文章分類: 管理學 (燦榮之友)

what customers want

licw2004 — Sat, 26 Sep 2009 23:42:08 +0800

65% Has knowledgeable employees
64% Addresses my needs on first contact
62% Treats me like a valued customer
54% Demonstrates desire to meet my needs
49% Can quickly access information
49% Is good value for the money
45% Has courteous employees
43% s a company/brand I can trust
38% Treats me fairly
31% Provides relevant/personalized service

Source: Convergys 2008 U.S. Customer Scorecard

role of CEO

licw2004 — Sun, 07 Jun 2009 14:00:50 +0800

But if linking the outside to the inside is the role of the CEO, what is the actual work? I think it comes down to four fundamental tasks, drawn from Drucker's observations:
Defining and interpreting the meaningful outside
Answering, time and again, the two-part question, What business are we in and what business are we not in?
Balancing sufficient yield in the present with necessary investment in the future
Shaping the values and standards of the organization

After Layoffs, Help Survivors Be More Effective ---fr HBR

licw2004 — Fri, 05 Jun 2009 17:23:52 +0800

If your firm has downsized recently, you're now managing a bunch of survivors -- the lucky ones who didn't get laid off. But good fortune doesn't make for good performance -- at least not in this situation. Chances are, you're presiding over a heightened level of employee dysfunction, even if you don't see it yet. Here are areas to address to limit the damage, according to our research and influential studies by others, including Teresa Amabile of Harvard, Regina Conti of Colgate, Wayne Cascio of the University of Colorado, Joel Brockner of Columbia, and Priti Pradhan Shah of the University of Minnesota.
Creativity. Evidence from several researchers suggests that downsizing dampens survivors' creativity -- a potentially dangerous development for almost any company.
To off set the drain on innovative energy, managers should put renewed effort into team building. Maintaining or improving work-group stability and providing challenging work stimulates creativity.
Communication. Downsizing tends to disrupt social networks and information exchange within companies, adding to employees' negative feelings. Leaders should encourage increased contact among managers and employees, promote active listening, institute open-door policies, and get employee input into decision making.
Perceptions. Layoffs tend to increase employees' levels of stress, burnout, and insecurity and to decrease morale, job satisfaction, and trust. Such perceptual changes are linked to greater turnover, diminished willingness of employees to help one another, and poorer job and company performance. Managers need to help employees see the downsizing process as fair and show that other options had been considered first. A moratorium on future layoff s, even if it has an explicit end point, might also be helpful. One study found that the anticipation of downsizing can have an even stronger effect than layoffs themselves on employees' negative perceptions of their work environment.
Turnover. Our own research shows a substantial increase in voluntary departures after layoff s, even if the downsizing was small. The costs of being understaffed and of employee replacement and training are particularly unwelcome when a company is attempting to save money. All the above recommendations can help limit voluntary turnover. And for the future, institute HR policies that promote a sense of justice, such as confidential problem-solving avenues and effective grievance or appeals processes. Companies with those policies had smaller increases in voluntary turnover after layoff s.
