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Be the Hero by Noah Blumenthal

Be the Hero
By Noah Blumenthal
Berrett-Koehler Publishers, 2009

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“Perception is reality” comes to mind when reading this book. Perception is a powerful influencer of how we see others, situations, and ourselves.

Author Noah Blumenthal uses a parable of an average guy who is struggling with purpose in his life, to guide the reader on a path of revelation and understanding of how we can use our own perception to paint ourselves and others as victims, villains, or heroes. He shows how perception is something that we can control and therefore, we influence the outcomes of how we interact with others. Blumenthal also offers insight into how to deal with our own demons.

The book is a short 137 pages, of which the first 120 tells the story and the remainder provides a resource guide. This little book is full of insights into how people perceive others, situations and themselves. It contends that we view each of these to paint others and ourselves as a victim, villain, or hero. In almost every instance, though, we have the choice on which one will apply.

The main characters in the book include Jeff, a generally good guy that is struggling in his work and home life and Martin, an old high school friend and management coach. They spend a few days together in which they have several discussions over lunch, about how people tell themselves stories regarding other people, situations and themselves. Martin guides Jeff to alternative views of the situations, his boss, and himself that lead to a better relationship—not by changing the situation, but by changing how Jeff chooses to look at it. Martin uses examples from his life and some “heroes” that he has met along the way to help Jeff understand how people create and control their reality to the benefit of a more fulfilling life.

The heroes in life see and deal with things with an attitude that helps them overcome adversity and enjoy the gifts of life. A wise man once told me that attitude is one of the few things we can control in life. This book provides a model of how to recognize that and, more importantly, how to do something about it.

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2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

The Speed of Trust by Stephen M.R. Covey with Rebecca R. Merrill

The Speed of Trust

By Stephen M.R. Covey with Rebecca R. Merrill
Free Press, 2006

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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Ordinarily I am not a fan of the offspring of famous people writing a book, but Covey has forged his own way in the business world and has written a book that covers the most important thing anyone or any organization can possess— trust. If you don’t have this as a foundation, you have nothing, as many of our “leading” companies and governments have discovered. Lose trust and you can lose all. The good element of the book lies with Covey’s optimism that you can recover trust.

This is not a “feel good” book or a manuscript on morals (although that is covered), but mainly an exploration of the things that make us who we are in others’ eyes, which ultimately helps us look into our own beings.  While a lot of this book is about business, it also covers personal relationships. I found myself reflecting on my own as I read through. Covey talks to two main characteristics about people—character and competence. He likens these to a tree with four core characteristics: the roots, which you can’t see, represent integrity; more visible is the trunk—intent—that emerges from the roots; the branches are capability, which you develop over time; and the leaves are results. It is easy to understand these and Covey takes a long time to develop them. While there are many books on each of these subjects, this book puts them together.

The actions that impact trust are covered in the section “Thirteen Behaviors.” These seem pretty basic but, once again, Covey covers them comprehensively and in context. Such behaviors as “Talk Straight,” “Right Wrongs,” and “Practice Accountability” ring true. He cites examples of people who demonstrate these behaviors as well as giving examples of what a bad behavior might look like.

Around these behaviors are what Covey describes as “waves of trust”—meaning the effect of what you do can ripple from a personal to a societal level. So, through some “simple” concepts, Covey weaves a book that can help you assess both yourself and your organization, and offers some concrete how-to’s on becoming the trusted person or organization you want to be.

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2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Social Intelligence: The New Science of Success by Karl Albrecht

Social Intelligence: The New Science of Success

By Karl Albrecht
Jossey-Bass, 2006

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

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In a 2006 national survey, 1,000 employers ranked “interpersonal skills” and “communication skills” first and second in a list of mandatory qualities they sought in new hires. Although lumped as “people skills” in common parlance, the author, consultant Karl Albrecht, asserts that what employers are really seeking is something more nuanced and multi-dimensional: “social intelligence.” To Albrecht, it is a single element of the six-sided model of intelligence crafted in 1980 by professor Howard Gardner and coined ASPEAK, for abstract (IQ), social, practical, emotional, aesthetic, and kinesthetic. Gardener’s research formed the foundation for Daniel Goleman’s breakthrough 1995 bestseller, Emotional Intelligence and his subsequent 2006 volume, published a few weeks after this one by Albrecht and also titled Social Intelligence.

In Albrecht’s version of social intelligence, these innate abilities can be measured using five dimensions of assessment, in yet another acronym—SPACE: Situational Awareness; Presence; Authenticity; Clarity; and Empathy.

Albrecht supplies short self-assessment quizzes to measure one’s aptitude in each aspect of “SPACE”—tools that could be readily adapted for use in workshops or the classroom. In a bonus for Career Resource staff or Organizational Development faculty, there’s a multiple-choice assessment section on social interaction style preferences. Based on Jung’s familiar four-part model—Driver, Energizer, Diplomat, or Loner, it could be a very useful guide for teaching students to augment their natural strengths with techniques that mitigate opposing weaknesses. The final third of the book deals with adapting various style preferences in the workplace.

In sum, Albrecht’s Social Intelligence is a simple-to-read, yet thought-provoking response to Daniel Goleman’s 1995 bestseller, Emotional Intelligence, which emphasized intrapersonal skills as the critical key to societal success. Instead, it is inter-personal skills, or “social intelligence,” that is more crucial than either IQ or emotional mastery in fueling success at work in the 21st century. I’d give the book three stars. It’s interesting and valuable, but not something that belongs on everybody’s bookshelf. For people in HR, it should be rated a four.

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2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life by Alice Schroeder

The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life

By Alice Schroeder
Bantam, 2008

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I confess to having read The Snowball twice since its release in September 2008, prior to offering to review the book for GBR. This 836-page biography traces the life and career of arguably the most interesting businessman since the captains of industry during the Gilded Age. The author, who was an insurance analyst for Morgan Stanley, became Buffett’s biographer upon his invitation. Buffett provided her an extraordinary level of access to his archives, as well as over 2,000 hours of interviews with him and numerous friends, relatives, and associates. The result is a fascinatingly comprehensive story of how a stockbroker and subsequent U.S. senator’s son reached the pinnacle of accomplishment in the financial and business leadership spheres. The irony of this man is the simple, informal nature that underlies all he is and does. The book aptly illustrates that Buffett as a child displayed three prodigious traits that foretold his potential. Young Buffett loved to collect things, he loved to tally and keep an accounting of these things, and he had a towering capacity for learning and retaining knowledge. The biography follows a loose chronology weaving together the subject’s well documented business deals and associations, personal friendships, and family life. Typically an investment banking analyst with a background as a CPA and project manager at FASB might not be expected to craft a rich, complexly layered, and free-flowing work; but that is exactly what Schroeder does. She allows the reader to freely observe, without being noticed, an anthology of prominent people and business events. Far from being a heavily structured timeline, The Snowball reads like a series of interrelated anecdotes.

It is a very highly decorated book. It debuted at No. 1 on the New York Times and Publishers Weekly lists of nonfiction best-sellers. Time Magazine named The Snowball one of the 10 best books of the year. Other best-of-the-year lists on which The Snowball appeared were Publishers Weekly, The Financial Times, Business Week, USA Today, and The Washington Post. The book was selected a Top 100 Editor’s Pick and one of the five best biographies of the year by Amazon.com editors.

While many books about Buffett have simply focused on him as a businessman or investor, Schroeder has created a comprehensive narrative of this extraordinary life.  Therefore, those who seek a management guide or investing manual are surely to be perplexed by the numerous personal insights. However for the reader who enjoys biographies, history, and business, this panoramic view of an iconic life could not be more entertaining.

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2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Roadmaps and Revelations by Paul R. Niven

Roadmaps and Revelations
By Paul R. Niven
Wiley, 2009

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There are tens of thousands of books available on the subject of strategy.  Over 110,000 are available on Amazon.com alone. Books by authors including Norton, Kaplan and Porter are a staple in many MBA strategy courses.

So how does Paul R. Niven, a strategy consultant, hope to stand out in a sea of established works? His attempt is “a business fable.” Niven’s three previous works on balanced scorecards are basically how-to books. Roadmaps and Revelations is a story of a road trip that takes many metaphorical turns.

The book is a quick read at 215 pages. The first 184 are the fable and the remaining 21 pages are a summary of Niven’s approach to strategic planning.

The main characters in the book include Rory Newman, Director of Planning for a privately held company, and Sydney Wise, a serial entrepreneur and strategy guru. The two are thrown together through a series of circumstances that results in a road trip down California’s Pacific Coast Highway from Napa Valley to San Diego. An acquisition of the privately held company puts Rory on the spot to develop a strategic plan for the company in a few days. He stresses about how he might approach this and then fate delivers Sydney. What ensues is a two-day road trip with a number of experiences and conversations that help Rory develop his strategic “story.” As quickly as Sydney enters Rory’s life, he disappears again, making an emergency departure at LAX. The fable, like PCH, has many twists and turns. Many of these are contrived experiences to make the author’s point on strategic development. Some, however, are just distracting.

The author’s message is clear:

• Many companies take a poor approach to developing strategies.
• A clear mission is at the center of a solid strategic planning process.
• Strategy development does not have to be an overly complex process.

Niven weaves his 10-step process of strategy development and implementation into the fable. Or if you just want to get to the point, you can simply fast forward to page 185 and read the “Process and Model Summary.” The author also promotes his Web site and consulting practice at the end.

This book is not for everyone. If you learn better by reading stories, this book will be helpful in underscoring the lessons you picked up at business school. If you learn better by having real fact-based examples of strategic planning or a reference manual, there are other books you should read.

