yudanliu'sBlog

The UN is always sufficient in budget and human power. However, if the United Nations was fully funded why would we need the Arc or social enterprise?

During reading the article, I swiftly founded my ideas. The answer to the question above is probably yes. Although the UN is undoubtedly doing impressive job in help and support those areas in trouble, such as fighting against Ebola in West Africa and transporting relief goods to disaster areas, the UN sometimes gives fish rather teaching those people in poverty and starvation how to fish. After processing ages like this, feedbacks tend to be something like to a continuous transportation work for UN and a handful of never self-dependence regions. As a solution, other charity organization like Arc can take care of those business calls for longer time and more patience such as cultivating the living skills of the local people and education.

In addition, even though the UN is perfectly funded, it can have influence beyond comparison worldwide rather than hire people from every single part of world or do everything itself. We can also talk about organization structure here as well. If the UN is going to do everything, the organization structure would be inevitably huge. If the UN want to keep its working efficiency and all missions delivered immediately, its leadership chain would be targeted to be short. But how could it be possible to manage the whole world with a short leadership chain?

sources: http://lewishistoricalsociety.com/wiki2011/article_image.php?image_type=article&id=53

That’s the problem. The UN is just a group of conscientious elites but not the god and many of those tasks dealt by UN are not something about whether fully funded. Furthermore, if the alliance of UN and other organizations can make the world a better place, why not?

Jing Zhou’s Blog <Target and big retailers in trouble> illustrates the present situation of most physical retailers. One hand they can hardly maintain the price competition with those e-commercial individuals, on the other they do not want to give up their market occupation. That’s a no solution dilemma.

We can hardly deny that operated with the direct selling strategy and not have expense on managing physical stores, those online merchants are talented with price advantage. Apart from this, people’s shopping custom has been altered more ages. While the decreasing trends of shopping in retailers such as Target and Walmart online shopping is boosting at a tremendous speed.

With the first look of the situation we have right now, most will state that the only outlet for those big retailers is to build their own e-commerce. However, I think those retailers should put much emphasis on their material flow advantage. Free or low charging on shipment may regain the declining tendency. Apart from this, teleshopping and TV shopping should be taken into consideration as well.

My friend Faria Sedighi had wrote about a long-lasting problem occurs in most metropolises worldwide. In her blog she pointed out that rising the parking fee is much a better and reliable solution to the increasingly serious parking problem when compared with the present parking app people use on smart phones. Those companies who own the parking app were not doing ethical business, stated in Faria’s blog, and those companies’ profit originated from selling public property.

Frankly speaking, I totally endorse the argument in this blog. The behavior of these companies mentioned above is doing a business unethical. However, on my own perspective, the initial motivation to create these kind of app is aiming at dealing with the parking problem which is not bad one. Apart from this, increasing the parking fee may ease the parking problem at the moment but it cannot stop the tendency that the number of cars is going to growing year by year.

On my view, some app work as the google map should be designed. This app ought to fix the position of the smart phone and provide the information of the car parks around the app users. Information like the location of the nearest car park and the number of available vacancies must be offered. Companies who make this app can charge a monthly fee to those who download it and discount can be considered if possible.

The app can be a bless, but it will stay as a curse if it still work as what described in Faria’s blog.

In Peter Nowak’s blog, he reviewed Google’s new inbox. Google’s Inbox is described as a “veritable dog’s breakfast” in this passage. Google is trying to use this app to change people’s habit to operating their email box. Through reinvention of emails and a group of new functions like bundles, highlights, reminders and snooze, Google’s Inbox is recommended as worse than nothing.

It’s not clear that email needed reinventing, says Peter Nowak.

This passage reminds me of the competitive strategy. Google Inbox is a negative example of competitive strategy. It wants to touch a long processed model and want to change a long lasting habit, but it doesn’t provide anything better. Trying to overrun ones business rivals through creating competitive advantage can remarkably beneficial but risky as well.

Creators of something unconventional can be judged as pioneers if they success such as Steve Jobs and his Apple whereas those “pioneers” will be related with dogs if their ideas and products are proved to be claptraps. Personally, I would like to say if a particular industry’s dominant competitive advantage is based on create something different with the present products in the market, the company ought to establish the difference in a longer period. Working step by step is time-consuming and less contented to most of people and enterprises. However it is the best way to realize competitive strategy, a long-term action plan .

In the past thirty years, people change their appetite to almost everything ranges from our eating and dressing habits to our view to superheroes in movies because of difference reasons. Years ago most people prefer perfect superheroes like superman where as in the movie <Batman: the Dark Knight> published in 2008 the villain in drama, the clown, owned a huge population of audiences worldwide.

This passage depicts the idea of the consumer trends and how companies will have to change their products to accommodate these new trends. It is obviously that people in 21^st century prefer figure with a more real character rather than being perfect. As a result, the Marvel created by Robert Downey Jr defeat Thor with his playboy appearance and behavior but utter innocence. To meet the new trend of customers, those heroes became less perfect but possess one or two bearable disadvantage when unfolded to audiences.

Meanwhile, due to the rapid living rhythm, much less people own the time to sit at the table and have cereal and milk. Facing with this kind of situation, those former cereal producers invited more portable items, such as Greek yogurt and breakfast sandwiches (Sales are up 40% in the past four years, whereas cereal sales are down by as much as 3%).

