After reading the concepts and examples of the Arc Initiative and social enterprise, I found it is a great idea to have increasing number of people getting interested in those activities.

“Social entrepreneurs are society’s change agents, creators of innovations that disrupt the status quo and transform our world. By identifying the people and programs already bringing positive change, we empower them to extend their reach, deepen their impact and fundamentally improve society.”

From the website, I saw this description about social enterprise, and some people like Marie Teresa Leal and Inderjit Khurana, or Jim Fruchterman, John Wood, all of them are passionate about donating themselves to saving other people who are in hopeless condition, or people who are living with no hope at all. They are struggling to do what they are doing although they rare to see in the history; their spirit and impacts are much huger than people think by themselves.

Actually, the big environment for social enterprise is not ripe enough. Some people are ambitious enough, and they social value instead of wealth, but “a successful social entrepreneur”. Also, they have some similar properties like must be strategic, resourceful, and results oriented, which means they see what others cannot see, using limited resources to help as many people as they could, and unlocking society’s potential to effect social change.

From information above, I realized social entrepreneur has a great responsibility to the whole society, not only for their own interests, but also engaging everyone walking on a right way to higher stand of life.

Reference:

http://skollworldforum.org/about/what-is-social-entrepreneurship/

I see one news that interests me from abcNews blog website, which is an external blog review. It says that the quality of gift toys by McDonalds. “McDonald’s is recalling a Hello Kitty-themed whistle given to children in Happy Meals, citing a chance they could choke on some of its parts.” Two children were found in great danger because of breathing in little segments of toy, which attracts medical attention at the end. Now consumers should return the whistle to any McDonald’s for a free replacement toy, including “about 2.3 million of these whistles in the U.S. and 200,000 in Canada from October through November in Happy Meals and Mighty Kids Meals.”

Based on this, my attention is put more on the outcome of this recalling thing. McDonald’s is a well-known fast food store, having millions of branches all over the world, and this might be a big obstacle for them to overcome. This accident hurts mostly the North American area, and children are the target damaged group—their parents must be angry with that, although it does not influence that badly. But there is another outcome, which is that this will not hurt this brand at all because McDonald’s is so powerful that they will not let people lose confidence to this company. Actually, two outcomes are based on the attitude the company gave to this accident—we can regard this as one good example to solving emergency problem while doing business, which interests me the most.

Reference:

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/mcdonalds-recalls-happy-meal-toy-choking-risk-26814833

Today I read a piece of news talking about Amazon launching a speaker people can talk to, which is something like Siri on an Apple iPhone. For example, you can give commands such as “play music by Bruno Mars” or “add gelato to my shopping list”. This speaker will run on Amazon Web Services, “continually learns a user’s speech patterns and preferences.” What’s more, it seems that Amazon has had an unusually busy year, “developing a mobile phone, video productions and grocery deliveries”. “Last month, the company forecast sales for the crucial holiday quarter that disappointed Wall Street and investors who are eager to see Amazon curtail its ambitions and start delivering sustainable profits.”

While talking about several similar products, there is a terminology word should be mentioned: product differentiation. Comparing and contrasting two products: Amazon Echo and Siri, their functions are nearly the same: people need to speak “Alexa” to start using Amazon Echo, while people say “Siri”; also, both of them can record what people want and need as they like, which is one convenient way to promote people’s life standard.

However, two products are from two different companies, and their fates are different refer to this unique reason. More people would like to use their smartphones more than Amazon, which hears bitter but that is true—it is good for Amazon to concentrate more on technological development, but I think the company should pay attention on what they really good at and how they could do to proof that, and that would be much better than struggling for one thing that might have nothing feedback.

Reference:

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/amazon-launches-a-speaker-you-can-talk-to/ar-BBdm1tn

I read one article talking about show business, which is written by my professor from Comm 101 Section 107, Paul Cubbon, and he told a true story about a graduate student named Sean Clark, from Sauder Business school of UBC. He made excellent achievements, who is a real successful entrepreneur, on making footwear online. That sounds not fun but he did a good job to connect customers with companies directly.

At the beginning, Sean just quit his last well-paid job and start to think about opening a Canadian-based online store since once his wife asked him to take shoes that ordered online but cannot be delivered to Canada. That is a great inspiration, which led him to startup his own business. There are not many stores that want to work with him actually, but as time passed, businessmen realized the importance of the connection with consumers, and an increasing number of brands come and join Sean’s online-service company.

I think this is a great example that shows the necessary of connecting and communicating with customers while dealing with business. Sean is a person with a clear mind, which perceived the chance of making brands working together via the same channel—internet—to deliver products directly to consumers when the environment is ripe enough. As time goes by, more and more people would rely on this channel to buy goods online, and the online company will be more prosperous because of more customers.

References:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/small-business/sb-marketing/customer-service/shoe-retailer-was-born-after-zappos-left-canada/article19765911/

I found a good article written by Jordan Andrew, which is about the acquisition between Facebook and What’sApp. In the blog, Jordan said at the beginning, Blackberry is well known because of its unique massage system: people could text message each other instantly between two Blackberry smartphones. However, people start to realize what if they do not use a Blackberry phone? Then some businessmen found how about connecting Facebook with What’sApp, which can make more people use both apps at the same time because there are a large number of people who are using Facebook already, and what they do is to charge the product differentiation, and then made a win-win business.

