Fellow classmate Pernille commented in her blog, that cellular company AT&T posted an ad of the twin towers in New York in memory of 9/11 on the 12th anniversary of the attack.  AT&T thought the ad which depicted a smartphone held against the New York skyline taking a photo of the memorial at ground zero, would be a tribute to the towers on the anniversary of the attack, but most viewers did not recognize AT&T’s efforts as respectful.  The purpose of the advertisement was to pay regards to everyone affected by the tragedy, but viewers thought that it was insensitive and responded over social media websites such as Twitter and Facebook to label the ad as “tacky” and “terrible”. AT&T took down the ad and apologized on these websites but people were still upset that AT&T had the audacity to produce a 9/11 themed advertisement.

I agree with Pernille’s opinion as she comments “the ad shows a lack of corporate social responsibility” and that it damaged AT&T’s reputation. Personally, as being a citizen of the United States and witnessing the twin towers destruction over the news channel that September 11th, 2001, I believe the ad is insensitive and that AT&T should have never published such an advertisement and will consequentially lose customers and respect.

The kitsilano.ca website discusses recent issues in Vancouver and all over the world, and a recent post by a blogger Taraneh, she writes about the popular Vancouver based althletic store, Lululemon.

Founder Chip Wilson recently made a negative comment about women’s bodies when he mentioned in an interview with Bloomberg TV’s “Street Smart” section that “‘Frankly some women’s bodies just don’t actually work for it’”.  Chip Wilson’s remark is rather derogatory towards women with bigger figures or that are labeled “plus size”. There is already controversy in today’s society about being labeled “plus size” and having an well known and respected athletic company practically shun larger women does not send a positive message to consumers.

A hot topic in today’s society is being thin and “the beauty that comes with a smaller figure” thus many teenagers and young adults succumb to eating disorders, so for a regarded company such as Lululemon to emphasize that thin is better, only pressures young adults to be thin by any means to wear Lululemon’s clothes. Taraneh suggests that Lululemon should stock larger-size clothes with frequency and not reinforce the fad of having a “thigh gap” in order to apologize for his derogatory comment and reassure that Lululemon clothes can fit any body, big or small, and look good.

In Alexis Chow’s blog she compares the sandwich chain Potbelly and it’s recent success in the market to similar stores such as Chipotle and Subway. While Potbelly is a relatively new sandwich shop chain, it has the potential to be extremely successful like Subway due its high demand and it’s IPO (Initial Public Offering) was $14 per share however it sold 7.5 million shares. If the company does in fact increase their stores by 10 percent each year, I agree with Alexis’s opinion that if Potbelly could become as well-known and profitable as some of the bigger brand-name companies.

In order for Potbelly to achieve the level of recognition and popularity that Chipotle or Subway gets, they have to make sure that their customer satisfaction is high, and that their company values are displayed to gain appreciation from customers as well as loyalty. Potbelly does a good job of making customers happy with a friendly attitude and a more “homey” atmosphere than Subway.

I agree with Alexis’s opinion that it is difficult for new sandwich chains to garner success when they have to compete with existing brands that have already gained popularity and success but Potbelly has a good business plan and has already showed rapid signs of popularity to become another big name sandwich shop.

In the Washington DC, the board of DCPS (District of Columbia Public Schools) recently announced that they are implementing a teacher evaluation system that is quite controversial. The measure is called IMPACT, it will assess teachers based on their performance of whether or not the have improved over the year based on the following degrees, not just student’s test results. Teachers are marked based on specific criteria that the school district uses to define effective instruction including “how well they explain concepts and if they check for student understanding. School administrators also rate DCPS teachers on their support of school initiatives, their efforts to promote high expectations and their demonstration of core professionalism”.

This system should prove to be highly effective, although in it’s early stages, it is quite controversial. While many teachers are willing to be evaluated in order to keep their job and possibly receive a monetary bonus, some lower-performing teachers are voluntarily leaving the classroom in order to avoid the risk of being fired.