No denying that lying in the old trend can only give rise to destruction like Nokia. However, if you can not only follow and accommodate the trends, you can create a new world.

This passage delivered a tragic piece of information—— Tim Hortons is going to rising it price due to the doubled price of its most basic raw material, the coffee bean.

Generally speaking, Tim Hortons is a conscientious merchant since it is almost the last to increasing price. If the present price cannot match up with the cost, rising in price seems as the only way to go. Starbucks and other competitors of Tim Hortons’ such as Keurig K-Cup and J.M. Smucker all have at least partly risen the price of some of their products.

Industries like café, whose selling price is highly related with raw materials while these materials’ annual price can alter dramatically every year will have to revise their financial report regularly. The aim to rise price is not to meet cost but to maximize the total profit. Nevertheless, once the upward ratio price leads to a greater downward proportion of consumption, the increasing of price is estimated to be a negative strategy.

There are other method to deal with this kind of situation. Reducing the price of other company products or branching out can be some ideas. If Tim Hortons rise the price of coffee but decrease the price of sandwich and invite some other products, less customer loss is forecasted to happen. Anyway, remover the burden caused by the rising of cost to the tolerance is never the best method.

The passage definitely unfolded us an excellent example of the power of transparency. The Nestle has long been a dominant enterprise in the food industry. The influence of Nestle is worldwide, but why Nestle can keep itself successful and occupy the leading position for decades?

This passage depicts an idea called “Creating Shared Value”, which is considered as Nestle’s key to where it is now today. Through creating to both shareholders and the society, Nestle gains approval in all parts of world in a considerably short period. Under the supervision mechanism established by Nestle itself, interactions between enterprise and shareholders become more effective and efficient which leads Nestle to the leading food products company in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index.

Hardly can we deny that the majority of companies worldwide can do a better job in improving their enterprise transparency. An opaque governance cooperation will highly reduce the stability of its product commitment and accumulate problems since most of them cannot be found until a miserable is caused. However, a transparently managed company will be better supervised by both its shareholders and consumers. Less black box operation is projected to occur whereas most report statistics of these enterprises will be reliable and valuable referenced.

Although the building of transparency of a world top 500 enterprise can be a work cost decades to accomplish, it is not the excuse to procrastinate this goal. The return of transparency can be too amazing to refuse.

As we read from the passage <First Nation chiefs to stage Site C showdown>, B.C. First Nation chiefs will be here next week to urge the Harper government to reject BC Hydro’s $8-billion Site C hydroelectric megaproject.

This project is going to establish a dam and a generating station which are projected to be great profitable. However, the man in the picture, the Grand Chief Stewart Philip, showed his objective attitude without hesitation. Why was it?

It is so obvious that a newly founding construction can provide the area countless commercial opportunities and better trade with outside world. Meanwhile, those first nations origins can obtain a chance to learn the world better through communicating and cooperating if they choose to be the partners.

Nevertheless, the real elites among those first nations rejected the “kindness” and benefit from those companies who want to build items in their territory. The reasons is just one sentence: “Our people say that we were put here to look after this part of the earth. “

We take this seriously. Sometimes, the sum of money is not that heavy for a nation to abalienate its territory and change its living habits. Sometimes, the tradition of the nation is much heavier. Sometimes, we have to protect and leave a same land and river and forest to our grandsons and granddaughters.

Do not put too much emphasis on benefits, we have more precious treasures of our own.

http://si.wsj.net/public/resources/images/OB-JH406_0719AM_G_20100719162210.jpg

A passage for the Wall Street Journal said that Amazon had sold more E-books than hardware books for the first time over the past three months.

When is comes to Amazon in Business, it is always a successful example of direct selling strategy. Through providing a stage for consumers and suppliers, A subject is obvious to charge more if it has to pass through the hands of more people, so that Amazon cut off all dealers in the business process except itself.  The remarkable price difference between Amazon and hommizational delivery service accelerate Amazon’s development every year.

Benefit from the direct selling had been a long-lasting advantage of Amazon for ages. However, no benefit is ever-lasting. Amazon’s benefit has touched the cake of all dealers and intermediary sellers in the chains. Meanwhile, the launching of other E-business such as the Alibaba will drive the market more competitive as they can provide the same service and product in a even lower price.

Nevertheless, Amazon is still occupying the dominant market ratio in north America. How will it face with the new challenges from it old and new rivals? Amazon, I will always keep my eyes on you.

http://regmedia.co.uk/2013/01/06/lenovo_ideapad_yoga_13_ultrabook_1.jpg

A passage from Microscope said that Lenovo is going to invent a new bid tool to to improve its efficiency of payback to its distributors’ and partners’ cash flow.

As we learnt in class 6, the significance of cash flow can always be put in the first three places  in a supply chain. The crack of the cash flow of several small cooperations can leads to the failure of the entire industry. That even was the origin cause of financial crisis in 2008.

Generally speaking, you are never too efficient to do your business whereas you will never overemphasis the importance of the inventory and innovation. On this point, Lenovo spares no effort to drive greater visibility of a product’s journey in the supply chain to give partners more predictability, This provide confidence and clearness to all its partners and made the relation between them more stable. 

A company with better visibility and more rapid paying back is always more credible. It will be hard for its stake to fluctuate dramatically and unpredictably. Most investors prefer such company with a long-term feast and stability.Maybe Lenovo is not the one who does best, it has always been struggling for.