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2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

The Spoiled American

An underlying shortcoming exists that prevents U.S. companies from globalizing— U.S. companies and the managers and executives who run them are spoiled.

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At the start of his administration, President Obama set a goal to double exports from U.S. companies. The hope was that increasing exports would dramatically benefit the U.S. economy in a number of ways. Chiefly among these would be to significantly improve the U.S. balance of payments, and also to measurably decrease unemployment as more workers were needed to produce U.S. exports.

Tremendous opportunities do exist for U.S. companies to expand exports (and international business in general). However, an underlying shortcoming exists that prevents U.S. companies from globalizing—U.S. companies and the managers and executives who run them are spoiled. In this article, I assert that because U.S. companies have achieved relatively easy success in serving their domestic markets compared to their counterparts in other countries that have had a lengthy history of serving multi-country markets, it will be difficult to achieve the Obama administration’s goals until U.S. companies overcome their “domestic complacency.”

Do the Numbers Make Sense?

Is the assumption that doubling U.S. exports will benefit the U.S. economy true? In 2009, the U.S. trade balance suffered an estimated deficit of approximately $450 billion (exports of $1 trillion, imports of $1.45 trillion). Assuming no reduction in imports, simple math tells us that doubling exports would produce a swing from a $450 billion deficit to a $550 billion surplus ($2 trillion less a constant level of imports of $1.45 trillion). So, we can conclude that achievement of the administration’s goal of simply doubling exports would certainly resolve the problem of a negative trade balance.

The implications for employment could be just as strikingly positive. Assuming that the economy has increased by the $1 trillion in exports (or approximately an additional 7 percent in 2009 GDP of over $14 trillion), we must also assume an equivalent increase in the number of jobs needed, thus unemployment would decrease from approximately 15 million (about 10 percent) to 5.34 million, or a 3.5 percent unemployment rate. In other words, a 7 percent increase in the GDP would result in an increase of 7 percent in the number of employed. While this model may be oversimplified, for our purposes, I believe that we could agree that such dramatic increases in exports would doubtlessly result in very attractive positives for the U.S. economy.

Potential for More Exports?

The real question is, is the doubling of exports a realistic goal? Is there room in the market for more exporters? How maxed out are companies in the U.S. in their export capabilities? How many U.S. companies could export more and to more countries? Or do more U.S. companies who do little or no exporting need to be convinced to begin exporting (and then presumably assisted in doing so)? Implicit in the Obama initiative is the desire to get companies who already export to expand their reach to more countries under the assumption that it’s a lot easier to convince the “converted” than to convert non-exporting U.S. companies to think globally for the first time.

In terms of how many U.S. companies are currently involved in exporting, the short answer is not many:

• U.S. exports in 2009 accounted for approximately $1 trillion U.S. in goods, representing only 7 percent of the U.S. economy and involved a much smaller portion of total companies (discussed below).[1]
• The Department of Commerce reports that only 1 percent of all U.S. companies export to another country. Of the approximately 17,000 large U.S. companies (with over 500 employees) who are presumably better positioned to export, only an estimated 5,000 (29 percent) are exporting to at least one country.[1]
• The total number of U.S. exporters decline to 0.5 percent when the contiguous NAFTA countries (Canada and Mexico) are stripped out of these figures. The number of U.S. large companies decline to 12 percent.[1]

The takeaway from these facts is that the U.S. economy is much more dependent on internal demand as the driver of its success, and when this suffers a downturn as it has in recent years, the U.S. economy doesn’t have the advantage of appealing to a global marketplace. Thus, very significant opportunities exist to increase exports through: (1) encouraging the companies that are already exporting, primarily to Canada and Mexico, to expand their export activities to other countries, and (2) stimulating the 99 percent of companies (and over 70 percent of large companies) to begin exporting for the first time. Emerging markets may still be relatively booming during the current downturn, but the U.S. doesn’t benefit from this as it is not really serving these markets as much as it could and should. In fact, the one major emerging market to which we do export a lot, China, enjoys an approximate $225 billion goods trade surplus with the U.S., (over three times the amount that the U.S. exports to China). On the other hand, both developed and emerging markets such as Germany and China are, in order of magnitude, much larger exporters than the U.S., and enjoy major trade surpluses, as is well known.

One might argue that the U.S. economy doesn’t really need to export: we are already very global. A significant number of U.S. companies have set up operations in other countries and are therefore manufacturing and providing services in these countries so we don’t need to export from the U.S. It would stand to reason then that our export numbers are so low because our foreign direct investment (FDI), which measures the extent of our activities in other countries, is so high.

However, this argument doesn’t really hold water. According to research conducted by A.T. Kearney, the U.S. continues to rank near the bottom of the top 60 countries in terms of FDI.[2] Furthermore, to the extent that a company has investments in other countries, it is most likely already exporting to that country as part of its global sourcing strategy, so the export numbers presumably already reflect the influence of FDI to some extent.

So why do so few companies export and why this tremendous shortfall in the globalization of the U.S economy when such an orientation and effort is sorely needed? How did we get so far behind most other economies? And are we likely to stay there?

I believe that the shortfall exists and will continue to exist for the two major inter-related reasons stated above: (1) U.S. companies are spoiled; and (2) American managers and executives themselves are also spoiled.

The Spoiled American Company

In general, U.S. companies are spoiled because historically they have needed only to operate in the relative simplicity of their very familiar home country market to be successful. This situation is unlike that of companies in other countries, like Germany, which has had to search out markets in several countries.[3] And, unfortunately, it seems that the vast majority of U.S. companies believe either that their home country market will continue to sustain them for the foreseeable future or if it is not currently, it will resume soon once the U.S. returns to its position as the dominant global market.

We can understand easily the reasons for this thinking. For decades the U.S. markets have been the largest globally as well as the fastest growing for most goods, certainly enough so to support even the most ambitious of companies’ business expectations. But this is changing; for example, in 2007 consumer spending in emerging markets was equal to that of the U.S., and has continued to grow. In fact, JPMorgan Chase projects that by the end of 2010, almost 35  percent of the world’s consumer spending total will be in emerging markets, while the United State’s share will have declined to approximately 27 percent.[4]

So do U.S. companies really understand the importance of emerging markets? That doesn’t seem to be the case. A recent McKinsey Global Survey reported that North American companies have made the lowest rate of actions to capture emerging market growth than any other region.[5]

According to the New York Times, Coca-Cola, the premier global brand, reported disappointing quarterly profits earlier this year, primarily due to weak sales in the U.S., their largest single-country market, (although three-quarters of sales come from outside North America). Specifically, sales in the U.S. declined by 2 percent, while volume increases in emerging markets were in double digits, for example, India (+29 percent), Turkey (+18 percent), Brazil (+12 percent), as well as in Russia, Egypt, Vietnam, and the Philippines.[6] Clearly, Coca-Cola shouldn’t need convincing to energetically pursue volume in emerging markets.

There are those who argue that this global imbalance will right itself once things return to normal, but it’s not quite clear how they intend for this to happen. Do they believe that the U.S. will return to growth rates as high as or greater than emerging markets, for example, and/or that the rest of the world’s growth will slow down? Or do they mean that goods in other countries will become more expensive, for example, from a revaluation of their currencies (think China) so that U.S. prices will become more attractive globally? Or do they believe that Congress will be able to restrict imports, which will allow U.S. companies to replace imported goods with locally manufactured goods?

Few economists that I’ve been exposed to honestly believe that any of the above will happen or will have much of a positive effect. In the past when we’ve tried to dampen imports, for example during the Great Depression through import restrictions, the rest of the world did likewise in retaliation, thus severely restricting U.S. exports and pushing the country (and the world) into an even greater Depression. And, recent speeches by Congress blaming China’s unwillingness to revalue their currency for the trade imbalance are only wishful thinking. It is unreasonable to assume that a rise in Chinese prices will automatically persuade consumers to beat a path to the doors of U.S. companies. Very few analysts agree that any reasonable increase in Chinese prices will make much of a dent in the massive U.S. trade deficit with the rest of the world through increased U.S. exports or decreased imports from China, but perhaps it’s easier to blame somebody else for our lack of success.

The Spoiled American Executive

It is my experience that, in a business environment where there has been little or no exposure to international business, American managers have perceived little need to focus their career aspirations on anywhere else but the U.S. And, as discussed, this negatively affects their willingness and ability to seek out international opportunities for their companies. Put another way, if a U.S. manager believes that ample career opportunities are available in the U.S., why would he or she be motivated to promote international business within a company or seek out an international career?

Societal influences may also come into play here. Perhaps our education system does not encourage international thinking. For example, foreign language education, which certainly provides one aspect of international sensitivity, lags far behind other countries. In my own international experience over a 20-year period, I found that a very high  percentage of non-American expatriate executives spoke at least a second language, and in many cases, a third or fourth language before they even embarked on their first non-home country assignment. And they always learned their host country language fairly fluently. Unlike the vast majority of American executives working internationally who attempt to survive solely in English, it’s not unusual for an experienced international executive to speak several languages.

Incidentally, as a consequence, when an American executive does take an international assignment, the associated expatriate remuneration, benefits, and perquisites that are required to support him/her far outweigh what the company would pay a local or a non-American expatriate (a so-called third country national).

Conclusion

Because of the relatively very low penetration of exports by U.S. companies, it’s clear that significant opportunities exist for increasing the U.S. economy dramatically through its export activity. But, to capitalize on these opportunities, we need to understand better why more companies are not exporting and then address the related issues. My contention is that the mindset of U.S. companies and their executives, which has been influenced by a long history of success in serving almost exclusively a domestic market, will need to shift attitudinally to one that recognizes the necessity of doing business globally. Only then can the necessary steps be taken to begin expanding U.S. exports.