IMPACT’s dismissal policy as well as it’s substantial financial rewards for high-performing teachers are a particularly important measure because if high performing teachers (teachers that receive a 350 or higher based on a 400 mark scale) earn an annual bonus of as much as $25,000, and for those who are “minimally effective” teachers (scores below 250) are told they have one year to become effective or they face the threat of dismissal.

Since the study was completed, the results have demonstrated that minimally effective teachers are much more likely to voluntarily leave, allowing for a new and much more hard-working teacher to take their place. The majority of the teachers demonstrated a significant improvement, emphasizing that a money based incentive and a threat to job security increases the performance of teachers.

http://news.stanford.edu/news/2013/october/dee-teacher-assessments-101713.html

One of the world’s largest retailers, Wal-Mart, has recently been under criticized of underpaying it’s employees. Many argue that their wages are too low and can afford to increase their workers’ salary as much as 50% without harming their business. Mathematical equations using the revenue of Wal-mart and their costs as well as stocks prove that Wal-mart can easily pay their employees more without it’s stock rapidly decreasing.Many critics argue that because Wal-Mart made $17 billion in profits last year, it can afford to pay more and even has an obligation to do so. Payscale, a salary information website, estimates “Wal-Mart CEO Mike Duke’s 2012 pay of $23.2 million was 1,034 times more than the company’s average worker”. This figure easily emphasizes the fact that employees could be making more money.

Wal-mart’s concern is that if they are to raise the wages, that could lead to a decline in stocks, shareholders could feel that will not be getting enough value or stock in the company if potentially Wal-mart’s profit was to decrease due to the increase of variable costs (employee wages). The reality is that stocks could change slightly if Wal-mart was to give raises, but they wont change to an extreme degree due to the sheer size and power that Wal-mart has in the market.

There is also the possibility that an increase in salary could give Wal-mart a positive outcome in the stock market. An example of this happening was in 2010, Google announced a 10% raise for their employees “the stock dropped a bit but mostly recovered within a year. And Google’s stock is 60% higher now than it was before the raise”.

In the long run, giving their employees a higher salary would be beneficial to their to the over productivity of employees and possibly the stock market.

http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2013/11/12/wal-mart-pay-raise/

The upcoming Olympic Games are set to be held in Sochi, Russia and the past Olympic Games (Vancouver in 2010 and London 2012) have tried to be environmentally friendly and achieve carbon neutrality: to have a net zero carbon footprint, which means to achieve net zero carbon emissions by “balancing a measured amount of carbon released with an equivalent amount sequestered or offset”.

Sochi is implementing a “Sustainable Future” program that will implement more low-carbon technologies that are energy efficient to decrease their carbon footprint in areas such as infrastructure and agriculture to make up for the estimated footprint of the Olympics in terms of planes and accommodations of the athletes participating in the 2014 Games as well as the staff in the organizational committee.

Their main inspiration is to increase environmental awareness and inspire others to do the same by focusing on renewable energy, energy efficiency, and the protection and restoration of ecosystems.

The goal of hosting the Olympic Games with minimal impact on the climate has been attempted in the past few Games, but if Sochi can achieve carbon neutrality they start a legacy of sustainability in the Olympic Games and also inspire other cities in Russia as well as the world to concentrate on their respective carbon footprints.

http://www.sustainablebrands.com/news_and_views/clean_tech/mike-hower/sochi-2014-will-be-first-olympic-games-achieve-carbon-neutralit

Twitter has been gaining headlines due to their recent announcement of their IPO (Initial Public Offering). Many economists and future shareholders were concerned due to the inital disappointment and inaccurate predictions of Facebook and wondered if the same was going to happen to Twitter.

Twitter announced their IPO as $26, and “Reuters estimated the 70 million Twitter shares being offered today were set to raise just over $1.8 billion and valued the company at $14.1 billion” due to high demand of Twitter stock; “this would make Twitter’s IPO the second-largest U.S. Internet offering in history, behind Facebook, and make it even more valuable than Google’s 2004 IPO”. However Twitter easily surpassed their IPO of $26, and its stock price opened at $45.10 (US).

