When I read my friend Max Rosenblatt-Hood’s blog about using video games in management, I agreed his ideas about using video games and giving immediate feedbacks, making simple and boring tasks more fun is an effective way of management.

However, I don’t agree with his statement that say some employees can find it patronizing because they get points and achievements. Every employee gets some sort of feedback from their managers. Sooner or later, frequently or rarely, it’s going to happen. Why not make it in a more informal way so the message is sent, but no feelings are hurt. Instead of talking to your employees once in a year and criticizing them, giving them more frequent and less formal feedbacks can be more efficient.

Of course, this can not be done in every company, but the companies that has the flexibility can benefit from this idea, and create a warmer organizational culture.

Link to Max Rosenblatt-Hood’s blog: https://blogs.ubc.ca/maximus/2012/11/18/video-games-in-management/

Blackberry and Iphone competition is pretty interesting

The concept of smartphone was introduced just when I started highschool. The years that teenagers keep bragging about their phones and always buy the newest versions. I was never that kind of a person, but I used both a blackberry and an Iphone. (I only had one of each though but still..) I remember when people went crazy about Iphone 3. Although I personally didn’t know about Blackberry that time, the chart above shows that Blackberry had a bigger demand than Iphone until 2008, the year Iphone 3G was introduced.

After that, for a short period, everybody around me had an Iphone. They started calling their phones Iphones instead of phone or cellphones. (For example when they took a picture they were saying “I took this through my iphone”) Although Iphone was a much qualified phone in my opinion, for most of the teenagers, free and unlimited texting was more important and this desired was satisfied by “BBM” the Blackberry Messenger.

A Blackberry Mania started at the end of 2009, and all of my friends switched to Blackberries. We were able to text freely all the time and it was like a heaven for all teenagers, including me.

In 2008, when I went out with my friends, I noticed that the tables were full of Iphone’s. In the year 2010, the tables were more welcoming to blackberries, and the people with Iphone’s were being made fun of.

This shows that RIM noticed the needs of teenagers and produced exactly what they wanted, but the years later brought whinings and complaints about blackberries. They kept freezing for no reason and the introduction of new apple product iphone 4G and then 4S, put Aplle in the leading position again.

Now it is really hard to see people buying blackberries, especially after the Iphone 5. I’ve been hearing that 5 was a dissapointment, so maybe Blackbery can again make a move and take the bigger pie out of the cake. But ops! What about Samsung(!)

I think we migh have a new winner soon…

Images taken from:

http://www.ceprobot.com/android-cep-uygulamalari/android-sistem-modifikasyon-ve-romlar/3041-samsung-galaxy-s-plus-deger-paketi-guncellemesi-nceleme.html

iPhone vs BlackBerry

http://www.arasindakifarklar.com/2012/01/iphone-ve-blackberry-arasindaki-farklar/

How significant is your mother’s surname before marriage?

Seth Godin’s blog about customer service is a very elaborate explanation of what people expect from a customer service respresentative. These days, most of the customer services keep asking irrelevant questions until they answer your one very simple question. This always frustrates the customer and a company would never want that.

In our comm101 class, we talked about this issue and listened to a customer and a representative’s conversation. The customer just asked how to turn his computer off and it took more than 5 or 6 minutes for him to get an answer, and the answer was “hold the shut down button for 8 seconds”

Why do they have to ask your mother’s surname before marriage to answer a simple question like this? Or is it really important for them to know your adrees and postal code? If you want to cancel your credit card, the answer is yes but the answer is a big NO if the question is “How am I going to turn this pc off?”

If you want to make your customer happy be fast, be concise, and ask significant questions related to the consumer’s problems. You don’t want your customers to look like this;

Link to Seth Godin’s Blog: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2012/10/the-only-purpose-of-customer-service.html

Image taken from:

http://www.news.com.au/business/telecommunications-regulator-tackles-telcos-over-poor-service/story-e6frfm1i-1225914576084

Technology is being developed for the enviroment, but do consumers always care about the enviroment rather than money?

Hybrid cars are basically cars that work with two types of engines at the same time, one electrical and one with gasoline. Hybrid cars also differentiate between them, but in the long run all of them aim to pollute the air less. The first models of hybrid cars were not as succesfull, but it was a good beginning. Toyota Prius, the model that led hybrid car technology for a long time, was designed with a normal engine and an electrical engine assisting it, so it wasn’t as efficient as the modern ones but clearly a leading model for the newest technologies.

New Honda Civic’s price is about $ 16.000

New Honda Civic Hybrid’s price is around $ 24.000

Now the hybrid cars can add up to 20-30 miles per gallon, but the prices are significantly expensive due to the high costs of production. Since these cars are aiming to help the enviroment, government should subsidize these car companies in some way, for example taxes, and help them to decrease the prices so that the consumers will have more reasons to choose a hybrid car. It is not fair to charge consumers more to help the enviroment since most people would care more about their savings rather than the air pollution.

It is true that in “some” models, the gasoline consumption is significantly less so in the long run it is an advantage for the consumer, but if a person spends $250 for gasoline monthly and if hybrid cars make them save up to $100 per month, covering $8000 will take almost 5 years, so it is not an attractive deal always.

Bibliography:

“Hibrid Otomobil Nedir Nasil Calisir Avantajlari Nedir | TeknoSeyir.” TeknoSeyir. Web. 19 Nov. 2012. <http://www.teknoseyir.com/31887/hibrid-otomobil-nedir-nasil-calisir-avantajlari-nedir/>.

Alkan, Hakki, Mr. “Toyota Prius Hybrid O–zellikleri, Fiyati, Resimleri.” ShiftDelete.Net. Web. 19 Nov. 2012. <http://shiftdelete.net/toyota-prius-hybrid-ozellikleri-fiyati-resimleri-24923.html>.

Nice, Karim, Mr, and Julia Layton, Ms. “How Hybrid Cars Work.” HowStuffWorks. Web. 19 Nov. 2012. <http://www.howstuffworks.com/hybrid-car.htm>.

Image taken from:

http://www.drive.com.au/Editorial/ArticleDetail.aspx?ArticleID=53482