---

[1] U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis 2009, U.S. Census Bureau.

[2] A.T. Kearney/FOREIGN POLICY Globalization Index, 2007 Edition, ForeignPolicy.com; ATKearney.com.

[3] Lemon aid: Germany’s exporting prowess is leaving the rest of the euro area behind,” The Economist, July 8, 2010.

[4] A Special Report on Innovation in Emerging Markets,” The Economist, April 17, 2010 (p 10, exhibit 4) source: JPMorgan Chase.

[5] Five Forces Shaping the Global Economy, McKinsey Global Survey Results, 2010.

[6] Associated Press, “Coke Profit Fails To Meet Expectations,” New York Times, April 21, 2010, at B7.

2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Choosing Your Negotiation Site

The staging of a negotiation can have long-term ramifications on the relationship between the two parties. This article explores the possibilities and strategies surrounding this crucial decision.

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Lorenz’s Butterfly Effect holds that minute variations at the inception of a dynamic exercise will produce unexpected and increasingly larger variations as the exercise plays out. The longer and more complex the exercise, the more pronounced the variations. Negotiations are dynamic exercises and Lorenz’s phenomena holds true in this case as well. Negotiators constantly disclose new information and resort to a panoply of new tactics and unique moves. From early on, seemingly arbitrary decisions and moves can have a crucial impact as the negotiation develops. Preparation is required to anticipate and plan for these variables that can impact negotiation.

Proper preparation requires anticipating a myriad of pre-negotiation considerations then working through them. One important consideration is the staging of the negotiation, i.e. planning where the negotiation will take place. While this may appear to be a minor factor, the venue can have long-term ramifications on the relationship between the two parties. This article explores the possibilities and strategies surrounding this crucial decision.

Where Should You Conduct the Negotiation?

When a typical executive is asked where they would choose to negotiate—their place or the other party’s place—a significant number of them will say, “My place.” Most people assume there is a “home-court advantage,” but choosing the negotiation site is a critical move and should not be a knee-jerk, default decision. First, consider abandoning preconceptions you may harbor about conducting a negotiation. By allowing preconceptions to become “defaults,” a negotiator will overlook and possibly miss very powerful opportunities.

It better serves the negotiator and his or her principal if as many variables as possible are carefully considered and pre-planned. This way the negotiator can more fully concentrate on the task at hand—to negotiate—and employ proactive tactics and/or strategies and not knee-jerk reactions. There are clear tactical and strategic options a negotiator must consider when choosing a site. These apparently innocuous choices, like in Lorenz’s “Butterfly Effect,” will almost certainly have an ever-increasing effect on the negotiation. Whether the negotiation site influences the negotiation positively or negatively may be contingent on the initial decision of where to conduct the negotiation.

Their Place

There are many benefits to conducting the negotiation at the other party’s choice of venue. The choices mentioned in this article are by no means exhaustive. I consider both practical and psychological reasons for choosing the other party’s office. Finally, there is no order of preference. That is to say, no one option is more important than another. Each should be independently considered.

Confidence

First, consider the non-verbal communication you give when you are willing to go to the other side’s office, plant, or place of business to conduct an important negotiation. You are saying “I am confident in my position.” An aura of strength and confidence is important and can be transmitted non-verbally in a high-stress situation like an important negotiation. The perception of confidence in your position lends credibility, which, in turn, may help the other party more readily embrace your position.

Opportunity

Second, going to the other party’s site gives the message, “I respect you. I respect your time.” A more subtle Meta message says, “I am not afraid of you.” While many people view negotiation tantamount to warfare, that approach may lead the negotiators into an inefficient environment. Efficient negotiations often look more like a partnership than a battle. Respect plays in integral part in an efficient, successful negotiation, especially if the negotiator looks at “winning” as something beyond this “one-off” meeting. Respect leads to positive relationships and positive relationships lead to parties that are willing to explore possibilities in a negotiation in hopes of a more efficient, mutually beneficial outcome. Fear of “losing” can cause negotiators to feel vulnerable. Some respond to this feeling by acting more forceful or aggressive, while others are more reticent to explore possibilities. It’s important that both parties see the negotiation as an opportunity, not a danger. The more positive messages a negotiator can deliver, the more the chances increase that the other party will see this negotiation as an opportunity as opposed to a danger.

Comfort Zone

Third, conducting the negotiation at the other party’s site may also give them a sense of comfort. Negotiations, especially those entailing significant resources, can take a physical and emotional toll. Giving the other party the opportunity to remain in their comfort zone may ultimately be more helpful to you then it is to them, because it may get them to see the negotiation as an opportunity and thus engage in the bargaining process with a spirit of cooperation rather than from a place of fear and protectiveness.

Cues

Fourth, going to the other party’s site has other very practical advantages. The negotiator has an opportunity to see more than just a body in front of them. Going to the place they consider a safe or comfort zone lends more dimension to the person. It also affords the negotiator an opportunity to gather intelligence about what influences the other party and may be a window into their motivations. It also helps in making a connection to build rapport. For example, When you enter another negotiator’s office, what pictures are on the wall? What books are in the bookshelf? What items are on the desk or in the office that appear to bring meaning to this person’s life? What artwork or memorabilia do they put on display? All of these things are clues into what drives this person. They are also cues you can use to open up a conversation and ask questions.

“Is that your family?” “Beautiful car, did you build it?” “What is the meaning of….?” These are just a few of the questions one might ask, which have nothing to do with the pending negotiation. They are a segue into a personal conversation that can alleviate some of their fear or concerns the other party may have about you, and open a dialog wherein you become more human and not just “the other side.” The goal is to use every tool you have at your disposal to find a way to get the other party to “buy in” to your perspectives of the issues, positions, and interests you are going to negotiate. By establishing common personal interests, you are more likely to establish a positive relationship than if you were to just cut to the chase and begin butting heads. Whatever you have to sell, whatever you need from this person, whatever the purpose is for being there to negotiate can wait a few moments while you connect with the other side on a personal level. Being in the other party’s office or factory may help in establishing this kind of rapport.

Available Information

Finally, another tactical consideration for going to the other party’s office or factory is that when negotiating there it is difficult for them to hide paperwork or declare files unavailable. It also gives you the advantage, when you need to defer or “hide the ball,” by saying, “Oh, that file is at my office.” Of course this can cut both ways. If it is something you truly don’t have and need, not having immediate access can be detrimental.

The On-site Visit

Negotiating at their plant or manufacturing site can have numerous benefits and is another important source of intelligence. For instance, are they in a rented facility? Are family members in critical positions that could be compromised in the event of a familial rift? Can they do what they say they can?

Suppose you are a buyer negotiating a “requirements contract” with a manufacturer. A “requirements contract” is an agreement by the manufacturer to provide all the buyer’s needs for a certain product. In doing your due diligence, you find a manufacturer whose price is very favorable. It would be a prudent move to schedule the negotiation at the manufacturer’s plant to see the facility, the manufacturing line, and just observe the daily routine at the plant. It affords you an opportunity to see, firsthand, if they really have the capacity to deliver what they promise. Under the guise of a respectful offer to negotiate at their factory, you get the ancillary benefit of gathering important information. On the other hand, any hesitation on their end to show you their plant and line should put you on notice that there may be a problem.

Your Place

As mentioned above, most negotiators generally feel more comfortable and possibly more confident in their ability to engage in meaningful negotiations at their own place of business. Additionally, if the negotiator is at his or her office, they will have easier access to any documents or records they may need during the negotiation. He or she will also have the benefit of the support staff and access to computers and other sources of information that may be important. On the other hand, it is important to note the other party has the same ease of access to your information. Conflict over whether or not to provide the information could then become a distracting issue.

Non-Verbal Messages

There may be another, more subtle purpose, for insisting on your office being the negotiation site. You may want to deliver a non-verbal message to intimidate, or more euphemistically, impress the other party. One successful attorney in Los Angeles takes visitors by a number of model dioramas. Each diorama depicts the incident that gave rise to a lawsuit for which he was lead counsel. Accompanying the models are newspaper clippings with the basic facts of the case and headlines such as, “Largest Award in the History of California,” “Largest Verdict Ever Awarded by a California Jury,” and “Multimillion Dollar Jury Award Assessed Against the City of…” The visitor sees this before speaking to anyone other than the receptionist. Nothing needs to be said, but there is the message to the visitor that they are in the presence of a powerful and successful attorney.

Ego Wall

Successful people (or people who want to appear successful) give numerous non-verbal messages. They use expensive watches, exotic vehicles, and custom-made suits. Their homes, offices, and personal appearances are all staged indices of success and power. Successful people know how to use these tools to their advantage. It is fair to assume their negotiation venue will also be staged to impress. Sometimes it is important to make the statement non-verbally. It would be gauche to say, “Look how good I am. Look at all my awards.” For this reason many professional people will have an “ego wall.” The ego wall is intended to impress and/or intimidate. It may have awards, citations, unique artwork, and certificates from schools and universities. Under some circumstances, pictures of the host in a golf foursome with a president of a multinational company, a famous celebrity, or shaking hands with the President of the United States makes a strong statement. As with every medium of communication, one has to be prudent. If you have a picture of you shaking the hand of your good friend George Bush or, alternatively, your friend Barack Obama and your guest is an ardent supporter for the other party, you may have made a critical faux pas. It all goes back to preparation. The central question is, “Why am I deciding to negotiate in a given place and what are the potential risks and benefits?”

