Thoughts – W.Z.

– respond to ‘If  the United Nations was fully funded why would we need the Arc or social enterprise?’

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Poverty in developing countries was once dealt with fund raising done by United Nations, but due to the emergence of more poverty and the inefficiency of funds, this method is no longer useful. What really helps is a group of organizations called ‘social enterprises’, which aim at creating opportunities for hopeless people, and thus solve global problems, whereas generating profits (money) is not the ultimate goal. The Arc Initiative, which can be considered as a social enterprise, is consist of a group of people, who ‘seeks to build a bridge that facilitates a genuine two-way exchange of knowledge and business skills’. Until now, the Arc Initiative has successfully helped a lot of small businesses that were faced with challenges.

Social enterprises, such as the Arc, are more effective in helping small businesses than fund does. This is because when the United Nations offer small businesses with funds, it only helps them in the short run, because they don’t really know how to manage and then generate more money from the funds they are given. However, things are different when it comes to the Arc. What the Arc does is actually teaching small-business entrepreneurs useful business skills, so that they can make good use of the funds. In this way, they can succeed not only in the short run, but in the long run instead.

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Nathaniel Koloc’s blog, Let Employees Choose When, Where, and How to Work, reminds me of the idea, Human Resource Management, which we learned in class 19. In Nathaniel’s blog, he indicates that both employees and company itself can benefit from giving employees the chance of deciding when, where, and how they want to work, and he includes some data to support this as well. I totally appreciate this idea.

Both class notes and this blog are more focused on the benefits that the companies get from implementing this idea. This blog actually makes me think deeper into the reason why productivity of workers increases after they are offered the freedom of choice:

Basically, this policy shows the employers’ respect and appreciation to the employees, thus the employees have more sense of self-satisfaction when they work, and this can actually contribute to the efficiency of their work. Besides, more freedom also means more responsibilities over the tasks they are assigned, and it is very likely that they finish the work exceed expectations.

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While reading classmates’ blogs, ShangYu (Angela) Liu’s blog about ‘Windowless Airplanes’ really catches my attention. In her blog, she talks about the idea of an innovative airplane that is ‘windowless’, and relates this idea to the concept of sustainability that we learned in class. I agree with her that this innovation is socially, environmentally, and economically sustainable, and thus beneficial to all of us. In addition to this, windowless airplane also reminds me of PEST – external macro-economic factors that can affect business.

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In my point of view, this is an excellent example where technology affects business in the positive aspect. This is because technological developments give airplanes this chance of being ‘thinner, more lightweight, and stronger’ as mentioned in the article. Besides, the screen, which is used to displace the windows of the airplanes, uses the technology called ‘OLED’, and organic materials are used in this technology. This is another reason why windowless airplanes can be considered as environmental friendly, since organic materials contribute to the reduction of the emission of carbon dioxide, and they can be recycled after being used.

In the case of windowless airplanes, and according to PEST, technology has a positive impact on the industry.

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In Sofia Bautista’s blog about in-store and online shopping, she relates these two kinds of shopping to the idea of ‘disruptive innovation’. ‘Disruptive innovation‘ is the idea that new entrants in an industry gradually take the place of those already-exist competitors. In Sofia’s blog, she states that ‘there is still much value in shopping in-stores’, and thus in-stores shopping cannot be easily displaced by online shopping. I agree with her.

Online shopping, as a product of the rapidly developing internet, does provide consumers with a lot of convenience. However, in-stores shopping is still irreplaceable for some reasons: for example, there is still a big portion of consumers who concern about the safety of online shopping, and in-store shopping with friends or family is always a good way of enhancing relationships, etc.

Besides, for a disruptive innovator to successfully displace an already-exist competitor, it’s necessary that the already-exist one ‘opens the door to’ disruptive innovators, but as we all know, retailers didn’t give online shopping this chance. And the only difference between online and in-store shopping is the indoor shopping and delivery service. Thus, these two kinds of shopping are not in conflict; they can both exist without displacing one another.

Recently, people in Vancouver, BC are more actively involved in the idea called ‘home exchange’, and BC has became the province where home exchange was the most popular in Canada, because of the perfect skiing site and natural scenery (snowbirds) here in Whistler, BC.

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The article mentions that Home Exchange‘s ‘target segment’ in BC is ski, and this reminds me of the idea of positioning in marketplace. In my point of view, the reason for Home Exchange’s success is that it correctly positions itself in the crowded market of house swapping:

In comparison with Airbnb, Home Exchange positions itself as ‘more trustful’. Customers of Airbnb take part in home exchange activities primarily because of the money they can get from renting out their houses. Sometimes renters even lock parts of their houses just because they don’t trust their ‘tenants’. While in Home Exchange, people do exchange their houses, thus they have trust in each other, which makes home exchanging experiences more realistic.

In comparison with Craigslist, Home Exchange positions itself as providing ‘better global customer support services’ and ‘more flexibility in choices’. This is because customers can get constant inflow of inquiries on Home Exchange website, and this is what Craigslist cannot provide.