Comm 101

Tying in the concepts of two classes, presenting and social entrepreneurship, is the company TEDx. During the presentation, the presenter mentioned that TEDx had taken “The Inconvenient Truth” by Al Gore from concept to presentation, successfully raising much-needed awareness bout global warming. Further looking into the company, it became clear that this company was unique in that aspects of the company were highly socially entrepreneurial.

TEDx Introduction

With a slogan of “Ideas worth spreading”, the company is built around the mission of making good ideas heard. Without the proper avenue to express the concept, no matter how innovative or important the message, it could easily get lost during execution. What TEDx does is ensure this doesn’t happen. By providing a toolkit of necessary skills, presentations, talks and demonstrations are effectively organized. The result? Conferences, videos and projects, which are easily accessible, spreading amazing ideas.

Looking at the company’s current projects reinforce the social entrepreneurship nature of the company. Their involvement is largely targeted to developing countries. Their YouTube channel showcases a huge collection of their efforts. Not only that but their audience also includes youth, universities and corporations. Hence, the only requirement needed in order to be supported by TEDx is simply, an idea worth spreading.

Incentive programs are no new idea. The problem issue here is what is a good incentive?

In Margaret Nadeau’s blog, the issue of rewards is brought up. The argument is that companies understand the need for rewards but the’re not doing it right. I completely agree. According to the original article, companies are offering rewards that do not correspond to motivating the employee, at least not for the right reasons.

At some point, rewards become expected.After a certain amount of work, there is a reward. Rewards become expected, not motivating. Further issues arise when companies provide rewards for something completely incongruent with the employee’s work. It is understandable that rewards programs are costly initiatives. Acting like a cheapskate, however, defeats the whole purpose of a reward program. If no one wants the “reward”, then it is hardly an incentive.

Perhaps a better idea is to properly design an rewards and incentives. More specifically, they should be tailored to motivating the employee to producing a certain results. The article further suggests non-monetary rewards such as growth opportunities, new challenges and broader purpose for the employees. Whatever the final program is, the key is to make it worthwhile to employees.

New and exciting seems to the the most alluring definitive characteristic of modern entrepreneurs. Personally, one of my most respected entrepreneurs is Coco Chanel. She is classic. Her styles and her fashion have become an icon and achieving such a status speaks volumes on her success.

To start out, Chanel was just a little shop in France. From that little shop, it became one of the biggest fashion houses. Undoubtedly, at that time, Chanel was “something new.” Opening during the war times, Chanel had strategically  located a new market – women in need of practicality. Restricting corsets and long skirts stood in the way of the new role of women in the society. Taking on jobs left open by men, women needed fashion that displayed class, femininity and most importantly, flexibility. Her success could also be measured by the revolutionary influence it has taken on. Without her venture, the norm of corsets and skirts could very well still be perpetuated.

Entrepreneurs could perhaps be defined small business with big success. Chanel fits that description perfectly. With a simple minded idea of being practical and feminine, it filled an unmet need, a new market. As women changed, it did too, allowing it to become the brand name it is today.

Referring to James Li’s blog, floods have been hailing its effect on the supply chain in the automobile industry.  Namely, the Thailand floods have been making a bad situation worse. With the Japanese earthquake already slowing down the supply chain, as the many factories that manufacture parts in Japan are affected, the floods in Thailand means that the Thailand factories are now also affected. Natural disasters, like floods, are disasters for companies that have a complex supply chain. Not being able to obtain outsourced parts means no finished product.

The automobile industry isn’t the only one industry taking a hit. These floods have been having far-reaching effects on the electronic industry also. For Toshiba, only one of their plants were left operating as normal. Delta, has chosen to shift to Chinese suppliers. However, its companies like hard drive manufacturers that magnify the problem. Since they produce components that appear early on the supply chain, all companies that need hard drives are conversely affected. 

All the companies are expecting that it will take several months and a least one quarter before operations return to normal. Importing parts from other plants mean higher shipping costs.Floods cause costly damage.