Playing in the Giant\u27s Field: Strategies for Effectively Competing in the Global Marketplace

This article inversitgates how a smaller, less resource-rich competitor can successfully out-maneuver a stronger opponent

Where does all the money go? an investigation of donation filtration

This paper is divided into three sections. The first section profiles three charities. The second section discusses the lack of established quantitative and qualitative measures to judge a charity’s performance; i.e., the degree to which a charity is successful at accomplishing its stated aims. It then goes on to suggest certain measures a charity can be evaluated against to evaluate the degree of its success. The paper uses these guidelines to measure the comparative success of each of the profiled charities. The third section finishes with recommendations for making charitable behaviours a widespread phenomenon that will further contribute to the success of each organization

Post-materialism's "silent revolution" in consumer research: still silent after all these years

The Protestant work ethic, with its emphasis on ever-increasing levels of production, contributed to the rise of the consumption culture and the legitimization of the market society. It appears that the very premise of the market society--specialization and the production of consumption--also paves the way for a post-materialist revolution

The big pictures: sources of national competitiveness in the global movie industry

The competitive dynamics of the global film industry are not frozen in time. The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) studios have pursued an utterly transparent strategy of buying out or otherwise dominating their domestic and international distribution chains, while generally avoiding cooperation with other nations’ producers. This strategy has gone unchallenged largely because other nations and film production companies have lacked perspective on their own position and potential in the global film industry. With keener use of existing tools, including co-production, these countries can establish themselves. For instance, Canada, having co-production treaties with both mainland China and Hong Kong while no other nation has co-production treaties with either, has uniquely positioned its film industry to enter the Chinese mass market either directly or via Hong Kong’s free trade without the crippling import expenses that other foreign producers face. However, Canada’s producers to date have made less creative use of the co-production treaty with China, using it to more easily access low-cost animation inputs

Against all odds: A strategic analysis of the fall of Hong Kong, 1941

Purpose: The paper seeks to build on a model from extant literature which utilized a similar historical analysis approach in a study of strategic decision making. Using the (unsuccessful) defence of Hong Kong in World War II as the historical case, the paper seeks first to apply Chung and McLarney\u27s model in the analysis, and then extend the model so as to better handle the unique sequence of events that took place in 1941. Design/methodology/approach: The paper employs a historical case event in an analysis of competitive strategies. The first section provides a descriptive historical account of the battle of Hong Kong. The second section describes the decision-making model, while the third section applies the model to explain three sets of decisions: the decision to defend the colony, decisions made during the battle and the decision to surrender. The fourth section draws implications for strategic decision making in organizations, while the last section presents conclusions. Findings: Organization theorists seem to be fascinated with planning and strategy formulation, at the expense of strategy implementation. While designing organizational strategy is often more glamorous than execution, it is the execution of strategy that ultimately determines an organization\u27s competitive advantage. Clearly, the strategy of the Allied Forces in Hong Kong was not hard to figure out (Mintzberg). However, there is growing research on how lower organizational levels have a tremendous contribution in fundamentally changing, formulating organizational strategy and sometimes even obstructing strategy formulated at the top. The decision to defend Hong Kong in the face of the Japanese invasion, decisions made during the battle and the decision to surrender were all major, critical decisions, especially susceptible to such biases as overconfidence, problem framing, availability heuristics and confirming-evidence. Overconfidence is particularly dangerous. Originality/value: The study not only modifies and extends the model, but also contributes to the literature by augmenting the validity of previous case research. © Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Social policy recommendations to alleviate stress among informal providers of elder care

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine social policy recommendations to deal with the high level of pressure placed upon informal providers of elder care. Design/methodology/approach – The paper investigates this subject of elder care by first establishing the significance of the problem. The paper provides an examination of how this problem is dealt with in several countries, both at the governmental level and by private enterprise. This forms the basis of a discussion of social (and enterprise) policy implications in particular for the USA. A focus on flexible work scheduling as a viable means to help alleviate the problem is recommended. In particular an approach of voluntary compliance is proposed to encourage wider acceptance by corporations. Findings – The paper finds that priority needs to be given to developing a social policy agenda that focuses on flexible work scheduling. In addition, meaningful effort must be expended to capture input from various stakeholders, and to educate and promote the program itself. Concurrently, efforts targeted at managers must be executed to move them away from the traditional line of sight management schema into one more akin to a target-based schema. Originality/value – The paper offers useful suggestions to promote implementation. © 2008, Emerald Group Publishing Limite