Twitter made sure not be over-zealous and not set a market share too high, learning from Facebook’s mistakes. Facebook shares had rapidly decreased once they hit the market but they are now recovering.  Twitter was determined to not follow in Facebook’s path, so they initially set a lower IPO of $17-$20 to keep investment expectations low in case of failure.

I believe Twitter was wise to set a low IPO in case of consumer expectations were not high, but as Twitter gains shareholders, they have created their own path to public ownership.

http://ca.finance.yahoo.com/blogs/dashboard/twitter-ipo-puts-social-media-trial-135438367.html

Canadian domestic car sales are increasing, however their manufacturing output has been steadily decreasing, and southern states in America as well as Mexico have been advancing towards the level of output that Canada produces.

This decline in the Canadian Auto industry are partially due to labor costs. Due to the high canadian dollar, labour costs in Canada are more expensive. Thus it is easier to produce more in a cheaper country such as Mexico or move (outsource) manufacturing operations to a less expensive area. NDP Leader Tom Mulcair and then-Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty suggested last year that “a high Canadian dollar, fueled by Canada’s oil exports, was hurting central Canadian manufacturing … they see a threat to their economy”.

This increase in the cost of Canadian labor not only affects Canadian outputs but also the global market.  Thus the increase of Chinese automobile manufacturing has rapidly increased due to cheap cost of labor, thus Canada’s economy, specifically automobile manufacturing, is becoming a smaller part of global trade.

A suggestion on how to improve Canada’s manufacturing industry is to become strategic about “where future growth will be and aim for those markets” as well as position themselves in the global economy so that they are essential.

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/2013/10/07/auto-manufacturing-canada-collapse_n_4059489.html

The camera company Olympus has been under fire recently for covering up a $1.7 billion loss in their company that had accumulated since the 1990’s. This money lost had been covered up by using outsized consulting fees and buying unrelated companies. This report of improper accounting was filed nearly two years ago by an investor who claimed “a loss cover-up by Olympus executives was responsible for its plunging stock price”.

Olympus, in order to settle this lawsuit with the US based investor who filed the claim, agreed to pay $2.6 million. When the accounting scandal first broke in the media, the share price of Olympic stock decreased dramatically, but now that Olympus has agreed to reconcile their improper accounting, their share price has gone up slightly, “now about 25 percent higher than before the loss cover-up was exposed”.

In addition to paying the lawsuit, Olympus has also been issued millions of dollars in penalties by courts and regulators. If Olympus had initially tried to deal with any problems or properly accounted their losses instead of covering up their mistakes, Olympus would most likely be successful instead of a disgrace and would not have to go through all the trouble of paying additional fees and being looked down upon.

http://www.france24.com/en/20130927-olympus-pays-us-investors-26-mn-over-accounting-scandal

Allegations of bullying and sexual harassment in one of the top news companies, BCC, have circulated the media recently. BCC is currently under investigation of these claims. A dossier of complaints and evidence this unprofessional behavior has been written by staff members at BBC.

This dossier supports the allegation of sexual harassment, as one BBC staff member was targeted based on his sexuality and a coworker told him “‘Your lifestyle sickens me but it’s your choice'” These types of remarks are not only unacceptable in general, but especially in the workplace where colleagues should get along with everybody no matter their sexual orientation and not discriminate.  Another instance of sexual harassment noted at BBC was by one woman who said “she was offered ‘any promotion I liked’ if she agreed to dinners and drinks at her manager’s cottage on Tuesday evenings”.  This blatant demoralizing and sexualization of women has prompted BBC to initiate a “Respect at Work” review to prevent more cases of bullying and ensure that staff members are being treated fairly.

I think in addition to the “Respect at Work” review, BBC should compensate the victims of the bullying and make sure the necessary steps are taken to the members accused of harassment and bullying their fellow colleagues.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/2013/oct/07/bbc-claims-bullying-sexual-harassment