Culture Differences in the Workforce

In regards to "Understanding Power in Organizations" and my interest in international business, I have presented a few arguments and agreements with the article to the workforce in both Western Europe and the U.S. After studying abroad in Europe, it is obvious that the cultures of many of the countries are all different from each other and from the culture of America. One key thing I pointed out, especially in Austria and Germany, was their dedication to their family more than their work. One professor there even talked to us about how our worklife establishes our success while a job there is just a paycheck to take care of the family. According to http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2005/11/28/051128ta_talk_surowiecki, the French work 28% less and Germans work 25% less than Americans. Does the worklife make the culture or does the culture make the worklife? It goes both ways. Since Americans work more, we drive wealth and productivity which forms our culture. However, our culture also makes believe that work is what drives success. The same goes for Western Europe. "Americans trade their productivity for more money, while Europeans trade it for more leisure."

To link this with the article and in class, there are points presented that I agree with in our culture, but may seem ridiculous for another culture. Since we put so much emphasis on our worklife, organizations do feel like a government to us and that we must have a certain power to help us succeed in the workforce. A job here sounds like a full-time life where you constantly have it on your mind and work towards pleasing those in your "government" and gaining power. Many European countries, on the other hand, leave work (when they don't have vacation time) and put it behind them to make time for their family. Another point that I picked out in the article was the problems that we have in our schools versus our worklife. In school, we are mainly taught to be interdependent. We don't do a lot of group work and when we do, we don't really know how to go about it. This is why in companies groupthink occurs. We are more individualistic than our Europe counterparts. Although they are more individualistic than Asian cultures, they do tend to be more collectivists.

Are these differences in culture a good thing or a bad? Is it bad to place so much emphasis on worklife that we are finding ways to be "powerful" and seek out networks? It all lies in personal opinions and how we want to live our lives. Society and culture places certain pressures on people to "fit in" but I think that it is beneficial for companies to offer a wide variety of different cultures both in America and in Europe. Not all people have the same desires or ambitions even though they are placed in a country that believes certain things. Offering different cultures in organizations could also be a good way for different countries to gain more international workers who would feel more comfortable in that work setting.

MIni Cooper

In Chapter 13, we discussed the importance of design to meet customer needs. BMW's Mini Cooper is only one example of an outstanding design that the car industry has developed. The principle of universal design holds that the product can be used by anyone regardless of age or ability. The BMW company capitalized on is its flexibility of use because it is able to accommodate a variety of preferences and abilities with its customization and wide range of choices for additional features and design characteristics. While it appeals to all ages and backgrounds, it has its focus on three specific targets. The first group includes young affluent individuals between 20 and 24 years old. They are spontaneous, like to try new things, have a good sense of style, and think that their car defines who they are. The second group, between ages 35 and 50, are more affluent and just like to add a sporty car to their garage. The third group has a high interest in cars and have many memories of classic cars from their youth. They enjoy the style and design along with the Mini's character. Mini's target market tends to be technologically savvy and like to define their own success. They are typically adventurous and a little quirky.

I think that some of BMW's most important design considerations were their decision to make the car customizable as well as offer unique features that coincide with their market. Since their target market likes to be different, why not make a car that can be just how they want it and different from all others? Some important features include its fun exterior appearance as well as the technology such as GPS and Ipod adapters that can be included. Also, since many target customers are active, there are plenty of options for ski racks, luggage racks, bike racks, etc. Aside from the actual product, Mini Cooper also has games on the internet in which its technologically savvy customers can spend time with the brand online. BMW has been very successful in its advertising by offering unique non-traditional ways to reach their consumers including "talking" billboards and hanging a Mini from a ski lift. Many of their crazy ads can be found at http://marketallica.wordpress.com/2006/04/30/collection-of-alternative-mini-ads/. It states "I like mini style of advertising. They meet people unexpected places and unexpected times."

It is obvious that it is not design alone that makes the product stand out to consumers. It is also the way they target their market and present the product to the people. They are currently strong leaders in the marketplace but I think that there is potential for other manufacturers to attract their niche market. Examples of potential competitors are the Alfa Mito and Fiat 500. Mini should just continue its focus on its niche consumers and take competition as it comes. A foreseen problem is them trying to branch out their market to try to reach more consumers.

Options Options Options!

A few weeks ago, we discussed the article "Innovation versus Complexity" and found that sometimes less is better. Consumers get overwhelmed by vast amounts of choices and companies get burnt out by high costs. When reading this article, I compared this to my dad's restaurant located in Gainesville, TX. When he bought it, it was famous for being two great restaurants under one roof--one side serving an all-you-can eat barbecue buffet including an array of fried foods and the other side offering a menu in which customers can order set dinners including catfish and shrimp. He, however, merged it more into one restaurant while still keeping both a buffet (which now includes the famous fried catfish) and a menu so that people from the same group can enjoy different ways of eating. This wide variety works in this restaurant because it is a well established place and people know how it works. However, it is often confusing for new guests. I think that one problem area we have is offering more health conscious products, such as fat-free salad dressings or making designated healthier options on the menu. I know that this does offer more choices, but this is health conscious segment is on the rise today and benefits could outweight the costs.