Neutral Territory

The tactic of choosing a place that neither party has ties to has been in effect for time immemorial. Some popular neutral sites include the golf course, the Rotary club, other service clubs, or a place like the Jonathan Club, an “exclusive” club where deals are negotiated and made sans the pressure of outside disturbance. If the environment is upscale, there are additional messages to consider, such as “I think you are special enough to bring you here,” or “This is the way I do business” or any other number of unstated messages.

In days gone by, the venue was often a bar for a couple of lunchtime martinis. We see this scene played over and over again in “Mad Men,” a current, popular television program on AMC depicting 1960s business behavior. The alcohol, along with the informal environment, was intended to create a relaxed ambiance and to lower defenses and inhibitions. The purpose for choosing a neutral, informal venue is to take the edge off of the negotiations. In today’s wired, high-speed world, proposing a meeting at a neutral site should take into consideration whether or not there is Wi-Fi or other technological requirements.

As a note, some organizations and clubs discourage the discussion of business on the premises. It would be a major error for you to attempt to open a business negotiation under such circumstances. Presumptively your host knows the rules and bringing you to the site is a polite way of saying, “I am not ready to discuss business yet.” Other forums are too busy or noisy to allow any meaningful negotiation. Going to a public forum, such as a bar or restaurant, may not provide the necessary confidentiality or privacy for a crucial negotiation. Also, the other party may have some bias against such an unprofessional environment. The attempt to convey a certain message could backfire.

A Note about Manager-Employee Negotiations

A negotiation in which a manager is negotiating to resolve a conflict with subordinates requires some special considerations. Does the manager go to the “floor” and discuss the matter with the employee(s) in a place where the conversation could be overheard or observed by the employee’s peers? Does the manager have the subordinate come to his/her office with a “power desk” separating them? Does the manager take the employee to the local bar for a beer and informally discuss the issue? Each of those decisions has ramifications that should be considered before the manager begins the negotiation.

Conclusion

The pros and cons discussed in this article for deciding where to conduct the negotiation are not exhaustive. The article is designed to raise your awareness of the potential benefits and detriments of a given choice. If there is any crucial “take away,” it is that the place to talk should be a factor of thoughtful and reasoned consideration. In making your choice you should consider the nature of the negotiation at hand, the parties involved, the goal, the issues, and the interests. You should not fall back on a default choice of “our place.” Choosing the proper site for the negotiation can be a powerful move. It should always constitute a part of your negotiation preparation and it should be carefully considered.

As the Butterfly Effect Theory holds, failure to consider minor matters at the outset may result in those “small” issues becoming gigantic issues—issues that can spell the success or failure of the negotiation. A little factor such as not having expeditious access to your files and records can become exponentially more troublesome the longer and more complex the negotiation. The negotiator who fails to plan should plan to fail. Get it right the first time through thoughtful and meticulous planning.

2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Editorial: Systems Thinking

Much of what has worked in the past no longer works in today’s competitive environment forcing firms to abolish the comfortable ways of doing business and to work harder to find new ways of creating and delivering value to their customers.

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The global recession that we have experienced in the last several years has caused businesses to rethink their operations. Even the industry leaders that have been able to gain a substantial advantage in the marketplace have not been immune to the struggle. Most of their competitive advantages—be it pricing power, control of supply-chain and distribution channels, name brand recognition, or a dedicated customer base—are short-lived, as the conditions are ever-changing. Much of what has worked in the past no longer works in today’s competitive environment. The change has forced firms to abolish the comfortable ways of doing business and to work harder to find new ways of creating and delivering value to their customers. As a result, many businesses are breaking down divisional barriers and conducting business in a more agile, flexible, innovative, and creative manner. To stay ahead of the curve, if not just afloat, businesses must understand how to create new value from multiple divisions and perspectives, drawing on a diverse skill set including information systems, law, entrepreneurship, organizational design, strategy, decision sciences, market, accounting, and finance.

This new perspective on orchestrating all of the organization’s functions and divisions can be described as a “systems thinking” approach to doing business. Systems thinking views the entities of the organization (i.e., departments or functions) and their associated processes from a holistic viewpoint and looks at them over time. It requires an understanding of the interactions and the cause-and-effect relationships between organizational functions and divisions. Think of it like a fishbowl—the fish, plants, water, oxygen, and food work together to create a systemic environment in which each entity relies on the other to survive and to be productive. Removing or damaging one part of the system can be catastrophic for the system as a whole. Many successful firms have been able to apply the notion of systems thinking to their organizations and have skillfully synchronized their firm’s initiatives so that the customer can experience and recognize their full value.

Initiatives that are enacted within the organization before they are fully developed can often have adverse effect on other parts of the firm. Typical questions that you should ask yourself before engaging in any strategic initiative are: What are the effects that the changes will have on other parts of the organization? Which functions may gain and which may lose as a result of this initiative? Would this initiative lead to any short- and long-term gains?

In this issue of the Graziadio Business Review, our contributing authors have shared articles that address how firms can systemically create value throughout the organization—whether it be through improvisation when dealing with ambiguity and complexity (Leybourne), by properly managing human resource capital during economic recovery (Leo and Schieberl), through corporate negotiation factors (Rainey) or by expanding globally through exports (Coscarello). All of these are important considerations for corporations that aim to be more competitive. In addition, interviews on green technology and leadership (Kass), the future of financial management (Iritani), and servanthood leadership (Bowman) are included in this issue to add an additional perspective for what is expected from firms as they attempt to conduct business and to provide value in today’s challenged economic environment. Interestingly, what remains consistent when creating new value to the customer across all business functions is the necessity to conduct business honestly and ethically.

There are numerous other ways to creatively deliver new value in corporations, especially after this down economy. We would like to hear your thoughts on other innovative and creative ways that you’ve added value to your firm. Check out a blog post on “systems thinking” at the GBR blog. Your comments are appreciated. We also encourage you to attend the Center For Applied Research 2010 Symposium, entitled “Creating Value After A Down Economy,” which will be held on August 31, 2010. Learn more about the conference at http://bschool.pepperdine.edu/events/applied-research/.

2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity

As “process” becomes less relevant in today’s flexible organizations, can organizational improvisation produce “emerging best practice?”

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

“The Times, They Are A-Changin,”[1] Bob Dylan said, or rather, sang in 1963, but as an anthem for the 2000s, he was right on the button. Organizations are changing, and changing quickly, and managers who do not recognize—and more importantly—react, to this emerging truth, will struggle to compete as markets become more demanding and competition intensifies.

Change is driven by a number of inter-related phenomena, notably:

1. the turbulence of environments;
2. the need for organizations to respond quickly to changing environments;
3. increasingly sophisticated, demanding, knowledgeable, and discerning customers; and
4. the shortening of product and service life-cycles.

Put simply, we as consumers want more choices, better quality, faster and more convenient delivery, and all at a lower price!

This requires significant change on the part of traditional organizations, and we have seen a shift away from hierarchical, “command and control,” micro-managed operational styles toward an organizational model based on “flattened” hierarchies, increased flexibility and local autonomy, the increased importance of inter and intra-organizational networks, of and self-directed, self-designed work. However, such a radical shift in organizational “style” also requires major changes in the way in which culture, motivation, commitment, and trust are addressed. Essentially, work is becoming less “formalized,” more “complex,”[2] and more “improvisational.”

This leads to a view that improvisation, which developed from Karl Weick’s early work on “sensemaking,”[3] and which has evolved through comparison to jazz,[4] and theatrical[5] improvisation, can assist in this shift. Improvisation has been accepted both conceptually[6] and empirically,[7] and has a genuine contribution to make in resolving the issues of complexity[8] and ambiguity that organizations are grappling with in these turbulent times.

Indeed, employees are arguably becoming more like entrepreneurs, or maybe “intrapreneurs,” in that they are often expected to innovate in “real time” within their organizations to resolve issues as they arise. This is the essence of improvisation, and it is also linked to an emerging area known as effectuation,[9] which involves problem solving through human actions in environments that are essentially unpredictable.

Components of Improvisation

So, what is improvised work about, and more importantly, what are the “components” of improvisation?

In 1998, academics at the University of Wisconsin[10] identified and documented three elements of improvisation: creativity, intuition, and bricolage.[11]

In other words, improvisation involves using an element of creative thought, combined with an intuitive feel for what will assist in the resolution of a particular problem. Bricolage, which essentially means “utilizing the resources at hand,” indicates that the improviser has only limited resources to apply. Bricolage comes into play because it is unlikely that the improviser in a given circumstance will have time to mobilize additional resources. This is a significant limitation at times when organizations are trying to achieve increased performance with reduced means.

Improvisation is also closely linked with time, and in particular the pressure to achieve a demanding or compressed timetable. Improvisation in this context is defined as: “…the degree to which composition and execution converge in time.”[12] It follows from this that the less the time between the design and implementation, the more that activity is improvisational. This temporal link between two activities is important in judging the degree of improvisation required in the activity.

Arguably, there are other constructs that link with the concept of improvisation, including “socialization,” given that group-based activity arguably produces more “robust” improvisational interventions, and “prototyping,” in that there are strong parallels between improvisation and new product development.[13]

In 2001, four additional elements or “constructs of improvisation” emerged from the literature[14]: adaptation, innovation, compression, and learning. Adaptation refers to the “adapting” of one of a personal store of previously successful interventions or improvised routines to assist in resolving emerging requirements. Adept and experienced improvisers innovate at the personal level in order to leverage previous practice and existing routines to solve organizational problems. Compression shortens intended timescales in order to deliver or resolve problems in less time. Learning is the outcome from successful, and indeed from unsuccessful, improvisation, in that effective interventions can join the personal library of successful improvised applications of the experienced improviser. Learning from less effective improvised activity is equally important.

