BA Strike Timeline

A great place to get started if you're looking for a history of the BA HR problems between 2009 and 2011.  It's great because it also has some links to other news articles that explain the strike in full.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/7760081/BA-strike-timeline.html

30 November General Strike

Here are some articles that are of interest with regard to the strike which is to take place on 30 November:

http://m.guardian.co.uk/politics/2011/nov/16/unions-public-sector-strikes?cat=politics&type=article

http://www.teachers.org.uk/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/education/educationnews/8879660/Head-teachers-back-national-strike-action-over-pensions.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/education/education-news/schools-to-be-shut-by-head-teachers-strike-6259187.html

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-15655434

http://www.teachers.org.uk/files/pension-facts-a4-7459.pdf

http://m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/s3qKM-zLeY8cgWKFgkSmeIA/view.m?id=15&gid=commentisfree/2011/nov/18/30-november-strike-ballots&cat=society

http://m.guardian.co.uk/ms/p/gnm/op/s3qKM-zLeY8cgWKFgkSmeIA/view.m?id=15&gid=commentisfree/2011/nov/21/striking-teacher-30-november&cat=society

http://menmedia.co.uk/manchestereveningnews/news/politics/s/1465796_public-sector-strike-on-november-30-to-wipe-3m-from-greater-manchester-economy

Decentralisation Within Johnson and Johnson

This is an interesting interview I found with the CEO of Johnson and Johnson talking about what it's like to run a decentralised workforce.

http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article.cfm?articleid=2003

in conclusion , gives good reasons for the use of decentralisation such as the ability to specialise and deal with change , but also talks about managing many of the disadvantages such as lack of control by making sure the right people are employed to perform the job.

Hard vs. Soft Human Resource Management

Many companies have a big decision when choosing Hard of Soft Human Resource Management, both have big benefits and drawbacks. A soft HRM strategy involves taking care of employees and viewing them as an asset. This could involve extra bonuses, time off, or free time to go to the gym at work etc.
A Hard HRM approach involves treating employees as just part of a businees, and seeing them as easily replaceable.

This website shows the benefits and drawbacks in a clear table.

http://tutor2u.net/business/people/hrm_hard_soft.asp

Archie.

Headteachers Strike Over Pension Pay

For the first time in 114 years the Headteachers of the NAHT have decided to take strike action with a ballot of 24,000 members and a 53.6% turnout on that. The result was a 75.8% vote in favour of strike action.

While the absence of a headteacher for a day would not necessarily lead to a school closure, the vote is likely to affect millions of children over the country as Headteachers are co-ordinating strike action.

Here is the best article I was able to find.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/nov/09/headteachers-vote-strike-action-pensions

Archie.

Decentralisation

Quite possibly the most concise and easy-to-understand explanation you could hope for:

http://www.economist.com/node/14298890

The Rise and Fall of Groupon

Groupon- have you heard of it?  The first time I did was in Christmas 2010 when some friends of mine in the US told me about these 'amazing' deals you could get. 

Here's how it works: Groupon finds a business, say a restaurant, which wants to increase its demand on a certain night of the week when it's capacity utilisation is really low, say a Tuesday.  Groupon approahces the restaurant telling them that they will be able to find enough customers to fill the restaurant up on a Tuesday night so long as the restaurant offers a significant discount, say 50% off.  Then groupon sends an email to all its subscribers saying there's an incredible deal for such and such a restaurant on Tuesday if they get 50 people to sign up.  50 people sign up and pay Groupon, Groupon gives them a voucher and this voucher buys them a meal at the restaurant.  Groupon takes a cut, customers get a good deal, and businesses fill up their excess capacity.  Everybody's a winner, right?

(As a persnoal aside: I was signed up for Groupon in the first half of 2011.  I got a deal on dog racing at Oxford Dog Track for £10 admission plus a free burger.  Of course I ended up spending about £30 on bets, so of course the Dog Track is happy even if they have to offer a big discount.  Think of it as a loss leader).

As it turns out, everybody's a winner, and that includes lots of copycat web businesses that are copying the Groupon model.  As the article says, you can't patent a way of selling coupons.  And with this model there is no clear advantage of being the first to market.  So in the past few months there have been lots of copycat websites (have you seen that annoying Wowcher! advertisement lately?) which means that it's going to be a tough year for Groupon.

It goes to show that if you can't protect your idea, you don't really have much of a business.

Here's the link:

http://www.economist.com/node/21533425

Happy reading!

Well take me back to ol' Missouri

This article was too good to miss:


http://www.economist.com/node/21534817


What does this have anything to do with Business Studies?


Well, take what we've been learning about with economies of scale.  Here's a quote from the article:


"Like both Las Vegas and Silicon Valley, Branson is a cluster. The concentration of theatres attracts skilled labour and allows specialist knowledge to spread. People quit one business to start a similar one, creating an entrepreneurial cycle, and, in the case of Branson, a lot of high-quality bluegrass music as well."


I'm loving that quote- it's external economies of scale in action!  No more using silicon valley in my lessons, I'll be explaining the joys of operating a theater business in Branson.


The first student who posts a meaningful comment to this post gets a ping!

Worlds Biggest R&D Spenders

Companies around the world spend billions of dollars every year on Research and Development (RandD) and pour thousands of man hours into finding the next biggest break in their sector of the global market. Is it all worth it?

This link shows the top selected RandD spenders in the world in 2008, is it what you expected?

http://www.economist.com/node/14926081

Toyota: Toyota motor company spends more than $1million every hour on R&D and in 2009 spent more than $9 billion on RandD. This putting them number 1 in the world.