Stars. Pay special attention to high performers. Research by one of us (Trevor) shows that those with the most training, education, and ability are the most likely to quit if dissatisfied. Provide support and encouragement, and help them see that downsizing opens new opportunities and channels for promotion.

~~~~~~~~
by Anthony J. Nyberg and Charlie O. Trevor

為未來設想

licw2004 — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:57:43 +0800

今時今日，任何公司或組織要生存，都要兼顧到全球化和應付未來的需要，但究竟那一個國家是最能夠前瞻性處事呢?

有美國的學者用了十五年，研究過來自61個地區，一萬七千過中層經理，指出今日香港的經理，前瞻的排名只屬中等，雖然領先內地或部份歐洲國家，但遠遠落後頭位的新加坡，第二位的瑞士，第三位的荷蘭和第四位的馬來西亞，即使是印度，菲律賓亦拋離香港。

研究同時發現，今時今日大公司的董事局，輕易更換行政總裁，比九五年多四倍之多。作者認為，這顯示大公司董事局越來越不相信行政總裁可以帶領公司進入未來。

雖然中國在有關的研究中，排名並不高，但我由個人的經驗發現，相關的調查不一定準確，因為中國地大物博，要找到有代表性的公司和經理，已經不是易事，假如以珠三角作為研究對象，我可以肯定，中國的排名會大幅提升。

鬥心

licw2004 — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 13:24:49 +0800

商場上決勝，不能沒有鬥心，但鬥心過強，卻為令人容易犯錯，哈佛商業評論一份論文指出，鬥心過高，有三大死穴，一是單一競爭對手，二是時間，三是眾人的目光。
學者以拍賣的現象做研究，發現在眾多對手，幾名對手和一名對手的組合下，單一對手令我們做成不理性決定最多，一九九九年在芝加哥，曾經有過這樣的網上加實物拍賣，140頭牛賣出了350萬美元，是原本估計價錢的七倍
時間是另一項足以令人失去判斷力的因素，越來越多資料顯示，拍賣臨近尾聲，正是一般決策者失去理智分析的時候，有高級行政人員反思過程亦發現，在早餐會有限時間做的決定，出錯機會亦高。　
研究同時顯示，經電子平台的拍賣的平均收益，比較真實的拍賣低，價錢相差達四倍，學者稱之為spotlight效應，即真實的拍賣，使人成為萬眾焦點，更容易輕率出價。
根據以上研究所得，學者認為，成功的領袖，即使不能完全排除所有競爭因素出現，但他們卻可以重新訂定公司的流程，令員工減少面對單一競爭對手，受時限所逼，或成為眾人焦點，如是者，做錯的機會自然減少。

Mr Wright and placebo effect

licw2004 — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 14:05:08 +0800

A man whom his doctors referred to as "Mr. Wright" was dying from cancer of the lymph nodes. Orange-size tumors had invaded his neck, groin, chest and abdomen, and his doctors had exhausted all available treatments. Nevertheless, Mr. Wright was confident that a new anticancer drug called Krebiozen would cure him, according to a 1957 report by psychologist Bruno Klopfer of the University of California, Los Angeles, entitled "Psychological Variables in Human Cancer."
Mr. Wright was bedridden and fighting for each breath when he received his first injection. But three days later he was cheerfully ambling around the unit, joking with the nurses. Mr. Wright's tumors had shrunk by half, and after 10 more days of treatment he was discharged from the hospital. And yet the other patients in the hospital who had received Krebiozen showed no improvement.
Over the next two months, however, Mr. Wright became troubled by press reports questioning the efficacy of Krebiozen and suffered a relapse. His doctors decided to lie to him: an improved, doubly effective version of the drug was due to arrive the next day, they told him. Mr. Wright was ecstatic. The doctors then gave him an injection that contained not one molecule of the drug — and he improved even more than he had the last time. Soon he walked out of the hospital symptom-free. He remained healthy until two months later, when, after reading reports that exposed Krebiozen as worthless, he died within days.
As Mr. Wright's experience illustrates, a patient's expectations and beliefs can greatly affect the course of an illness. When psychological factors tied to an inactive substance such as Krebiozen lead to recovery, doctors call the improvement a placebo effect.

active processes in the brain.

licw2004 — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 13:46:40 +0800

In recent decades reports have confirmed the efficacy of various sham treatments in nearly all areas of medicine. Placebos have helped alleviate pain, depression, anxiety, Parkinson's disease, inflammatory disorders and even cancer.