Improvisation Ecology

It is evident that experienced and adept improvisers can circumvent routine and process, and deliver resolutions to problems quickly and effectively. In organizations where the culture and working styles are supportive of improvised work practices, employees can quickly develop a store of effective interventions that can be adapted and re-used. Often, this skill is linked with “experience” i.e. “this is an experienced manager.” This can however require a degree of risk tolerance that some organizations find difficult to engage with.

The next step is to capture successful improvisational activity and “codify” it—and in doing so, make the shift from “tacit” to “explicit” knowledge, that can be shared within the organization for wider benefit. This requires that the organization supports and encourages improvisational activity, and has a culture that does not denounce or worse, punish “failure.”

This is essential, as one of the outcomes of research in this area is that in many organizations, “failed” or ineffective improvisation is stigmatized, leading many employees to improvise “surreptitiously.” Moving away from “planned” activity involves discarding the shared responsibility that comes from consensus-based planning, and it exposes improvised activity to intense scrutiny. Lack of organizational support can therefore drive effective and adept improvising managers “underground.”

A Taxonomy of Improvisation

Given the importance and likely influences documented in this section, it is useful to develop a taxonomy of improvisational competence to assist with the management of complex and challenging work.

Figure 1: Improvisation Characteristics – Creativity -v- Analytical Adaptability

In Figure 1 a simple matrix is proposed that classifies activity along two axes: “creativity” and “analytical adaptability.” The intention is to assist organizations to identify situations where improvisation could reasonably be beneficial. The matrix can also help to understand what practices and procedures are relevant to organizations in similar regions of the diagram.

Creativity

The creativity axis is characterized as high and low. High creativity is associated with dramatic change, numerous risk events, and situations with many unknowns. These changes should be fundamental and more than simple incremental variation and cost escalation.

Analytical Adaptability

This axis recognizes the fact that improvisational work needs to be based on and linked with traditional analytical tools and techniques, such as the production and analysis of decision-making data (e.g. to estimate costs and scheduling). However, particularly early in the planning cycle, much creativity may be required in data collection and analysis. Questions to be answered include: Is the data typical, or did special conditions hold? Is the design facing major revisions? Are the underlying assumptions no longer valid?

If the answer to these types of questions is “yes,” then we ask the fundamental question, “Can improvised activity assist?”

In Figure 1 the vertical axis describes the level of creative challenge, which can be high or low. The horizontal axis describes the level of analytical adaptability, which again can be high or low.

For the purposes of this matrix, creativity can be considered as an “assumption breaking process,” in that it defies the acknowledged and accepted paradigm in a specific area or for a specific process.

On the other axis, analytical adaptability is considered as a “tool breaking process,” in that it defies the acknowledged and accepted paradigm for the tools and techniques. Analytical adaptability is required when the processes or the cost and schedule data are unpredictable—that is, significantly outside of their expected bounds—and the tools and techniques generally associated with activity planning appear to be predicting results well beyond a simple cost or schedule overrun. It is now appropriate to move to an explanation of the matrix.

An example from the IT sector will be given for each quadrant in the matrix, in order to contextualize the concept.

Box One: High Creativity, Low Analytical Adaptability

Smaller non-profit organizations tend to fall in this category. Non-profits often encompass creative arts organizations conducting fund-raising projects or putting on performances. They typically require considerable creative energy, but the activity often resembles previous efforts: previous fund raisers or previous performances. Therefore, while this requires considerable creativity, the analytical aspect is often similar to previous efforts and is therefore low on the analytical adaptability scale. Web page development for new markets would fall into this quadrant.

Box Two: Low Creativity, Low Analytical Adaptability

Here we have work such as incremental software maintenance and Information Technology (IT) activity, which requires relatively low creativity. Maintenance work typically inherits characteristics from the already existing parent system, which presumably has existed for a while. Therefore, relatively low creativity is also required, since maintenance changes are unlikely to require a redesign of the underlying system.

In box two, we do not expect the activity to require much in the way of new or innovative tools to analyze the project. Maintenance activity typically exists in a regime where the processes and tools are already rigorously defined, and the team is expected to follow existing protocols.

Box Three: High Creativity, High Analytical Adaptability

The pharmaceutical and drug industries characterize activity with both very high creativity and highly adaptable analytical requirements. New drugs require research and development, which is unpredictable, and calls for high degrees of creativity. Drug development is both highly regulated and expensive, so there is a great deal of analytical work to plan the development, and closely monitor the cost and schedule during the trials and acceptance. A high degree of analytical adaptability is also required to manage the project through the lengthy process with its many changes in direction. Strategic IT systems would fall within this quadrant.

Box Four: Low Creativity, High Analytical Adaptability

Here we have activity with very high analytical requirements but low creativity. Many types of Department of Defense and other large public sector projects fall in this category. The government imposes many and varied standards and procedures. While data reporting and analysis requirements in this category of activity are significant, the work is developed to a very specific and pre-existing scope statement, on which compromise and the use of immature process is rarely possible. Backroom accounting systems would also fall within this quadrant.

Summary

The logical outcome from this matrix is that creative improvisation is likely to be more evident, and indeed more effective, in certain environments. In some domains, considerable analytical creativity can be brought to bear to evolve new and innovative ways to allow adept and motivated employees to develop new ways of achieving required activity. An example of this is the development of the Grameen Bank, where bricolage and significant creative leeway is required to circumvent and adapt traditional banking models to operate effectively in a “third world” environment.

The skill in improvisation is in knowing when to relax the framework that surrounds proscribed activity in organizations, and when to impose a greater degree of rigor and structure. Realistically, this will depend on two factors:

That is, employing creativity will depend on the degree of trust and confidence that strategic managers have in the ability of employees to improvise effectively. As this trust and confidence increases, the degree of rigor and structure can be relaxed.

Managing the tension between improvisation and control is a challenge for modern organizations, but is one that needs to be addressed. Evidence suggests that traditional routines for “micro-managing” organizational activity will not deliver the flexibility and agility required in modern organizations, and will not resolve the ambiguity and complexity that are inherent in modern organizational work.

This tension is real, and complicates the relationship between proscribed activity and improvised creativity. It is apparent that those organizations that successfully manage the tension between process and improvisation effectively will benefit in the turbulent organizational environments that make up tomorrow’s challenging business landscape. As an example of this, innovative organizations like Grameen Bank are demonstrating that rethinking traditional business sectors can generate dramatic change from very small beginnings.

---

[1] Dylan, Bob, “The Times They Are a-Changin” (Columbia Records, 1963).

[2] For an interesting exposition of complexity in organizations, Ralph Stacey’s work on organizations as “complex adaptive systems” is highly recommended reading.

[3] Weick, Karl E., The Social Psychology of Organizing [2nd edition], (Addison-Wesley, 1979).

[4] Hatch, M.J., “Exploring the Empty Pages of Organizing: How Improvisational Jazz Helps Redescribe Organizational Structure” Organization Studies, 20, no. 1 (1999): 75-100.

[5] Vera, D. and M. Crossan, “Theatrical Improvisation: Lessons for Organizations” Organization Studies, 25, No. 5 (2004): 727-749.

[6] e Cunha M.P., J.V. da Cunha, and K. Kamoche, “Organizational Improvisation: what, when, how and why?” International Journal of Management Reviews, 1, No. 3 (1999): 299-341.

[7] Miner, A.S., P. Bassoff, and C. Moorman, “Organizational Improvisation and Learning: A Field Study,” Administrative Science Quarterly, 46, (2001): 304-337.

[8] Lewin, R., Complexity: Life at the Edge of Chaos, (New York: Macmillon, 1992).

[9] Effectuation is outside the scope of this paper, being an interesting subject in itself. However, for more information on effectuation, see Sarasvathy, S.D., Effectuation: Elements of Entrepreneurial Expertise (Cheltenham, Glos: Edward Elgar, 2008).

[10] Moorman C. and A.S. Miner, “The Convergence of Planning and Execution: Improvisation in New Product Development,” Journal of Marketing, 62, No. 3, (1998/July): 1-20.

[11] Bricolage can be literally translated from the French or Spanish to mean “do-it-yourself,” and in this context, it means doing the best job you can with the human, physical, and financial resources that you have at your disposal at that time.

[12] Moorman, C. and A.S. Miner, “Organizational Improvisation and Organizational Memory,” Academy of Management Review, 23 No. 4 (1998): 698.

[13] See note 10 above.

[14] Miner, A.S., P. Bassoff, and C. Moorman, “Organizational Improvisation and Learning: A Field Study,” Administrative Science Quarterly 46 (2001) 304-337.

2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study

Economic Recovery Gaining Traction

Many economists and business commentators are beginning to agree that the latter part of 2010 will make it the “rebound year.”[1][2]

Podcast: Play in new window | Download

Businesses Must Plan for Post-Recession Growth and Sustainability

It is widely reported that the economic recovery from one of the most severe recessions in United States memory is beginning to gain traction. The authors firmly believe that it is crucial for business owners, executives, managers and Human Resource professionals to prepare for this imminent economic recovery. The Federal Reserve Chairman, Ben Bernanke, recently reported on June 7, 2010, through the Associated Press[3] that he sees signs that the economy will gain traction and not fall back into a “double-dip” recession. Bernanke reported that the economy grew at a rate of 3 percent during the first quarter of this year.

The current economic mindset, however, is resulting in employee layoffs, the termination of employee benefit programs, and the elimination of training programs and leadership development efforts. Businesses should therefore begin to transition to a system that facilitates stabilization and again allows for the kind of sustainable organizational growth that can ensure the viability of any organization. This article will address issues associated with employee training, employee benefits, management development, and litigation management.

