Monthly Archives: November 2013

So here I am looking for an external business blog to fulfill my commerce blog requirement for 10% of my grade and I stumble across gold on the Harvard Business Review Blog.

Here are my takeaways based on the characteristics of Chinese consumers:

1) Brand conscious and Price sensitive (seemingly paradoxical)

Solution: Develop brands and products that signal status (goods which can be observed by the public) vs. goods which are used in private

2) Lack of trust in Chinese consumers in Chinese Businesses

Solution: It seems to me that Chinese people have a skewed perception that western civilization is characterized by complete honesty and fair-play, a concept supported by its capitalist nature. Might I also add that it’s difficult for Chinese businesses to play fair if no one else in the environment follows the rules – why should you single your business out to suffer the rightful consequences if no one else is being subjected to them? Hence the numerous scams in China. This vicious cycle doesn’t exist in western civilization because of heavy government regulation: protecting the rights of citizens to own things they produce and buy as well as property rights. In this case, government intervention in the form of reinforcement of laws result in better market outcomes.

If I were to solve this problem in its first stages, I would literally establish a company based in North America targeting markets in China. The only purpose of setting up the enterprise in the US, for the sake of this argument, is to play up to the belief that western companies are so-called “trustworthy”.

3) Investments in Children’s Education

Solution: Since Chinese parents become penny-pinchers on themselves (on average) and big-handed spenders on their kids, it only makes sense to develop products catered toward enriching the lives of their kids – through education which is the most popular.

I heard some very creative ideas in COMM 101 today from my peers who pitched their unique marketable idea in an entrepreneurship exercise. In this post, I’m going to examine in detail the idea that interested me most and project how this idea could take off by using the themes from the Lean Start-Up. As mentioned in Victoria Yang’s blog, the Lean-Start-up is suited to aspiring entrepreneurs because it involves less risk of failure, more flexibility which is easier to achieve in smaller organizations, and just generally searching for a suitable business plan which does not have to be pre-defined. The idea I’m most interested in developing is an app tentatively named: UBC Events. This idea for a smartphone app would collectively display all the current and upcoming events being held or affiliated with UBC along with RVSP and information on how to attend. This app could a pain killer or a vitamin – it serves to eradicate the problem of people who can’t always get enough (if any) information to attend an event they’d be interested in if word never reached them, or it could be enhancing an organized way of being aware of all the recreational activities to connect more social circles in UBC. I’m positive that this idea has great potential as the target market would be the majority of UBC students who own a smartphone (so, almost everyone).

If I were an entrepreneur, I would work with a few buddies closely in the early stages of developing this program to make sure the app is developed as we envisioned – perhaps we could all take up learning programming during our leisure time. In fact, having heard from many classmates through a show of hands after we pitched the idea of this app to peers, they seemed very eager in using a potential app like this and are willing to make a one time payment for using the service when they buy the app. This brief exercise mimics real market research in the Lean Start-Up because it focuses on getting continuous customer feedback on what they’d like to see in the product through its development stages.

Zappos – a 4-million inventory online shoe retailer has reached amazing sales levels. However, this outside success originates from the core of the business and their impressive company culture which leave its employees saying: WOW. I admire Zappos for being able to grasp one of the fundamentals of customer service – that the attitude employees have towards their job will be presented to the customers through communications, specifically phone centres.

What really dazzled me are the measures Zappos has taken to ensure that their employees enjoy their job to the fullest. What with medical and healthcare benefits completely covered, regular company retreats, and even free food offered in the workplace cafeteria, I’m sure that Zappos employees have huge incentives to give maximized levels of productivity through effort back to the company.

That being said, I believe the most unique workings behind the company culture would have to be the employees’ familiarity with CEO Tony Hsieh.

I think it’s incredible that, as an employee at Zappos, I could literally works ‘next’ to the CEO. I mean honestly, he’s working from a workplace cubicle rather than an office behind glass doors. This method clearly enhances the employees relationship with Zappos as it tears away extreme formalities where employees are intimidated by the CEO. This way, employees could express their thoughts toward the bettering of the company directly to the CEO and viable opinions and recommendations could get implemented sooner with increased flexibility. Furthermore, this action promotes team play and encourages employees to participate and contribute to company culture. The benefits work both ways. Mr.Hsieh can observe the conditions of his company hands-on and see exactly how his employees work while playing a part in the lives of employees. Personally, I think it’s very welcoming for the CEO to work in close proximity with workers and that’s definitely a deciding factor in people’s choices of companies to work for.

In our latest class, rewarding employee contributions and cultivating a strong company culture has been an intriguing discussion. Among the companies brought up was: 3M – and more interestingly, their emphasis on employee innovation. It’s always encouraged that companies listen to their employees and maximize their potential by tasking them with the jobs that brings out the most productivity based on assessments of employees’ skills. 3M raises the bar on encouraging employee innovation by making it an actual requirement.

Official sources say that “technical employees are tasked with spending 15% of their time on projects of their own choosing and initiative”. Additionally, they also offer employee grants on promising project ideas voiced through company forums created solely for harvesting innovation. I believe that 3M is straying from conventional methods of cultivating employee innovation by mandating it. Here, they immediately set “innovation” as a criteria for its employees rather than concentrating on novel projects proposed by executives and just setting employees specific tasks to carry out which don’t involve a lot of creativity. What I mean is that the job itself requires “creativity” which is generated on the employee level – as opposed to employees following a company set method to achieving certain goals. This type of requirement really challenges employees to think and take risks which strengthens the connection the employee feels for the job/position. It’s a great deal because employees receive massive financial and social benefits if their inventions begin to take off after being launched in the market. Having opportunities for growth in a job is a key part of employee retention and serves to reduce employee turnover rates. These are valuable traits in the long run as replacing, hiring, and training new employees require further expenses and time, as well as a grace period while the employee begins to familiarize themselves with the job and are not as productive as can be initially. Overall, I applaud 3M’s long standing methodology which maximizes employees’ potential and gives them a chance to share their innovations with the world.