Social entrepreneurship is “identifying a social problem and using for-profit entrepreneurial principles to organize, create and manage a venture to achieve a desired social change”. Social entrepreneur knows how to create the lifestyle they desire while doing good.

Even though theUnited Nations was funded for the universe,helping everyone in the world is a task that is too huge to achieve. There are many problems such as global economic downturn, personal debt, and low job security. However, social entrepreneurship can offer solution because it can help you create your own lifestyle while making a difference. Eventually, these differences will change the world.

Toms Shoes is one example. Toms was founded by Blake Mycoskie. He was traveling around Argentina and he noticed that the locals were wearing a form of shoes that is made from canvas or cotton fabric and is the classic of Toms shoes. Later in the trip, he saw that there were many children who were barefooted. He was aware that a lack of shoes was a serious and wide situation in Argentina. When he got back the US, he started this company with a philosophy that every time they sell a pair of shoes, they going to give a pair of shoes to a poor child.

There are many social entrepreneurs like Blake Mycoskie. It is their social entrepreneurship that offers them such a solid market. They not only create profit but also bring a better life to those children. The world is changing because of social entrepreneurship.

Work Cited:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toms_Shoes

http://www.academia.edu/6661221/Fundermetal_of_Entrepreneurship

Sustainable business is any organization that environmentally friendly imposes their actions on the global environment, society, and economy. Specifically, it is a business that strives to meet the triple bottom line.

There was a fire in Ohio. One of the state’s main waterways, the Cuyahoga River caught on fire after becoming saturated with oil chemicals and garbage. In response to the catastrophes and the enormous pollution, cleanup expenses and health care costs, the federal government set higher standards by introducing more laws that restricted the amount of pollutants a business could emit. However, business leaders claim that they work hard to reduce the expenses that generated from production. Oppositely, their actions would dramatically increase their cost in the future.

An example of a corporation successfully adopted the concept of sustainability in their business is 3M, an American manufacturing company. They aim to help customers to become more energy efficient, implement approaches to distribute service and goods in a sustainable way.

To sum up, my analysis shows that the value of being green is much more than that of being unsustainable. It can reduce risks and attract more customers and investors since people’s demand for environmentally friendly service and goods is increasing.

Work Cited: http://www.ohiohistorycentral.org/w/Cuyahoga_River_Fire?rec=1642

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sustainable_business

“First Nations people” refers to various aboriginal peoples in Canada. They believe in a Great Spirit that implies that the Earth is the mother of all spirits. To be more specific, they regard Earth as the inheritance of their future generations. In the contrary, governments explore nature more frequently nowadays. Therefore, there must be much controversy between governments and aboriginal people.

Take the Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline for example. The First Nations claimed that the project violated their rights significantly such as lose of 22,000 square kilometers land. And they claimed that it was the central government’s duty to consult and accommodate the interests of them right from the start. So they headed to the court to stop the project. Apart from different understanding of nature, I believe that the aboriginal people are greedy. According to the Indian Act, they wanted to be independent, however, they were reluctant to give up the special protections that the central government gave them such as tax exemptions in the reserves.

Although this is a huge threat to this project, I think the central government should not give it up for the enormous benefit behind it. The pipeline could enlarge and diversify the market of for Canadian energy resources since it would be shipped to Asia directly. It could “produce approximately $2.6 billion in total local, provincial and federal tax revenues during 30 years of operation.” (CBC News)

Under this huge pressure, what would the central government do? But there is one thing for sure, it is never easy to trade with the First Nations.

Reference:

http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/northern-gateway-pipeline-benefits-vs-concerns-1.1135312

Value proposition is basically what the products or services do. This is a significant part of business strategy. A good value proposition always gives a succinct summary and statement that really captures customers’ attention. Take newspaper for example. If the publisher expects to sell more, the best way is publishing the most attracting and latest news and highlight it to draw people’ attention so that more readers actually want to buy one.

On the other hand, there are many companies within one market competing by remaining the same proposition that other companies have. But I think uniqueness of the proposition is way more important. From my perspective, employees in most companies are valuable. Take journalists for example. There is no point that if anyone has the latest news because eventually everyone would know about it. The key point is how to make it different from others. If the perspective were distinct from others, there would be more readers.

Besides having the right value proposition, target customer is another essential part of a business strategy. Because we want to know who are the ones that would buy more of the product. If we blanket too many customer segments within one marketing area, we would lose most of the customers because it does not apply to them. Apart from that, if we have a larger range of customer segments, we would devote more resources and invest.