The Mindset of the Post-Recession Workplace: Survival and Sustainability

The post-recession workplace will require a return to adequate talent management, competitive employee benefits, provisions for essential employee training programs, and continued leadership development in order to both develop and maintain important job core competencies. The pace and complexity of companies’ environmental, economic, and strategic planning changes will have to be hastened in the post-recession jobs marketplace.

The Human Resources (HR) function, in particular, must play a critical role in efforts to effectively align companies with the realities of recovery. HR must provide guidance to company leaders in their efforts to successfully respond to inevitable challenges.

There is no question that over the past few years, the economic downturn has caused companies to rethink their business strategies and HR practices. While the authors of this article believe that many of the organizational changes that have been implemented will likely remain intact after the economy rebounds, new mindsets, ways of thinking, and strategies will be essential.

Re-Doubling Communication Efforts

Keep in mind that “perceptions” among employees play a very significant role in a weak economy. It is extremely important for leaders and HR professionals to maintain and encourage frequent, candid, and proactive communication. Handling the “people side” of things is more important now than ever.

Equally important is maintaining esprit de corp, not only among the employees in an organization, but among all of the appropriate stakeholders (whose perceptions are also very important).

The Role of HR Leaders: Stepping Up in the Post-Recession Recovery Period

The current recession provides an excellent opportunity for HR professionals to be effectively proactive, stepping up and contributing to their organizations strategically. HR managers and directors in today’s business climate should be involved in every step of not only the strategic planning for their organization, but also in the actual strategic implementation process.

Litigation Management

HR professionals should consider consulting with legal counsel about new trends in compliance requirements and business regulations.

After two successive years (2008 and 2009) of reporting declines in the number of lawsuits and regulatory proceedings, in 2010, senior corporate counsel began to anticipate an increase in lawsuits and government problems. This is probably because employees are emboldened to pursue their grievances by a recovering economic climate.

In the midst of a recession, business organizations often find that the number of lawsuits decline. Even government probes will often be fewer in number. Repercussions from the recession are the most frequently cited reasons for expected increases in litigation and business regulation at the local, state, and federal levels.[4]

In one annual survey monitoring litigation trends, about 40 percent of the more than 400 participants who represented 276 U.S. companies and 125 companies in the U.K., experienced increases in the number of wage and hour, multi-plaintiff labor, and employment law cases brought to court during 2009.[5] Among the most numerous types of litigation were disputes predicated upon wage and hour laws.[6] Employees generally alleged underpayment for overtime, meals, and rest times.

Another absolutely critical area to examine is the appropriate classification of employees. Retailers who often rely on part-time and/or seasonal workers have the most significant risk of being named as defendants in these types of claims. As a practical litigation mitigation measure, it is therefore imperative that HR professionals revisit their compensation policies and practices, the appropriate classification of their employees, and all current local, state, and federal compliance laws circa the current year, 2010.

Other critical areas of complex legal compliance in the economic recovery period will pertain to general employment discrimination cases, right to privacy issues, possible ERISA (Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974) violations, as well as disability claims and age discrimination issues. Viable mitigation measures for these types of disputes include well-conceived, drafted policies that have been effectively communicated to all employees and incorporated into the employer’s employee development programs and training regimen. Other employment-based claims that will pose significant concern to companies in terms of their possible financial risk are claims predicated upon sexual orientation discrimination, sexual harassment issues, violations of the Family Medical Leave Act, and disputes deriving from non-compete agreements.[7]

It is also crucial that HR professionals and business owners carefully review and update all employee policy manuals and handbooks to be current with 2010 employment-related laws and regulations.

The current stages of the recession recovery period should spur HR professionals to closely monitor federal, state, and local legislative agendas. There will almost certainly be pending legislation that will directly impact companies’ new strategic plans. For example, the health care reform legislation may directly impact the cost of doing business in the future and may necessitate a careful review of employee benefits.

Likewise, HR professionals and managers should consider consulting with legal counsel about developing trends in litigation and business regulation. Specific areas of liability that have the potential to impact the cost of doing business and new strategic plans include products liability, employment law, and tax law. Specific areas of business regulation that have the potential to impact the cost of doing business and new strategic plans include wage and hour policies, workers‘ compensation, and environmental rules and regulations.

Lastly, in an effort to reduce costs, a company’s long-term strategic planning should not overlook the need to review dispute resolution strategies. Perhaps adopting alternative dispute resolution policies, e.g., arbitration relative to employer/employee disputes, as well as standard form contracts, could dramatically reduce the costs associated with the resolution of such disputes.

Think Beyond Merely Being Defensive and Reactive: Lead

By identifying and planning post-recession strategies and HR-specific programs, sustainable organizations are more likely to succeed and even prosper, while those that adopt only a short-term reactive perspective are more likely to struggle or fail. Sustainability demands a balance between short- and long-term thinking.

In difficult times, sustainable businesses actually seek out opportunities for the future. They utilize best practices to appropriately manage and guide current resources, and they also prudently invest in longer-term human and capital resources.

Overly conservative companies that do not embrace a longer-term, sustainability-based perspective as a core value are more likely to run the risk of surviving only in the short run and thereby, from a weakened position.

Another appropriate role for leaders and HR professionals at this time is to enhance the current organizational culture with a sub-culture of “looking for new opportunities.” Against the backdrop of our current business climate, enhancing “effective leadership in a recession” is absolutely critical for organizational survival and sustainability.

Concluding Remarks: Survive and Thrive

Truly sustainable organizations do not fear the ups and downs of the economy. In fact, sustainable and progressive organizations prepare for just these highs and lows. They realize that the current economic challenges are certainly significant, but nevertheless temporary. They view the economy as resilient in the long run and they make sure that they are adequately positioned to prosper when the turnaround inevitably comes. By maintaining a longer-term focus on the organization’s critical factors for success, they are better positioned to survive and thrive.

• It is essential to be in on all strategic planning meetings.
• Assume an active role in facilitating full discussions.
• Keep the conversations grounded and positive.
• Balance short-term with long-term perspectives (i.e., through scenario planning).
• Be a driving force in shaping clear commitments to new strategic plans.
• Give thorough attention not only to key planning strategies, but also to specific implementation strategies throughout the organization.
• Be proactive: Take a significant and very active role in supporting all managers and leaders.

---

[1] Leonhardt, David, “Judging Stimulus by Job Data Beginning to Reveal Success,” The New York Times, February 18, 2010, OpEd.”

[2] David Wessels, “Business Recovery and Reorganization After an Economic Recession,” The Wall Street Journal, February 14, 2010, OpEd.”

[3] Ben S. Bernanke, The New York Times, Business News: Federal Reserve Statistical Release Data, June 7, 2010.

[4] http://www.fulbright.com/images/publications/6th.LitTrendsreport 2009.pdf. (link no longer accessible).

[5] Ibid.

[6] http://www.fulbright/com/images/publications/6th.LitTrendsReport 2008.pdf. (link no longer accessible).

[7] Ibid.

2012 Volume 15 Issue 1

• CEO Performance of 100 of Southern California’s Largest Companies
• Editor’s Note
• UPDATE: Reforming Corporate America
• UPDATE: Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• UPDATE: Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• UPDATE: Management Skills for the 21st Century
• UPDATE: Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• UPDATE: The Dollar vs. the Euro
• UPDATE: Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• UPDATE: The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• The Book Corner
• Video Library
• Graziadio School Business Programs
• Dean’s Executive Leadership Series

2011 Volume 14 Issue 4

• Editor’s Note
• Financial Swiss Army Knife: A User-Friendly Tool for Facilitating Financial Analysis and Due Diligence
• Achieving Enterprise Stability Based on Economic Capital
• The Internet and Globalization: Ten Tips to Building an Effective Digital Strategy for Global Success
• Learn to Expect the Unexpected in Global Retail Expansion
• VIDEO: Stop the Madness: A Recipe to Jump-Start the Global Economy
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 3

• Editor’s Note
• Labor Pains: The Recovery of the U.S. Labor Market is about to be Pushed Back
• Creating Advocates: A Values-Oriented Approach to Developing Brand Loyalty
• Leveraging Action Learning as a Talent Management Strategy during Economic Uncertainty
• Protecting Descriptive Brands in Trademark and Trade Dress Law:
• VIDEO: Transforming the Relationship between Business and IT Executives
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 2

• Editor’s Note: Finding Distinctiveness
• Secondary Meaning in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Financial Elements of Business Resilience
• Positive Organizational Scholarship and Practice: A Dynamic Duo
• VIDEO: Currency Wars, a Faculty Panel
• The Book Corner

2011 Volume 14 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note
• A Consequence Analysis that Needs to be Shared
• Family Business Succession
• The Quest for Distinctiveness in Trademark and Trade Dress Law
• Self-Organizing Conversation as an Invitation to Serendipity
• The ABC’s of Effective Feedback
• “Spiritual Capital and Virtuous Business Leadership” with Yale’s Ted Malloch
• “The Role of the CIO” with Harvey Koeppel
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 4

• Attn: The Corner Office – Why U.S. Firms Should Pay Special Dividends Before Year-End 2010
• The Charisma of Twitter
• Lessons from the New Dodd-Frank Financial Regulatory Reform Law
• The Changing Role of the Residential Real Estate Broker
• 2010 Student Paper Winner: Using Social Media to Grow Your Business
• Editor’s Note: New Look, New Name, Still Great Content
• What to Do when Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail – Revisited
• Great Leaders are Great Decision-Makers
• The Four Levels of Innovation
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 3

• The Spoiled American
• Choosing Your Negotiation Site
• Editorial: Systems Thinking
• Improvisation as a Way of Dealing with Ambiguity and Complexity
• Economic Recovery Gaining Traction
• The Book Corner
• City National Bank’s Robert Iritani Discusses the Future of Financial Management
• An Interview with Clean Tech Start-up Advisor Susanna Kass
• Servanthood Leadership

