most common being that it increases productivity as well as employee loyalty. While these are all valid justifications, the costs of having work-life balance programs should not be ignored. Therefore, do the benefits of work-life balance programs outweigh the costs? Going further, should these programs be considered a cost or an investment to the firm?

While it may be easier to estimate the returns on investment of a project, it is difficult to financially quantify the impact of work-life balance programs. Thus, companies have to resort to a series of performance measurement tools that are indirectly related to financial return. The best performance indicators are in terms of human resource management. One of the benefits of work-life balance programs can be seen through recruitment. Successful work-life balance programs are powerful marketing tools for attracting new employees who are drawn to the company not just for good remuneration, but other perks too.

Work-life balance programs also help to create a better relationship between employer and employee that can be mutually beneficial.… Read the rest

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In 21st century, life is increasingly difficult with people managing multiple roles. Therefore, they will only stay with a job that offers flexibility. Different people have a different satisfactory balance, but most of the people results from combination of different aspects. The first aspect is the time balance which concerns the amount of time they have to work or the time they do not have to work. The second aspect is involvement balance which means the level of psychological participation or obligation to work and also the level of control on the work whether when and how they will do it. The third aspect is the satisfaction balance which is the level of satisfaction and value on the works given to them.

It is important for a company to provide work-life balance because it ensures employees are highly effective and motivated while they are on the job.… Read the rest

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During the last decade technological revolution has stormed all aspects of life and there were different debates about the future of work. Different scenarios predicted a rising trend in un-employment and economic insecurity. Industrial restructuring and emergence of latest technology no only affected the importance of workforce but it was also felt that employees will be treated as superfluous overheads.

History of Work-Life Balance

In 1986, the term “Work-Life Balance” was first identified, but it’s usage in everyday language was still sporadic for a certain number of years. Although, interestingly work-life programs existed in early years such as 1930, but people did not recognize them. Before the Second World War, the W.K. Kellogg Company created some flexible work hour shifts for their employees who replaced the traditional daily working hours, and the new shift resulted in increased employee efficiency and morale. In 1977, Rosabeth Moss Kanter, for the first time in his influential book, Work and Family in the United States: A Critical Review and Agenda for Research and Policy, raised the issue of Work-Life Balance and brought it to the forefront of organizations and research. This concept forces organizations to follow work-family friendly environment.… Read the rest

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Benefits of Innovation in Teams

Nurturing innovation in a team also has great benefits on not only the team members but also to the organization as a whole. This includes:

• The organization benefits greatly by being the first organization to take a product or service to the market before any of their competitors.
• Innovation gives the organization an edge over its competition. By being the first organization to take a new product or service to the market the organization gains a large market share.
• Due to having a large market share and increased team productivity the organization benefits by the increase of profit margins. This in turn increases the share price of the organization.
• Innovation also leads to increase in shareholder dividends due to the increased profit margins of the company.
• Innovation will increase the overall production of the organization by having a highly motivated team.

Nurturing innovation in teams has great benefits. They are:

1. Nurturing innovation increases curiosity in the team. Curiosity leads to the team trying out new ideas and concepts.

… Read the rest

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For obvious reasons nepotism is common in family owned businesses and this can be viewed in the more positive terms. Nepotism in family owned businesses can result in continuity in that the business will be passed on from generation to generation and this means that the profit will stay within the family and will be inherited by family members.… Read the rest

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Supplier chain relationship was considered to be one of the important factors in most business, since it can influence the potential of supply chain concept. Now, the modern business seems to be more complex with high competition. Due to the information has more valuable in the supply chain management, firms then need to re-design the ways of managing and sharing information among each others. Organizations cannot independently run the business by themselves. Not only good relationship can help companies to have more competitive advantage to survive in the market, but it can also help companies expands the market too.

Supplier Relationship Management (SRM) is not the new concept used in today supply chain management, but was recently exploited in order to increase benefits across the supply chain. SRM has now become one of the key factors that influence the supply chain. In the future, SRM will not just only an option for firms, but it will be one of business fundamentals, which firms need.