In conclusion,  I think a good business strategy should have a perfect value proposition and its target customers.

What is operation? It is “the making and delivery of any product or service.” (Operation, Mahesh Nagarajan) To be more specific, I think the essence of operation is that we need plans and actions to create value in the form of products and services. The set of activities requires the transformation of converting inputs into outputs.

There are three core functions for operation, which are production, finance, and marketing. Take a supply chain of Air Jordan sneakers shoes for example. The manufacturers need resources to produce and then distribute to warehouse around the world. This is the process of production. Meanwhile, they also need to consider the cost for the production. Therefore, finance plays an important role because it enables the company to track its capability. After shoes are produced, the company needs to figure out a specific selling plan for its product in order to maximize the profit. So they need marketing to generate demand. At last, shoes are sold to customers.

So, why should we study operation? In my opinion, operation is one of the major functions of any organization. We want to study how people organize themselves for productive enterprise in an efficient manner. For example, a company sells its product directly to its customers. During this process, there is no cost for middleman. Besides, the company can get useful information directly from its customers, such as the feedback provided to improve its product, and the demand that it can use to predict the future demand. By catering to the taste of customers and less stock, the company can actually have more demand and cash flow. In conclusion, I believe it is important and beneficial for us to understand operation more specifically.

Source: https://blogs.ubc.ca/courseblogcl_ubc_comm_101_101_2014w1_44739-cl_ubc_comm_101_101_2014w1_44739_2045960_1/files/2014/05/Class-06-Operations.pdf

Glamour Girl Cosmetics is a company that provides various cosmetics in California. Recently, this company plans to develop business in its targeted market among female buyers.

First of all, Glamour Girl has its own value propositions. They focus on various products such as perfumes and makeup used for not only beauty but also health because more people pay attention to their health condition. Although their products have higher quality, they do not consider increase the price. Besides, for the convenience of their customers, they also plan to develop an on-line shopping business.

With these new value propositions, the range of customer segments also increases. This time, they target at middle to upper-middle class women and e-shoppers. With the premium quality of products and moderate pricing, they can maintain the customer relationships.

To reach their customers, they plan to target at more regional and national wholesalers, and retailers. E-commerce functionality for website can also bring in potential customers. With the power of advertising, more people will pay attention to this company.

To support all these measures, an excellent management team leading by its CEO, Isabella Gorinski is one of their key resources. The technical support from overseas manufacturing firms and bank loan are also part of key resources to assist their development.

I have selected Ultimate Events to enhance my understanding towards the cosmetic market because all girls focus on it. I hope I can know more about how an organization responses to different needs of their customers. And I would like to see the business related knowledge, such as accounting, value proposition and operations.

Source: http://go.galegroup.com.ezproxy.library.ubc.ca/ps/retrieve.do?sgHitCountType=None&isETOC=true&inPS=true&prodId=GVRL.bphc&userGroupName=ubcolumbia&resultListType=RELATED_DOCUMENT&searchType=BasicSearchForm&contentSegment=9781414472539&docId=GALE|CX1677700012

Everyday when we walk on the street, we can see people holding a cup of Starbucks. For many customers, coffee is a necessary part of our life. As one of the biggest coffee company, Starbuck seems to provide benefit for all stakeholders through promoting different business ethics action. However, according to a magazine, Dan Welch, they have uncovered GM growth hormone in milk. For customers, our health is threatened. And Starbucks also promotes business in GM growth hormone products. In terms of our society, more food products would be influenced, which means a larger range of human health is influenced potentially. While for Starbucks, they have more profit.

Responding to the claim, a Starbucks spokesperson said that they disagreed with the opinion this magazine editor held. “Starbucks widely published ethical standards which guarantee rights, wages and conditions for coffee farmers, as well as offering industry-leading environmental performance in coffee production.” (STARBUCKS MOST UNETHICAL COFFEE CHAIN IN THE UK).

In my opinion, business ethics is related to every individual, to all stakeholders. The measures they claim to have business ethics are what they use to distance themselves from the fact that they use GM growth hormone in milk. Compared to all the ethical measures they promoted, I believe customers’ health is significant or they lose the primary source to run their company.

Reference:http://www.justmeans.com/blogs/starbucks-most-unethical-coffee-chain-in-the-uk