After reading Yue Huang’s blog “IPO BABA” about her understanding of Alibaba’s situation, I would like to add more analysis on incentives of Jack Ma’s decision. As she said, the rapid speed of  E-commerce development  in China brings Alibaba intensive domestic competition. As a result, Alibaba should exploit foreign market to bring the company to compete at a higher level. In addition, I think the IPO of Alibaba is more than market strategy and risk taking of financial market; it takes a risky step to test the potential of E-Commerce under Chinese prohibitions on several foreign investment, and the corporate structure becomes a risky variable interest entity. Although it is hard to estimate the space of foreign investment because Alibaba’s development are influenced by the macro-environment in Chinese foreign investment regulations, in my opinion, it is worthy to seek larger space of development and higher platform of competition despite the uncertainty in financial market, because Alibaba is the leading Chinese company in E-Commerce and Jack Ma should have the ambition to explore because that’s part of the spirit of an entrepreneur.
Source of picture: Alibaba increases IPO price range www.dw.de

This blog is a comment on Cindy Li’s blog “Lulu-lama? New Lululemon partnership faces social outcry”. In her blog, she expressed that the company was attempting to rebuild their image through association with Dalai Lama, who fought against poverty and spread mindfulness, which marketing decision was ineffective. I agree with her that this partnership was not clear in terms of purpose, which occurred to be misleading to the public. In my opinion, the company may also trying to create shared values of helping against poverty, however, it will not be successful unless the company can lower the prices of their products to open to general public or perform some sort of  donations; it is not influential enough to only partner with a public figure. In my opinion, Lululemon should make decisions to against poverty or stop partnership with Dalai-lama; otherwise it would be ironic for a company who sells high price products to perform marketing promotions by partnering with people who against poverty. In addition, since Lululemon has successful experience in sustainability practice like people-powered projects to reduce negative environmental impact, I believe the company have ability to do CSR practices as well.

The news article about Detroit bankruptcy catches my eye because I am surprised that like a corporation, a city can be exhausted by liabilities and go to bankruptcy. As one of America’s biggest cities, Detroit has $18 billion of liability mountain. According to the news article, there are mainly two causes for this result. The first one is mismanagement, as the article mentioned, the funds raised are given priority to retirees rather than creditors, and the large amount of retirees pension and health-care to be paid are underestimated. Moreover, the ridiculous spending on art protection is another factor. In my opinion, what Detroit case teaches us is like corporations, government are responsible to use the funds raised from investors wisely by making budget based on moderate projections before implement fiscal policies or adding public benefit. The government should add good managerial accounting  practices into their budget calculations so that both the development of  the city and creditors can be benefited. Since creditors and citizens are stakeholders of municipal government, government should be cautious and responsible when make decisions about budget.

Citation: http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-07/detroit-bankruptcy-taught-muni-investors-painful-lessons.html

Source of picture: “Detroit bankruptcy just what doctor ordered” freedom works.com

In the news article “First Nation chiefs to stage Cite C showdown”, BC hydro has difficulty to build their Site C hydroelectric megaproject because of the impact on First Nations’ traditional practices. The project falls down to the land ownership, which goes a bit extreme.

Instead of comparing the benefits and loss of both sides which is hard to move on, both of First Nations and BC hydro should communicate more about the stewardship of the nature for the interests of both. It’s about collaboration and partnership. To illustrate, BC hydro should think about how to minimize the influence of the hydro project on First Nations’ lives, for the respect to their traditions; then generate environmental friendly solutions and talk about them with First Nations’ band leaders. Besides, BC hydro should increase First Nations’ engagement in various areas in their business as well, like take part in employment and management which can promote the positive business interactions among both sides. After the project starts, both sides should take environmental stewardship to protect the nature, for examples, protect the wild lives and plants.

To conclude, hydro business need to build consistent communications and understanding with First Nations in order to create more space for the development of the business.

Photo credit: BC Hydro submits information on impact of Site C Dam. cbc.ca. Web. Oct. 5th 2014.

Customer is definitely one of the most important component of a business model, the success of a business rely on great customer relationship. It is important for companies to evaluate their customer services in different angles in order to improve their customer relationships.

Dave Brock clarifies customer service and customer experience in his blog that describes his experience with troublesome phone plan services. His story is a great example to illustrate that good customer services should not only mean a nice representative with clear instructions but also effective services that can provide customers great experience. In another word, the companies should deliver their services effectively to customers through their customer representatives. The effectiveness of customer services is especially important for technology product companies because customers will easily lose their patience and are tired of repeating contacting the companies overtime. For an example, if your phone has continuous problems and you don’t know how to solve them, you may want to switch to a new phone rather than being stuck on the phone. This is why companies should be familiar with how to solve customers’ different problems effectively. Companies can also provide customers with self-assistance options through online instructions like FAQ, social networking sites and video tutorials. These options are all channels to assistant customers.

The key points for the customer services are effectiveness, helpfulness and easiness. Companies should value the quality of customer services over quantity of representatives they provide.

Photo Credit: customer service issues. shutterstock.com.Web. Oct 4th 2014.