The Growing Importance of Supplier Relationship Management (SRM)

Business has changed many times in the last decade. Only making and selling are not enough for firms to survive in current business. Since we now live in the age of information, information then becomes the important factor in supply chain management.… Read the rest

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However, if you want some additional lifestyle benefits from your card, your best bet is to invest in the Best Premium Credit Card in India. Not only do such cards offer benefits that are above and beyond those offered by regular cards, such as Lounge Access at Airports, but also entitle you to exciting redemption alternatives which can help enhance the quality of your lifestyle!

Let us take a quick look at some of the leading premium credit cards available in India:

SBI Card ELITE

One of the most sought after SBI Credit Cards, the SBI Card Elite has been meticulously drafted to offer premium privileges on categories such as entertainment, fine dining, travelling and high-end shopping with dedicated offers of lifestyle brands such as Marks & Spencer, Shopper Stop, etc. Some of the noteworthy features of this card are –

• Welcome Bonus – Gift voucher worth Rs. 5,000, from popular brands
• 10 points for every Rs. 100 spent towards dining, movies, department stores, and groceries
• 2 points for every Rs. 100 spent on other retail spends
• An incredibly low mark-up of 1.99% on international transactions

• Free movie tickets worth Rs.6,000 every year
• Bonus reward points of up to 50,000 per year
• Free access to 6 international and 2 domestic airport lounges every year
• Complimentary membership to Club Vistara
• Complimentary membership to Trident Privilege Program
• Rewards Redemption – Use your reward points to pay your outstanding amount, wherein 4 Reward Points equal Re.

… Read the rest

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With the increasing pace of commercialization of economy, international and domestic market environment has changed dramatically-the termination of seller’s market and shortage economy, the arrival of buyer’s market and surplus economy. Consumers have become the leading role within transaction relationship. Companies must spare no efforts to please consumers, provide consumers with satisfactory products. Nowadays, concerning corporate marketing concept, there are customer centric and market driven.

Customer centric refers that the enterprise takes the fulfillment of customer demands and the increase of customer value as business starting point. It stressed that the organization should avoid separating the actual demand from customers and subjective assumptions of the market. A customer-centric approach can add value to a company by differentiating themselves from competitors who do not offer the same experience. In essence, customer centric means the modern marketing concept that build a long-term and stable business relationship through provide customers more value and improve customer satisfaction. Customer centric is a marketing philosophy which regards customer-oriented needs and desires as its direction.

The concept of market driven is defined through three dimensions: customer demand for current and future generation of market intelligence; market information dissemination in the organization; organization of the market intelligence activities and responses. In order to maximize long-term achievements, enterprises must establish and maintain long-term mutually beneficial relationship between customers. The concept of market-driven is based on customer centric and supplemented by competitor orientation. Company applying market-driven always fully satisfies customer demand and pays close attention to changes in competitive environment. From the perspective of competitive advantage, market driven is the organizational culture which can reach this relationship most effectively.

… Read the rest

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Defining Marketing Myopia

‘Marketing myopia’ is a term made up of two words: Marketing and Myopia which is used to describe the short sighted (myopic) approach adopted by organizations which often leads to their premature decay. The term was coined by ‘Theodore Levitt’ in a paper which was published in the Harvard Business Review in the year 1960. This paper has been regarded by several industry experts as a revelation for the modern marketing era. It has set aside most of the myths and has proposed a visual modality for the modern day CEO and is being successfully implemented by most of the biggest corporate houses in existence today.

His theory suggests that “most of the industries are restricted in their thought process and implementation of their future endeavors”. He felt that the world was living in the ‘selling concept’, where the objective was to follow a push model instead of a pull model thereby forcing the customer to buy whatever you produce.… Read the rest

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Service sector in post industrial economies is facing unprecedented changes. Service marketing in 21st century is all about achieving return on investment (ROI) and relationship (ROR), retaining customer and increasing customer lifetime value. The changing role of marketing in service sector demands efficient and effective management of customers, channels, markets and profit in order to evade commoditization and low margins. Three core trends that have resulted in changing role of service marketing are: the increasing importance of technological mediation; changing consumer and professional role; and decreasing importance of relational factors in consumer decision making. These trends pose fundamental challenge to service marketers to design business strategies that integrates such dynamic changes in business environment.