Placebo effects can arise not only from a conscious belief in a drug but also from subconscious associations between recovery and the experience of being treated — from the pinch of a shot to a doctor's white coat. Such subliminal conditioning can control bodily processes of which we are unaware, such as immune responses and the release of hormones.
Researchers have decoded some of the biology of placebo responses, demonstrating that they stem from active processes in the brain.

placebo effect 安慰劑效果

licw2004 — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 13:40:21 +0800

For several decades, however, researchers have known that placebo effects can also arise from subconscious associations as opposed to overt beliefs. Stimuli that a patient links with feeling better or with physical improvement — say, a doctor's white lab coat, a stethoscope or the smell of an examining room — may induce physiological reactions even if a patient has no explicit faith in the treatment being given. That is, simply seeing a doctor holding a syringe can produce a placebo reaction if a patient has previously associated that scenario with feeling better. In such cases, the overall effect — improvement or even complete recovery — stems from a combination of the pharmacological action of the drug and the subconscious or conditioned response.

x 6

licw2004 — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:25:39 +0800

one deiscovery by Xerox shattered conventional wisdom, Its totally satisfied customers were 6 times more likely to repurchase Xerox products over the next 18 months than its satisfied customers

X 8

licw2004 — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 12:16:24 +0800

Some experts suggest replacing the reflex to postpone with time-stamped prescriptions for action. Psychologist Peter Gollwitzer of New York University and the University of Konstanz in Germany advises creating "implementation intentions," which specify where and when you will perform a specific behavior. So rather than setting a vague goal such as "I will get healthy," set one with its implementation, including timing, built in — say, "I will go to the health club at 7:30 A.M. tomorrow."
Setting such specific prescriptions does appear to inhibit the tendency to procrastinate. In 2008 psychologist Shane Owens and his colleagues at Hofstra University demonstrated that procrastinators who formed implementation intentions were nearly eight times as likely to follow through on a commitment than were those who did not create them. "You have to make a specific commitment to a time and place at which to act beforehand," Owens says. "That will make you more likely to follow through."

Japanese coming back...in a different form

licw2004 — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 23:01:10 +0800

Newly energized Japanese companies are once again grabbing worldwide market share. They provide crucial technology for iPods, and the innards of Boeing's new jets are made largely in Japan. One reason the revival hasn't garnered much attention is that the companies leading the way aren't consumer-product firms, as in earlier decades, but component and materials providers.
