Social Interactions

Social interactions establish the role that people play in a society and their authority responsibility pattern. Their roles and patterns are supported by a society’s institutional framework, which includes, for example, education and marriage.

Social roles are established by culture. For example, a woman can be a wife, a mother, a community leader, and/or an employee. What role is preferred in different situations is culture-bound. Most Swiss women consider household work as their primary role. For this reason, they resent modern gadgets and machines. Behavior also emerges from culture in the form of conventions, rituals, and practices on different occasions such as during festivals, marriages, get-togethers, and times of grief or religious celebration.

With reference to marketing, the social interactions influence family decision-making and buying behavior and define the scope of personal influence and opinion. In Latin America and Asia the extended family is considered the most basic and stable unit of social organization. It is the center for all economic, political, social, and religious life. It provides companionship, protection, and a common set of values with specifically prescribed means for fulfilling them. By contrast, in the US the nuclear family (husband, wife, and children) is the focus of social organization. The US wife plays a more autonomous role than the Dutch wife in family decision-making. Thus social roles vary from culture to culture and are likely to affect marketing behavior.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Expert Power

There are several ways managers use expert power. They can promote an image of expertise by subtly making others aware of their education, experience, and accomplishments. To maintain credibility, a leader should not pretend to know things that he or she does not know. A leader whose pretentions are exposed will rapidly lose expert power. A confident and decisive leader demonstrates a firm grasp of situations and takes charge when circumstances dictate. To enhance their expert power, managers should also keep themselves informed about developments related to tasks, valuable to the organization, and relevant to their expertise.

A leader who recognizes employee concerns works to understand the underlying nature of these issues and takes appropriate steps to reassure subordinates. To avoid threatening subordinates’ self-esteem, a leader with expert power should be careful not to flaunt expertise or behave like a know-it-all.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Shift Worker Needs

Scheduling policies should take into account important outside activities such as religion, education, community services, sports, and so on. In fact, 10 – 20 percent of your workforce may be in school. Many companies support further education to help increase technical skills. They can design a shift schedule to make it easier for employees to attend classes, while maintaining full operational coverage at the work site. Another solution is to being education to the plant.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Learning from Market Leaders

• Customer Market: We believe our first responsibility is to the doctors, nurses, and patients, to mothers, and all others who use our products and services. (Johnson & Johnson)
• Product Service: AMAX’s principle products are molybdenum, coal, iron ore, lead, zinc, petroleum and natural gas, potash, phosphate, nickel, tungsten, silver, gold, and magnesium (AMAX)
• Geographic Domain: We are dedicated to total success of Corning Glass Works as a worldwide competitor (Coming Glass)
• Technology: Control Data is in the business of applying micro-electronics and computer technology in two general areas: computer-related hardware and computing-enhancing services, which include computation, information, education, and finance. (Control Data)
• Concern for Survival: In this respect, the company will conduct its operation prudently, and will provide the profits and growth which will assure Hoover’s ultimate success. (Hoover Universal)
• Philosophy: We are committed to improve health care throughout the world. (Baxter Travenol)
• Self Concept: Hoover’s universal  is a diversified, multi-industry corporation with strong manufacturing capabilities, entrepreneurial policies, and individual business unit autonomy. (Hoover Universal)
• Concern for Public Image: Also, we must be responsive to the broader concerns of the public, including especially the general desire for improvement in the quality of life, equal opportunity for all, and the constructive use of natural resources. (Sun Company)

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Context for Reinventing the Corporation

1. The shift in strategic resource from an individual to an information society;
2. The coming seller’s market and the new competition for the best employees;
3. The whittling away of middle management;
4. The continuing entrepreneurial revolution;
5. The emergence of the new variegated work force;
6. The demographic revolution of working women;
7. The growing use of intuition and vision;
8. The mismatch between our education system and the needs of the new information society;
9. The rising importance of corporate health issues.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Deming’s Service Quality Principles

1. Maintain a constancy of purpose
2. Adopt the new philosophy
3. Cease dependence on mass inspection
4. End the practice of awarding business on the basis of price alone
5. Improve constantly and forever the system of production and service
6. Institute training
7. Institute leadership
8. Drive out fear
9. Break down barriers among staff
10. Eliminate slogans, exhortations, and targets
11. Eliminate work quotas
12. Remove barriers to pride of workmanship
13. Institute a vigorous program of education and self-improvement
14. Put everyone to work on the transformation.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Preparing a Resume

All job applicants need to have information circulating that reflects positively on their strengths. That information needs to be sent to prospective employers in a format that is understandable and consistent with the organization’s hiring practices. In most instances, this is done through the resume.