2010 Volume 13 Issue 2

• Carl Schramm Talks Expeditionary Economics
• Highly Effective Technical Personnel Strategies
• Real Options: The Value Added through Optimal Decision Making
• 10 Lessons for Entrepreneurs
• Utilizing Business Service Management Concepts to Improve Healthcare Information Services
• Editor’s Note
• Strategies for Leading through Times of Change
• Editorial: Will commercial real estate will follow in the footsteps of the residential property market?
• The Book Corner

2010 Volume 13 Issue 1

• Six Steps for Confronting the Emerging Leadership Succession Crisis
• Interview with Robert Eckert, Chairman of the Board and CEO of Mattel, Incorporated
• Political Connections: The Missing Dimension in Leadership
• How Coach, H-P, Zara, and Ford Profited from a Comprehensive Application of Market Orientation
• Three Ways Larger Monitors Can Improve Productivity
• The Role of Finance in the Strategic-Planning and Decision-Making Process
• Editorial: Is Robotics America’s Ticket to Continued Global Competitiveness?
• The Power of Collective Wisdom and the Trap of Collective Folly By Alan Briskin, Sheryl Erickson, John Ott, and Tom Callanan
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 4

• Women, the Recession, and the Impending Economic Recovery
• The Power of Sharing in an Uncertain World
• How to Communicate Change to Employees
• Five Tactics to Create a Sustainable Restaurant Business
• IT Solutions for SMBs in an Economic Downturn
• What’s Next, Hollywood?
• Eight Key Attributes of Effective Leaders
• What to Do When Traditional Diversification Strategies Fail
• Video Interview on Corporate Social Responsiblitiy with Golden State Foods
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 3

• Offshoring May Slow Impending U.S. Economic Recovery
• In Memory of Luis Villalobos
• IT Outsourcing: China Grasps for the Lead
• The Buffett Approach to Valuing Stocks
• Audio Interview with BP’s Chief Economist Christof Ruhl
• Audio Interview with McKesson U.S. Pharmaceutical President John Figueroa
• Editorial: E-Learning is Green Learning
• Domestic Partner Benefits in the United States
• Examining the Role of Short-Term Correlation in Portfolio Diversification
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 2

• The Root Causes of Unethical Behavior
• Price Fixing and Minimum Resale Price Restrictions Are Two Different Animals
• Investing for Income in a Down Economy
• What Determines Which Businesses Win and Which Lose?
• Leveraging Opportunities in the Current Economic Climate
• Editorial: Writing a Business Plan to Attract Investors
• What’s Next LA: The Road to Economic Recovery
• Owner-Occupied Commercial Real Estate for the Entrepreneur
• Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in the Workplace
• The Winner’s Curse and Optimal Auction Bidding Strategies
• The Book Corner

2009 Volume 12 Issue 1

• Private vs. Public Real Estate Markets
• More Than Money
• The Successful Expatriate Leader in China
• Recognizing Organizational Culture in Managing Change
• Editorial: Taking Advantage of California’s Retirees to Help Close the Budget Gap
• Believe It: Complaints Are Gifts
• An Alternative Way to Manage Equity Portfolios
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix A
• Active Alpha Portfolio Management: Appendix B
• The Book Corner

2008 Volume 11 Issue 4

• Best Practices for Headcount Reporting
• 2008 Graziadio School Student Paper Competition – How Intercultural Competence Drives Success in Global Virtual Teams
• Discovering Leadership Potential
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Survey
• Discovering Leadership Potential – Evaluation Guidelines
• Corporate Governance, SOX, and the Business Judgment Rule
• What Will The International Financial Reporting Standards (IFRS) Mean to Businesses and Investors?
• Who are Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?
• Editorial: Crisis in America: A Nation at Risk
• The End of the Beginning for the Global Credit Crisis
• The Book Corner
• All IFRS-Compliant Statements Are Not Equal

2008 Volume 11 Issue 3

• The Book Corner
• IT-Enabled Information Transparency: A Strategic Approach
• Editorial: The Top 10 Embracements for Difficult Economic Times
• Servicing the Software Industry (SaaS)
• Where Do Older Workers Go?
• Creating Wealth in Low Income Communities
• Supplier Diversity and Competitive Advantage: New Opportunities in Emerging Domestic Markets
• The Last 100 Feet of the Supply Chain
• America’s Financial Crisis

2008 Volume 11 Issue 2

• The Tie-In Decision
• The Trybaby Syndrome
• Editorial: California Greening: Boom or Bust?
• High CEO Pay Could Draw Renewed Attention in Election Year
• The Book Corner
• Empowering Employees to Success
• Commercial Banking and Treasury Management in Mexico

2008 Volume 11 Issue 1

• Venture Capital Audio Interview
• Learning to Love Financial Market Barbarians
• The Top 10 U.S. Economic Issues to Monitor
• Putting Performance and Happiness Together in the Workplace
• In Memory of Robert Hockenberg
• Harassment Prevention Training 2008
• Editorial: No Child Left Behind-A Blueprint for Success
• A Class with Drucker by William A. Cohen
• The Book Corner
• Is Managed Futures an Asset Class?

2007 Volume 10 Issue 4

• Organizational Design and Implementation
• Managing the Critical Role of the Warehouse Supervisor
• Editorial
• Creating a Community in Southern California that Values Sharing Knowledge
• The Book Corner
• Commercial Banking in the U.S. Versus Canada

2007 Volume 10 Issue 3

• Developing a Barometer for Workplace Attitude (WPA)
• The Employers’ Legal Obligations to Employees in the Military
• Employee Incentives
• Will the Sub-Prime Meltdown Burst the Housing Bubble?
• Strategic Leadership – Part Two
• Editor’s Note
• Assertive Performance Feedback
• To Tell or Not to Tell?
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 2

• The Trader Joe’s Experience
• Strategic Leadership
• Managing Organizational Knowledge
• The Family-Owned Business
• Editor’s Note
• Emotional Dynamism: Playing the Music of Leadership
• Benefits of International Portfolio Diversification
• Aligning Business with a Value Statement
• The Book Corner

2007 Volume 10 Issue 1

• The Death of Time and Distance
• The Moral and Financial Conflict of Socially Responsible Investing
• What You Need to Know about Labor Shortages
• Women Entrepreneurship
• SEC Quest to Regulate Hedge Funds Hits Speed Bump
• The Book Corner

2006 Volume 9 Issue 4

• Seasonality and the Stock Market
• Airline Industry Key Success Factors
• Seven Neurotic Styles of Management
• IT in Healthcare
• Wings of the Great Northwest
• Gratitude at Work
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• Using ADR to Resolve Worker’s Compensation Claims

2006 Volume 9 Issue 3

• Making Marketing Accountable
• Conversations about Conscientious Capitalism
• Gen Y and Organizational Life
• The Business Impact of Change Management
• Class Action Shareholder Suits Face Legal Setbacks
• The Book Corner
• Achieving Corporate Success and Maximized Value

2006 Volume 9 Issue 2

• Business Survival Skills
• Six Components of a Model for Workplace Spirituality
• HR’s Strategic Partnership with Line Management
• The Book Corner
• Obesity, Social Responsibility, and Economic Value
• Graziadio Faculty Discuss Ethics

2006 Volume 9 Issue 1

• A Winning Tool to Manage Price: The Pricing Checklist
• Update: The Price of Oil
• Mapping IT Resources for Successful Implementations
• Is the Real Estate Market a House of Cards?
• Whither Now Dow?
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 4

• Whistleblowers
• Editorial: Does a Non-Public Business Need SOX?
• Am I My Brother’s Keeper?
• 5-Forces Industry Analysis
• IT MATTERS: Measuring Success
• A New Imperative for Management: Sexual Harassment Training
• The Company Director’s Role In Company Growth
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 3

• IT MATTERS: The IT Governance Road Map
• Fair Trade or Strategic Concern: The Unocal War
• Avoiding Ethical Misconduct Disasters
• The Positive Psychology Approach to Goal Management
• Antitrust Law in the European Union
• Editor’s Note
• The Book Corner
• D & O Policies: Greater Risks Less Coverage
• A Blueprint for Change: Appreciative Inquiry

2005 Volume 8 Issue 2

• Connecting Enterprise Information and People in a Web World
• The Leader’s Role in Strategy
• IT MATTERS: Ethics, Information Systems, and a Steel Ax
• Conversation with author and leadership scholar James M. Kouzes
• Will China Float the Yuan?
• Editorial
• Corruption Across Borders
• Resolving Intra-Organization Conflicts
• An Uphill Battle
• Leading and Managing Change
• The Book Corner

2005 Volume 8 Issue 1

• Managing Resistance to Change
• The Link Between Price and Profit Margin in a Global Market
• IT MATTERS: Or more correctly, use of IT matters…
• The Impact of Empowered Employees on Corporate Value
• What You Need to Know about Attorneys’ Fees
• Editor’s Note: Phishing
• The Book Corner
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 3)
• Will Your Company’s Electronic Records Storage Withstand Legal Scrutiny?
• Conversation with Gemstar-TV Guide International’s Jeff Shell

2004 Volume 7 Issue 3

• Litigate or Arbitrate?
• Presidential Elections and Stock Market Cycles
• Businesspersons Beware: Lying is a Crime
• Strengthening Value-Centered Ethics (Part 2)
• Attempting to Control Health Care Costs – Again
• Editor’s Note
• The Crude Facts About the Price of Oil
• Conversation with Sempra Energy’s Stephen Baum
• The Book Corner