Nevertheless, the book does not tell a simple story of convergence in Western and Japanese business practices. After all, choosing where to focus, or deciding how much to emphasize profitability, still involves a lot of executive judgment. And such judgment is inevitably influenced by the remaining differences across countries in the legal frameworks that bind corporate decisions. Financial and employment rules are tighter in Japan than in many other developed economies, but the country has gone further than its peers in deregulating telecommunications and reducing barriers to hostile takeovers.
Differences with the West will become more important as the downturn forces many countries and companies to rethink their faith in markets. As we've seen, it can be as dangerous to maximize profits as to maximize stability.
Although Schaede finished writing this book before the financial crisis hit, she persuasively argues that Japan's reforms are too far-reaching to be undone even in a deep recession. Instead, we can expect a fresh rethinking in Japan of how to preserve the advantages of focus while maintaining certain limits on competition. The world's second-largest economy will be one of the major sources of evolving management practice. As Schaede remarks, Japanese business is once again exciting to watch.

learning from Heroes

licw2004 — Tue, 31 Mar 2009 22:57:05 +0800

Like Hercules, Luke Skywalker, and Jack Welch, we all struggle with five recurring challenges as we journey through work and life: We wander without knowing where we're going. Data and circumstances confuse us. Fear blocks us from acting. Change paralyzes us. And despite our best intentions, we talk more than we listen.
An examination of business writing from the past 30 years shows that these challenges emerge again and again -- and the best books offer simple yet profound lessons for overcoming them: Find a clear purpose. Be aware that past experience and a mass of information can interfere with wise decisions. Maintain a bias toward action. Be open to change. Seek feedback.
In the 1980s, for instance, Thomas Peters and Robert Waterman's In Search of Excellence showed how exemplar companies instilled a bias for action by replacing reports, committees, and protocols with frequent conversation and relentless prototyping. In the 1990s, Robert Kaplan and David Norton's The Balanced Scorecard demonstrated how the careful use of data can support good judgment. And in 1999, Thomas Friedman's The Lexus and the Olive Tree described how change -- in the form of globalization -- can be freeing rather than paralyzing.
The five lessons feed into one another. Clarity of purpose provides wisdom in decision making, which informs action, which creates change, while feedback makes everything work better. They also resonate with the stages of the "hero's journey" made famous by mythology scholar Joseph Campbell. The archetypal heroes of myth and popular culture walked more or less the same path as Jack Welch.
It's painfully obvious that companies continually fail to absorb these simple lessons. The question is, What will it take for us to internalize the insights won by our heroes?

incentives backfire

licw2004 — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 23:17:38 +0800

A generation ago, Richard Titmuss claimed that paying people to donate blood reduced the supply. Economists were skeptical, citing a lack of empirical evidence. But since then, new data and models have prompted a sea change in how economists think about incentives -- showing, among other things, that Titmuss was right often enough that businesses should take note. Experimental economists have found that offering to pay women for donating blood decreases the number willing to donate by almost half, and that letting them contribute the payment to charity reverses the effect. Consider another example: When six day-care centers in Haifa, Israel, began fining parents for late pickups, the number of tardy parents doubled. The fine seems to have reduced their ethical obligation to avoid inconveniencing the teachers and led them to think of lateness as simply a commodity they could purchase.