No matter who you are or where you are in your career, you need a current resume. Your resume is typically the only information source that a recruiter will use in determining whether to grant you an interview. Therefore, your resume must be a sales tool; it must give key information that supports your candidacy, highlights your strengths, and differentiates you from other job applicants.

It is important to pinpoint a few key themes regarding resumes that may seem like common sense but are frequently ignored. If you are making a paper copy of your resume, it must be printed on a quality printer. The style of font should be easy to read—Courier or Times New Roman. Avoid any style that may be hard on the eyes, such as a script or italic font. A recruiter who must review 100 or more resumes a day is not going to look favorably at difficult to read resumes. Use an easy to read font and make the recruiter’s job easier.

It is also important to note that many companies today are using computer scanners to make the first pass through resumes. They scan each resume for specific information like key job elements, experience, work history, education, or technical expertise.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

Vision and Profit Potential

Profit is your reward for serving others. In business, profit is what you earn from offering good products and services at a price. In non-business, profit may be number of people you help to learn and live better. Profit to a charity may be the number of people helped; and to trade association, profit may be its service to members. Always, profit represents the good you do.

Regardless of your vision/dream, you want to harvest the maximum profit because profit is the way results are measured.

Potential counts big. Each person has several talents. A key to the good life is selecting and developing one’s best talent. A path to a sad life is doing something we know is wrong. As you select a vision—a dream—ask, “How much satisfaction will implementation of your dream give others?”

There is nothing right or wrong with money. Money is simply (a) a tool you use to energize and direct human activity, and (b) a device for keeping score. On one hand, money builds and operates schools and hospitals and runs our government. On the other hand, money finances crime, bribe those in trusted positions, and corrupts some people in government, in education and others areas of human endeavor.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

 

Direct Response

You should, if at all possible, engage in direct marketing. The value to you is enormous. You get to pinpoint your prospects with amazing accuracy. You can be selective in regard to age, race, sex, occupation, buying habits, money spent on past direct mail purchases, education, special interests, family composition, religion, marital status, and geographic location. The list should naturally start with your own customers. From there you can expand it to include people who have recently moved into your area, and people who have recently been married or divorced, or become parents. You can eliminate people who have moved away.

You might engage in a simple direct mailing of postcards to customers, informing them of a sale you will have the next week. They will very much appreciate the early notification and will show their gratitude by purchasing from you. You might also engage a full scale direct mailing, consisting of an outer envelop, a direct mail letter, a brochure, an order form, a postpaid return envelop, and even more.

Whatever you do, the process begins when you decide exactly what it is you wish to offer. How will you structure that offer? Then you must select your mailing list. If you haven’t got the names already, you can purchase them from a list broker. Be sure, you buy a clean, fresh list. You must be certain that you know all  the costs involved: postage printing, writing the mailing, artwork, paper, personalization (individualizing each letter by name and address, and repeat mailing costs. Your gross sales, minus these costs and your production, handling, and shipping costs, will contribute your profits. Be sure you make financial projections and know your break-even point.

In the old days, a direct mail campaign meant a letter. Today it means a letter, two, three or five follow-up letters, perhaps a follow-up phone call or two, and finally, one more direct mail letter. Many entrepreneurs engage in weekly or monthly direct mailings.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.

 

Knowledge Management Strategy

What does it mean for an organization to have a knowledge management strategy? If we think of a corporation as an individual, then a corporation’s knowledge management strategy may be likened to individuals’ strategy to obtain an education and to apply their knowledge and learning to advance their career. If an individual’s education consisted of nothing more than acquiring information (as was largely the case some 50 years ago) he or she would be woefully unprepared to deal with today’s rapidly changing business environment. By the same token, if an organization’s knowledge management strategy focused solely on information flow, it would also be unable to deal with the challenges of doing business in the knowledge era.

Developing a knowledge management involves four basic steps:

1. Dialogue, discuss, debate and define your objectives;
2. Formulate a strategy;
3. Devise the tactics; and
4. Then act.

My Consultancy–Asif J. Mir - Management Consultant–transforms organizations where people have the freedom to be creative, a place that brings out the best in everybody–an open, fair place where people have a sense that what they do matters. For details please visit www.asifjmir.com, and my Lectures.