2004 Volume 7 Issue 2

• The Uncertain World of Trademark Dilution
• Does Corporate Social Responsibility Pay Off
• Strengthening Values Centered Leadership
• Editor’s Note: Deeper Questions
• The Twin Deficits
• Conversation with Rite Aid’s Robert Miller
• The Book Corner
• From Michelangelo to the Modern Boardroom
• Preparing for a Future Labor Shortage

2004 Volume 7 Issue 1

• Slowing Runaway Juries
• Merger and Acquisition Strategies
• Slips, Trips, and Falls
• Using Conflict to Your Advantage
• Wired!
• Editorial: Don’t Panic!
• IT MATTERS: Seek and You Might Find
• Conversation with American Honda’s Tom Ross
• The Dollar vs. the Euro
• The Book Corner

2003 Volume 6 Issue 4

• Negotiating Effectively
• Why Good Leaders Do Bad Things
• Editorial: Cybersatire
• Main Street and Hedging
• IT MATTERS: Digital Indemnity
• What Stays and Who Pays?
• Inflation to Deflation and Back?
• Conversation with AT&T’s Betsy Bernard
• The Car Deal
• The Book Corner
• Using Dashboard Based Business Intelligence Systems

2003 Volume 6 Issue 3

• The Cost of Lost Data
• Consolidate All IT?
• Blowing the Whistle
• Hedging Strategies for Uncertain Times
• Creating and Sustaining an Ethical Workplace Culture
• Editorial: Onward and Upward?
• IT MATTERS: Portal Combat
• Facing Up to the Possibility of Deflation
• Dialogue With Four Executives

2003 Volume 6 Issue 2

• Do Not Call!*
• Improving Research Performance
• Just-in-Time to Just-in-Case
• Increasing the Firm’s Strategic IQ
• Special Purpose Entities
• Editorial: Shock and Awe
• IT MATTERS: Webhosting
• Conversation with Galpin Ford’s Bert Boeckmann

2003 Volume 6 Issue 1

• Communicating Your Strategy
• Reforming Corporate America
• Recognize the True Cost of Compensation
• Learn from Experience
• Use Emotional Intelligence to Cope in Tough Times
• Conversation with Evoke Software’s Lacy Edwards
• Editorial
• Predicting Bankruptcy in the WorldCom Age

2002 Volume 5 Issue 4

• Build Value in a Small Business
• Protect Your Trade Secrets
• Managing in an Era of Multiple Cultures
• Consider the Pros and Cons of Expensing Stock Options
• IT MATTERS: Web Services May Bridge the Great Culture Gap
• Editor’s Note
• Conversation with Kinko’s Paul Orfalea
• Calculating the Strategic Value of Customer Satisfaction

2002 Volume 5 Issue 3

• Encourage Your Employees to Play
• Managerial Leadership at Twelve O’Clock
• Remembering George L. Graziadio
• Editor’s Note: Bad Boys in the Board Room
• Who’s Driving American Firms?
• Supreme Court Sides With Business
• Using Asset Allocation Strategies to Recover from a Bear Hug
• Mediate, Arbitrate or Litigate?
• IT MATTERS: The Wonderful World of the Wireless Web

2002 Volume 5 Issue 2

• Does Market Efficiency Trump Behavioral Bias in Finance Decisions?
• Making Mergers a Growth Strategy
• Sealing Cracks in the Capital Markets
• Artificial Intelligence Techniques Enhance Business Forecasts
• Editor’s Note: Weapons of Mass Disruption
• E-Commerce Reboots
• IT MATTERS: Web Services Prevail Despite Travail
• Go Directly to Jail?
• Conversation with Trader Joe’s John Shields

2002 Volume 5 Issue 1

• Build a Culture of Value Creation
• Choose Tomorrow’s Leaders Today
• Small Firms Keep R&D Vibrant
• Teams Use IT to Manage Client Impressions
• Putting Spirituality to Work
• IT MATTERS: Fifty Years and Counting
• Defining Disability Under the ADA
• Conversation with Reid Plastics’ Joe Rokus
• Editor’s Note: Decisions, Decisions, Decisions

2001 Volume 4 Issue 4

• Gender Impacts Virtual Work Teams
• Doing Business in a Volatile World
• The Strategic Downside of Downsizing
• Editor’s Note: Corporate Citizenship in the Wake of September 11!
• The Economic Downturn is No Surprise
• IT MATTERS: ROI for Tech Deployments in the Downturn
• Supreme Court Faces Key Business Cases
• Conversation with Joseph and Edna Josephson Institute of Ethics’ Michael Josephson
• Are Workplace Bullies Sabotaging Your Ability to Compete?

2001 Volume 4 Issue 3

• Suddenly Unemployed?
• Too Late for an IPO?
• Electricity Price Gouging in California?
• Editor’s Note: Surf’s Up!
• The Fine Art of Delegation
• Waiting Games People Play
• Business at the Bar
• Conversation with California’s Senator Sandra Bowen

2001 Volume 4 Issue 2

• Knowledge Management and Business Portals
• Trust as a Competitive Advantage
• Is Price Everything?
• Editor’s Note: A Quarter Without Quarter
• Has the Dow Really Escaped the Bear?
• Dot.Gone
• IT MATTERS: E-Business is Definitely an E-Ticket Ride!
• Downsizing with Dignity
• Conversation with Salomon Smith Barney’s Mitchell J. Held
• The California Electricity Crisis

2001 Volume 4 Issue 1

• Repetition Leads To Innovation
• What’s the Problem?
• Editor’s Note: Quakes, Flakes, and Double Takes
• IT MATTERS: CRM Solution Seekers Beware!!!!
• Language, Culture and Global Business
• Conversation with WATTSHealth Systems’ Dr. Clyde Oden, Jr.
• Personality Traits and Workplace Culture
• Who Wants to Lose a Million?
• The Power of Performance Profiling

2000 Volume 3 Issue 4

• Building Wealth
• How Small Firms Plan to Grow
• Using Internet Portals to Manage the Information Deluge
• Editor’s Note: Messy Brains and Global Opportunities
• SEC Requires Fair Disclosure
• IT MATTERS: MP3.com Completes Settlements
• Conversation with Boyd Clarke of tompeters!
• Planning in a Complex World
• Business Be Advised!

2000 Volume 3 Issue 3

• Do Japan’s High Tech Failures Open Doors for Western Firms?
• Managing Earnings … or Cooking the Books?
• The Battle Over Merger Accounting
• Conversation with Development Bank of Japan’s Dr. Kazuyuki Matsumoto
• Editor’s Note: Friends, Romans & Countrymen…
• What Directors Need to Know
• Still Thinking of Doing an IPO?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 2

• Managing Innovation through Corporate Venturing
• The Death of the Sales Force
• Thinking of Doing an IPO?
• Serving Each Other on the Inside
• Editor’s Note: Screaming Into the Future!
• Conversation with Power-One’s Stephen J. Goldman
• Will Marketers Survive the Information Age?

2000 Volume 3 Issue 1

• Re-Assessing the Health of the Asian Tigers
• Knowledge Management and the Internet
• The Learning Organization in Practice
• Economic Forecasting
• Editor’s Note: A Short Hello!
• Are You Ready for E-Commerce?
• E-Business: The New Management Challenge
• Conversation with Raytheon’s Daniel Burhnam
• The Bull Market’s Flawed Foundation

1999 Volume 2 Issue 4

• The Electric Day Trader and Ruin
• Teambuilding for Competitive Advantage
• Parable of the Commons
• Preserve and Strengthen a Business Partnership
• Editor’s Note: Here to Be Thrilled!
• Conversation with McDonald’s Mike Roberts
• Telecommuting… Out of Sight, Out of Mind?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 3

• How Gerber Used a Decision Tree in Strategic Decision-Making
• Customer Satisfaction Measurement
• Get Your Message Across!
• Balancing Act for Employers in Today’s Labor Market
• Editor’s Note: Too Much Fun!
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Harvard’s Dr. Gary Hamel
• To Join or Not To Join..?

1999 Volume 2 Issue 2

• Defamation Vs. Negligent Referral
• Maximize Business Achievement
• Preserving Family & Business Assets
• Knowledge is Power…
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the Graziadio Business Review
• E-Commerce & Taxation
• Conversation with Franchise Mortgage Acceptance Company’s Wayne “Buz” Knyal
• Cultivating the Customer Asset

1999 Volume 2 Issue 1

• Business and Universities Moving to Collaborative Technologies
• Tips for Reducing Executive Stress
• Russia at the Crossroads
• Editor’s Note: Volume 2, Issue 1
• GBR Case Study
• Launching an Effective Citizen Advisory Panel

1998 Volume 1 Issue 3

• T.I.P.S.
• Retirement Call to Action
• The European Directive On Data Privacy
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 3
• Debt Tied to Lower Firm Performance
• Conversation with Countrywide Credit Industries’ Angelo Mozilo
• Boosting Country Club Memberships With Innovative Marketing and Pricing Concepts

1998 Volume 1 Issue 2

• Management Skills for the 21st Century
• Middlaning
• Decision-Making in a Global Environment
• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR, Volume I, Issue 2
• Conversation with Global Pacific Information Services’ Jeffrey Rigsby
• Cultural Insights on Doing Business in China
• When Worlds Collide

1998 Volume 1 Issue 1

• Editor’s Note: Welcome to the GBR
• Guide to Personal Investment Software
• Southeast Asia: Crisis To Recovery
• Growth Strategies for High Tech Firms
• Conversation with Imperial Bank’s George L. Graziadio
• The Human Realities of Corporate Downsizing
• AB Corporation Case Study