International Differences in the Business Practices and Productivity of Firms
International Differences in the Business Practices and Productivity of Firms

Author: Richard B. Freeman

Publisher: University of Chicago Press

Published: 2009-10-15

Total Pages: 284

ISBN-13: 0226261956

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In recent years, globalization and the expansion of information technologies have reshaped managerial practices, forcing multinational firms to adjust business practices to different environments and domestic companies to adjust to their foreign competitors. In International Differences in the Business Practices and Productivity of Firms, a distinguished group of contributors examines the phenomenon of widespread differences in managerial practices across firms, establishments within firms, and countries. This volume brings together eight studies that combine qualitative and quantitative insider analysis of business practices such as the use of teams, incentive pay, lean manufacturing, and quality control, revealing the elements that determine which practices are adopted and why. International Differences in the Business Practices and Productivity of Firms offers a much-needed model for measuring the productivity and performance of international firms in a fast-paced global economy.

Productivity Based Management
Productivity Based Management

Author: Ephraim F. Sudit

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 163

ISBN-13: 9401196672

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Realization of productivity gains is a necessary condition for long-term consistent improvement in economic well being. We have to work smarter and produce more efficiently to attain an ever higher quantity and quality of goods and services without sacrificing leisure. This is true for the economy at large as well as for individual firms. In a competitive environment, businesses must continuously improve the productivity of their operations in order to sustain and augment profitability and growth. This basic requirement may be temporarily obscured by unexpected external developments or financial manipulations, but it is nevertheless essential to the long-term health of any economic enterprise. Increasing awareness of the importance of productivity has recently motivated renewed interest in the development and refinement of productivity-based management techniques. The purpose of this book is to review and evaluate some of the new contributions in this area. The analysis of productivity-based management in this book encompasses planning, decision making and control methods which explicitly incorporate techniques designed to measure, monitor, induce and improve underlying productivity performance in production, financial planning, marketing and international operations. These productivity-based methods can easily accommodate built-in efficiency incentives designed to motivate people vii viii PRODUCTIVITY BASED MANAGEMENT working in decentralized organizations toward goal congruent behavior. It is argued throughout the book that productivity-based management, at its best, is likely to improve significantly the efficiency and effectiveness of economic enterprises.

Aligning Strategy and Sales
Aligning Strategy and Sales

Author: Frank Cespedes

Publisher: Harvard Business Review Press

Published: 2014-08-12

Total Pages: 329

ISBN-13: 1422196089

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"The best sales book of the year" — strategy+business magazine That gap between your company’s sales efforts and strategy? It’s real—and a huge vulnerability. Addressing that gap, actionably and with attention to relevant research, is the focus of this book. In Aligning Strategy and Sales, Harvard Business School professor Frank Cespedes equips you to link your go-to-market initiatives with strategic goals. Cespedes offers a road map to articulate strategy in ways that people in the field can understand and that will fuel the behaviors required for profitable growth. Without that alignment, leaders will press for better execution when they need a better strategy, or change strategic direction with great cost and turmoil when they should focus on the basics of sales execution. With thoughtful, clear, and engaging examples, Aligning Strategy and Sales provides a framework for diagnosing and managing the core levers available for effective selling in any organization. It will give you the know-how and tools to move from ideas to action and build a sales effort linked to your firm’s unique goals, not a generic selling formula. Cespedes shows how sales efforts affect all elements of value creation in a business, whether you’re a start-up seeking to scale or an established firm looking to jump-start new growth. The book provides key insights to optimize your firm’s customer management activities and so improve selling and strategy.

Drilling Down: Turning Customer Data into Profits with a Spreadsheet
Drilling Down: Turning Customer Data into Profits with a Spreadsheet

Author: Jim Novo

Publisher: BookLocker.com, Inc.

Published: 2004-06-18

Total Pages: 380

ISBN-13: 1644387832

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I spend a lot of time in marketing-oriented discussion lists. If you do, you probably also sense the incredible frustration of people who keep asking about using their customer data to retain customers and increase profits. Everybody knows they should be doing it, but can't find out how to do it. Consultants and agencies make this process sound like some kind of "black magic", something you can't possibly do yourself. I disagree. I think the average business owner can do a perfectly decent job creating profiles and using them to retain customers and drive profits. Thus the book. The examples provided are Internet specific, but the methods can be used in any business where customer data is available. This book is about the down-and-dirty, nitty-gritty art of taking chunks of data generated by your customers and making sense of it, getting it to speak to you, creating insight into what types of marketing or general business actions you can take to make your business more profitable. We'll be talking about "action-oriented" ideas you can generate on your own to drive sales and profits, ideas that will reveal themselves by analyzing your own customer data, using only a spreadsheet. We have all heard how important it is to collect customer data, to "know" your customer. What I don't hear much about is what exactly you DO with all that data once you have collected it. How is it used? What exactly is Drilling Down into the data supposed to tell me, and what am I looking for when I get there? For that matter, what data should I be collecting and how will I use it when I have it? And how much is this process going to cost me? The following list outlines what you will learn and be able to do after reading the Drilling Down book: --What data is important to collect about a customer and what data is not --How to create action-oriented customer profiles with an Excel spreadsheet --How to use these profiles to plan marketing promotions --How to use these profiles to define the future value of your customers --How to use these profiles to measure the general health of your business --How to use these profiles to encourage customers to do what you want them to --How to predict when a customer is about to defect and leave you --How to increase your profits while decreasing your marketing costs --How to design high ROI (Return on Investment) marketing promotions How to blow away investors with predictions of the future profitability of your business Table of Contents Chapter 1: What's a Customer Profile? Chapter 2: Data-Driven Marketing - Customer Retention Basics Chapter 3: The Language of Data, The Science of Profit Chapter 4: Interactivity Changes the Rules of the Game Chapter 5: How to Build a Customer Profiling Spreadsheet Chapter 6: How to Profile (Score) Your Customers Chapter 7: Marketing Using Customer Scores - Basic Approach Chapter 8: Using Customer Characteristics and Multiple Scores Chapter 9: Watching Scores over Time - Customer LifeCycles Chapter 10: Customer Scoring Grids - Profiling on Steroids Chapter 11: Calculating and Using LifeTime Value in Promotions Chapter 12: Turning Profiles into Profits - the Staging Area Chapter 13: Turning Profiles into Profits - the Financial Model Chapter 14: Turning Profiles into Profits - Financial Tweaks Chapter 15: Measuring Success in Best Customer Promotions Chapter 16: Some Final Thoughts Seasonal Adjustments to Marketing Promotions Don't Fight Customer Behavior CRM Software and Customer Scoring Data-Driven Marketing Program Descriptions There's more! Automate the basic customer scoring process on large groups of customers. Use the software included free with this edition! Windows OS and MS Access and Excel required to run the software.