I think Jordan’s opinion is alternative, and what I regard this type of reaction is like chasing chances. For every business, the most important thing is to know what they should do and how to achieve that. Therefore, having a good version is the most critical thing in their life career. It is successful for Facebook manager to deceive the opportunity of newer and wider market, and the target is more likely expanded to normal people, not only youths and businessmen need them now, but also some workers and teachers can use them to do what they really want, and that would be much more convenient than before. To sum up, it is a good thing to see acquisition happening on Facebook and What’sApp, which brings people more benefits.

References:

Jordan Andrews’ Blog: http://blogs.ubc.ca/jordanandrews/

http://blogs.ubc.ca/jordanandrews/2014/10/23/facebook-acquisition-of-whatsapp/

After reading Ayesha Hasan’s blog post about Staples, I also found the importance of relationship between business and customers. Just like what Ayesha said in the blog, when 15 of 33+ Staples retail stores closed in Canada, borders are broken; businessmen more and more concentrate on online shopping, so they give up opening a local store, instead, they would like to sell their products using internet and logistics corridor. However, obviously, it is harder for companies to communicate with customers than before.

Apparently, customer is the main goal for every type of business, so the relationship between suppliers and consumers is needed to be fixed tightly. If a company needs to be more likely to be chosen by customers, it should have a good relationship which connects it with other consumers. Actually demanders also need the process of fixing relationship with companies, which can bring them more benefits.

What’s more, businessmen need to solve one problem, like Ayesha stated, how can them balance between local stores and online stores? One interesting question. In my opinion, people would like to choose some regional products like specialties of other areas; and they would like to choose some life essentials like laundry detergents in a local store. It is hard for a company to decide what to sell and how to sell products or services, and to keep a good connection with customers, they need to understand what people really need, and how they will do to satisfy their wants.

Links:

http://blogs.ubc.ca/ayeshahasan/

http://blogs.ubc.ca/ayeshahasan/2014/10/05/staples-online-shopping/

Today I would like to talk about marketing, which is one important part of doing business. Marketing is the process of communicating the value of a product or service to customers, for the purpose of selling that product or service. In my words, I think marketing is an activity happening while creating, communicating, spreading, and exchanging products, which provides profit to customers, consumers, working partners, even the whole society.

I would like to talk about one piece of news relating to marketing.

Recently, food industry like milk and dairy is hurt due to bad quality, including the frequent occurrence of various trades before the product safety issue. Unfortunately, especially in China, due to the rapid economic increase in the past 30 years, the quality of goods cannot be absolutely perfect.

Events like this always happen, and they truly hurt company’s brand and reputation. While doing marketing, consumers’ opinions will change over time and happening accidents, then change their decisions about buying products from which company. However, after analyzing, it seems not a bad thing for a long-run period. “Crisis will enable enterprises to develop higher product quality standards”, which means when the company meets some trouble, it will try their best to get it over, and the products in the future will be much better than now, which can be regarded as one benefit to consumers.

References:

https://www.boundless.com/marketing/textbooks/boundless-marketing-textbook/an-overview-of-marketing-1/introduction-to-marketing-18/defining-marketing-106-6816/

http://news.frbiz.com/the_next_step_in_business_communication-390142.html

While talking about First Nations, I feel pretty familiar with this topic because I have thought about it since I was in high school. It has been a long time for people to consider this problem because we cannot find a right way to solve this until now. In the past, First Nation people really suffered pain of losing their own culture and festivals, which are the soul of themselves; however, due to the assimilation, they have to abandon it. What’s more, their children had been treated unfairly, after reading the article introducing the background of First Nations, I was shocked and sad about what they faced in the past.

Fortunately, the government realized what they did making the society even worse than before, so they chose to publish the Indian Act, but it is still unfair to aboriginal people. Problem came again, how to clear and solve the problem perfectly? Then the government provides a new Act called the First Nations Land Management Act to give confidence about keeping their reserves, which means the government will not interfere their life including using their land. Time goes by, the problem is still here that nobody could solve it our appropriately.

Actually, I think the First Nations are supposed to be benefited by the government because they have endured so much pain in the past, and the government has done what they could do to change their opinions, to make them confident about their future. The land seems to be the biggest problem, and it will be the most important thing they are going to solve in the future.

One important thing that should be mentioned is about the economy of  the reserve. The First Nation still rely on producing some raw materials like cutting trees and hunting wild animals, and that is not efficient at all. What’s more important, they need to trade with others to make money so that they can survive, and the Canadian government is the most powerful strength that can provide help. In my opinion, ss time goes by, the First Nations would like to believe in the government so that they can make great progress together one day.

References:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/background-the-indian-act-1.1056988

http://www.vancouversun.com/news/metro/Unilateral+park+declared+Tsilhqot+includes+Prosperity+mine/10192766/story.html

I read an article named “How to select a tax professional for your small business” from Entrepreneur website. It explains clearly how important accounting is while running companies, “If you own a business, it is critical to find a tax preparer who understands the tax implications of owning a small business as well as your particular needs in order to establish a beneficial relationship.” For every company, we need people to calculate a lot of stuff like current assets and fixed assets, and how much profit we can make, and how much we might lose. It is also important to know tax preparers’ backgrounds: “How long have they been in the business? Lived in the area? Do they stay in a community for a long period of time? Are they involved? What do their references have to say?”

References:

Needles, Belverd E.; Powers, Marian (2013). Principles of Financial Accounting. Financial Accounting Series (12 ed.). Cengage Learning.

Accounting Research Bulletins No. 7 Reports of Committee on Terminology (Report). Committee on Accounting Procedure, American Institute of Accountants. November 1940. Retrieved December 31, 2013.

https://adminet.uchicago.edu/fasmanual/docs/9.a.0.shtml

http://www.entrepreneur.com/article/237850