CEO pay

licw2004 — Sun, 29 Mar 2009 22:57:35 +0800

From 1978 to 1989, the pay of the CEOs at the largest U.S. companies went from 35 times the average worker's salary to 71 times. It ballooned to 300 times at the end of the 1990s, the decade of heroic leadership, as the media made CEOs into superstars. With stock options, it was very easy for companies to boost pay.

引述文章----更大危機將至

licw2004 — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 12:41:41 +0800

按照宋鸿兵的预测，第二波金融危机就可能在最近爆发，区间为2009年4月到9月。

　　在第三波风暴中，一些国家或地方政府将会破产或倒台。

　　国家开发银行经济学家吴志锋也表示，在第二波金融风暴中，美国现有的8000家银行之中可能会有近50%的银行倒闭，即4000家银行可能倒闭。

　　在利率火山阶段之后，将进入金融风暴的第四阶段—美元冰河期，不过这个阶段宋鸿兵现在还没有时间表。

　　《货币战争》的作者宋鸿兵，这位曾经在美国房利美和房地美工作过的中国四川人，因预言的大胆和部分准确性备受媒体关注。

　　枯燥的数据和图表只是他分析的工具之一，金融世界中能够提供独有信息的人脉关系，似乎更是其判断来源。

　　2009年2月22日，在环球财经研究院成立当天，该院院长宋鸿兵表示，将通过对西方金融界人脉关系的分析，预测未来的经济发展。

　　他说：“我们将对统治世界的17人俱乐部展开研究，这些世界核心金融人士，是大多数中国金融人士之前没有关注到的。” 在宋鸿兵看来，这些“统治世界命运的人”将与接下来金融风暴的延伸发展有着密切关系。

　　4000家银行或倒闭

　　宋鸿兵与该研究院的国内研究成员、国家开发银行经济学家吴志锋等，都认为金融危机将在接下来的不久，产生第二波更为剧烈的风暴。出语惊人的宋鸿兵认为，这一波冲击的标志，将可能是位于美国的银行业翘楚花旗银行和美国银行的破产倒闭。

　　“现在花旗银行的股价只有不到2美元，美国银行的股价只有3美元多，之前，他们的股价都在20美元和30美元左右。”宋鸿兵说。

　　已经跌掉90%市值的两家银行，最近的股价走势与此前两房出问题前的股价走势非常相似，都是几波下跌后来一次最大的跌幅，而这也可能就是其破产的前夜。

　　宋鸿兵表示，第二波金融危机就可能在最近爆发，区间为2009年4月到9月。

　　宋鸿兵阐释了自己说这些话的依据。他认为，资产价格是金融危机中衡量银行系统的重要标准。如果是20倍的杠杆，现有的资产价格下跌，可能导致银行资产归零，但是，美国和欧洲的银行平均杠杆率都在30倍左右，而现在的测算是资产下跌幅度已经达到了8.68%。

　　这实际上表明，美国的商业银行体系已经资不抵债，而包括欧洲在内的银行，与美国一样，也将出现重大的危机，花旗银行和美国银行也处在这个危险的边缘。

　　宋鸿兵分析说，资产价格的下跌，将导致商业银行在接下来的几个月中面临着两个残酷的选择，要么申请破产保护，要么被全面国有化。

　　最近格林斯潘已经提出来，说美国银行系统的国有化可能是个不错的主意。宋鸿兵对此的解释是，这已经是没有办法的办法。

　　国家开发银行经济学家吴志锋也表示，根据他们对美国市场的观察，在第二波金融风暴中，美国现有的8000家银行之中可能会有近50%的银行倒闭，即4000家银行可能倒闭。当然，美国与中国不同，他们的银行虽然数量庞大，但资产规模都较小。在这些即将倒闭的银行中，会有一些大型商业银行倒闭，这将构成第二波金融风暴的标志性事件。

　　吴志锋认为，第二波风暴中，大型商业银行的倒闭对市场的冲击，将远大于第一波中雷曼兄弟等几大投行的倒闭，因为，他们承担着支付功能。

　　政府面临破产危机

　　吴志锋认为，由于商业银行倒闭而导致的支付危机的影响力会更大，并将由此产生第二波风暴后的第三波金融风暴。

　　宋鸿兵表示，在第三波金融风暴中，商业银行一旦国有化，商业银行此前发行的16.7万亿美元金融债将会被调价，这些金融债，现在被美国的养老基金、社保基金和各个国家的金融机构持有，他们将面临巨大损失。

　　除了金融债将可能出现问题，地方政府债、企业债、信用卡债务等也将出现问题，这些债务的总额是25万亿美元。

　　此间，问题的另一个核心是企业债中的垃圾债券。这些债券最没有信用，担保能力最差，规模达到了3万亿美元。宋鸿兵预测，在接下来的4月到9月期间，这些垃圾债券的违约率会由现在的4.5%提升到20%以上。

　　而在宋鸿兵看来，保尔森奥巴马采取的目前的救市方法也都不能奏效，因为方法是错误的。

　　目前的情况，第一个办法，政府出钱购买银行的烂资产以图恢复流动性，好比在洪水爆发的下游去抽水，但是洪水源头的问题没有解决，洪水会越来越多。

　　第二个办法是向银行注资，如同在加固堤坝，但上游还在下暴雨，洪水上涨速度太快。第三个办法是让银行破产，采取炸坝措施，但是奥巴马目前没有更多的财政力量做这件事。

　　唯一的选择是大规模增发国债，但是，这个窟窿也是惊人的。其中商业银行3万亿美元、财政赤字1.2万亿美元等，总救市资金总额需要5万亿美元。这样的发债规模是往年的4到5倍，往年的发行量只有8千亿，今年可能达到5万亿美元。

　　问题是市场上是否有足够的资金来购买美国国债。目前全世界外汇储备共有7.6万亿美元，其中大部分已经是各种票据，可动用的现金为2万亿到3万亿美元，如果采取发行国债的方式，将会造成美国国债供应量过剩，没有人买得起这些国债，相应的国债价格将下跌，也造成危机进入第三波金融风暴。

　　在第三波风暴中，一些国家或地方政府将会破产或倒台。

　　实际上，美国加州政府可能将是美国第一个出现大规模地方政府违约的地区。一些东欧国家也已经处于非常艰难的地步，最近它们引入了战略投资者，迹象有所改善，但国家银行的控股权旁落，交给了投资人，控股方占到了东欧国家75%以上的股份。

　　此前，一些外资银行控股了东欧国家的银行，又向东欧国家进行大量借贷，而一旦去杠杆化的过程发生，外资银行将会抽取资金回避风险，必然造成本国货币的急剧贬值，形成货币危机，随之也产生第三波金融危机的演变。

　　在这个过程中，美国的地方州政府可能倒闭，东欧国家可能会发生较大的社会动荡。10年之前，印尼政府倒台和社会的动荡就与亚洲金融(2,-0.08,-3.85%)危机密切相关。

　　宋鸿兵表示，在第三波的冲击中，美国将产生大量美国国债，这将导致长期收益率狂涨，融资成本同步上涨，形成利率火山，严重打击美国现在的实体经济，债务成本进一步上升，最后导致越来越多的资产脱离美元计价，美元将会贬值。

　　在利率火山阶段之后，将进入金融风暴的第四阶段—美元冰河期，不过这个阶段宋鸿兵现在还没有时间表。

　　宋鸿兵认为，最后的结论是无论美国如何做，全世界包括美国在内，必然面临着长期衰退，没有其他更好的办法。唯一的悬念是衰退将会在通缩还是通胀下进行。如果是在通胀下，衰退会类似上世纪70年代美国长达10年的滞胀—经济衰退，但是通货膨胀在两位数以上。

　　时代周报记者张子鹏