10 Trends identified in the Service Sector in 21st Century

1. Personalization: The new service marketers are designing marketing strategies that favors engagement of human in delivering a service in order to build relationship factor. However, with increasing use of technology the human factor is placed less importance.

… Read the rest

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Emotional Quotient (EQ)

EQ is a measure of one’s emotional intelligence, as defined by the ability to use both emotional and cognitive thought. Emotional intelligence skills include but are not limited to empathy, intuition, creativity, flexibility, resilience, stress management, leadership, integrity, authenticity, intrapersonal skills and interpersonal skills. It involves the lower and central sections of the brain, called the limbic system.… Read the rest

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Throughout Caruso and Salovey’s descriptions of the six challenges, they cited a connection with Kouzes and Posner’s Effective Leadership Practices Model.

1. Building effective teams

The first challenge was building an effective team. Caruso and Salovey discussed the need for clarifying personal values before attempting to formulate team values. Like Kouzes and Posner’s model, Caruso and Salovey explained that leaders must identify their own values before clarifying team values. A significant level of trust is important for leading teams, and a leader must generate positive opportunities for meaningful team communication and interaction. Additionally, a leader must have significant self-confidence to give team members credit for accomplishments and not blame them when shortfalls occur.

2. Planning and deciding effectively

Caruso and Salovey went on to explain that even though planning and decision-making can seem cognitive and practical, emotions contribute significantly to these activities. Emotionally intelligent leaders possess the ability to remain flexible and open to other alternatives. Additionally, EI leaders take into account how their team members may react to a decision, and then attempt to make decisions that will fit in with the shared values of the team. In the end, this type of flexible decision-making will contribute to the successful implementation of the decision.… Read the rest

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The Kouzes and Posner’s Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership Model has been noted for its contributions to the Relational Leadership paradigm. Kouzes and Posner (1987) conducted research in the area of “personal best” leadership experiences. They developed a “Personal-Best Leadership Experience” questionnaire, asked thousands of managers to complete the questionnaire, and conducted many follow-up interviews to gather additional information. The personal-best questionnaire asked managers to pick a project, program, or event that they characterized as their “personal-best” leadership experience. After analyzing the data collected from questionnaires and interviews, Kouzes and Posner found that despite the variety in situations and types of leadership experiences, similar patterns were identified related to actions taken by the leaders during the experience. Through the analysis process they identified “Five Practices of Exemplary Leadership” that contributed to “getting extraordinary things done in organizations”:

1. Modeling the Way,
2. Inspiring a Shared Vision,
3. Challenging the Process,
4. Enabling Others to Act and
5. Encouraging the Heart.

The first practice is “Modeling the Way,” in which leaders role model the behaviors they want the see in their constituents. Through action and involvement, leaders earn the right to lead and the respect of their followers.

The second leadership practice is “Inspiring a Shared Vision.” This is when the leader imagines what the organization could be and then creates a vision that is attainable and attractive.… Read the rest

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Emotional intelligence to a larger extent involves “emotional empathy” which is the ability to concentrate on one’s emotions and recognize mood both of themselves and others. It further describes how well one is able to adapt to various life challenges like stress and difficult incidences. It also involves the ability balance “honest expression of emotions against courtesy, consideration and respect”. This would obviously involve possession of some level of good social and communication skills.

Read More:

• Introduction to Emotional Intelligence
• Four Components of Emotional Intelligence
• Domains of Emotional Intelligence
• Four Branch Model of Emotional Intelligence

Emotional intelligence is often times measured using the Emotional Intelligence quotient (EQ) which is more of a description of the capacity or ability to perceive, then assess and eventually manage one’s own and others emotions, To date there are mainly three emotional intelligence models which include:

1. Emotional intelligence Model based on Trait
2. Emotional Models based on Ability
3. Emotional intelligence from Mixed models

1. The Trait Emotional Intelligence Model

Trait emotional intelligence or Trait emotional self efficacy refers to a constellation or behavior dispositions and self-perceptions regarding a persons ability to recognize, process and utilize emotional-laden information” where the trait emotional intelligence should be measured within the framework of an individuals personality.… Read the rest

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