I wanted to also address the In-N-Out Burger joint that we discussed in class. I did some online research and found that this place has been able to gain some serious word of mouth through the internet. On their actual website they offer a secret menu list which doesn't seem to make it very secret, but it doesn't even list all of them. However, on the website http://www.badmouth.net/in-n-outs-secret-menu/, there is a complete list as well as over 600 postings from consumers! I found some very positive word of mouth including exciting things like people ordering the 100x100 (http://whatupwilly.blogspot.com/2006/01/in-n-out-100x100.html). Someone even designed a menu wish list (http://fantasymenu.blogspot.com/). While their small displayed menu with "secret options" has given way to huge publicity, it could also lead to negative results. For one, people who don't know of the secret menu may not ever eat there because they want something different than a plain burger and fries. Also, in one of the postings, I read that one location gave a girl a secret item and another location did not know what item she was talking about. Training employees would have to be consistent since the menu is so farfetched and customers expect them all to offer the same products. Another downside found in post #116 is an employee of In-N-Out Burger who bashed the secret menu maker because he claimed that the menu was almost just like asking for fries to be cooked longer, for no bun, no meat, etc. He said that "for the retards animals style is just a regular burger, we just fry mustard on the meat patties and add extra sauce, pickles and grilled onoins." This employee attitude could turn employees away. My advice for In-N-Out Burger is to stick to the "secret menu" with only burgers, fries, and shakes since that is keeping their costs low and word of mouth high. Some companies wish they could target everyone by offering numerous products, but sometimes you have to realize that your profit can also come from one defined area while keeping down costs. I also think that employees could be better trained to know all of the products as well as not bash consumers who feel important when they give pride in knowing the "secret menu".

Prediction Markets

Nintendo Wii was mentioned in the "New Products Blockbuster" article, and I was interested to see how it used prediction markets to overcome the problem. I found TheSimExchange which uses community intelligence to not only predict upcoming monthly sales of platforms, such as the Wii and Xbox, but also to find the top-rated corresponding video games. In regards to the different video games, it states that "prediction data is really only useful to developers before the game comes out. Currently, our trading is focused to near release and after the game comes out. From now on, we will only be listing games that are coming out at least 4 months away." Obviously TheSimExchange has already been tweaked so that it can better predict future sales, and it was shown in class that these prediction markets can often portray how the market will react in reality. It covers the five principles suggested in the article including incentives and the ability for people to share their expertise. However, I can see how problems could arise in the fact that the only people who participate are those who are knowledgeable about the website and who are interested in participating. Therefore, companies may not want to base their entire decisions on these "experts". They should really make consumers aware of these prediction markets online as well as tap into paper surveys that can reach out to other types of consumers who may not be technologically inclined. Since Nintendo's Wii targets even older consumers who may not be computer literate, this may be a good idea especially when making games that target an older market such as the yoga or cooking game.

Also, when viewing this website, there was a link on the side that caught my eye-- http://www.xpree.com/. Here, anybody can start their own prediction market for their company. What a perfect place to advertise! These can really help companies that have no direction come up with innovations, product management strategies, and demand planning. I think that all companies can really learn a lot from these especially with the increase in technology and the fast changing market. It could cut back costs so as to not overproduce as well as underproduce like the Wii and lose a good customer base. However, they could be stuck with the same problems--only attracting those who see it. So, new companies should also look into other types of surveys as well.

Questioning the Consumer

The article Spark Innovation Through Empathic Design makes a good point—“customers are so accustomed to current conditions that they don’t think to ask for a new solution”. Therefore, it states that questioning them isn’t as effective as observing them in their everyday life with the product. This may be true is some cases, but it is sometimes difficult to know what the person is thinking or what the situation may be. I think that questions after observing are imperative in certain situations when the outside world needs to know exactly why the consumer did what they did. HEB, for example, conducts marketing research by having researchers follow customers around for their typical shopping experience. When certain behaviors arise, the researcher takes note and then asks the consumer why they did what they did. For example, a customer picks up several loaves of bread and looks at the labels of each. She sets each one down before finally making her final decision. If someone was merely observing this behavior, they could have several ideas as to why the behavior occurred such as calorie count or the number of fat grams. If someone actually asked her why, then she could state that she was comparing the grams of fiber in each. This could help the store decide to carry more breads with high fiber or bread companies could consider making more high fiber products. This technique could be used with several types of products and could give designers more insight into what kind of product would best fit the needs of the consumer. While people might not be able to form new solutions on their own, they could maybe be given some options and be questioned right after the observation and problem situations take place. Some people don’t really think about their problems until they arise and they are often forgotten afterwards. With the example in class, someone could have observed the walkie talkie being stuck in the boy’s pocket. Rather than making and spending tons of money on a product that they think may work (the glove), they could have instead asked the boy what he thought would have been more convenient while giving him suggestions and options. They could have realized that the boy would have preferred to have a bike clip to hold his walkie talkie on. This could save organizations both time and money while producing a product that consumers would actually use. One problem that researchers always have to be cautious of, however, is that some consumers sometimes tell people what they want to hear. This is why the questions must be focused on options of further products rather than on the current product. If researchers make it apparent that they want innovation and change to better serve the consumer and their problems, customers would be more willing to answer their questions for their future change. If consumers are only asked after creating a new product, they want to spare hurt feelings most of the time.

Apple Affecting Other Brands

Apple’s Ipod is untouched by competitors in the cost-benefit model as they compete both in the “red ocean” as well as form their own “blue ocean”. Other companies are becoming aware of Apple’s competitive advantage so they are making ways to form their own blue oceans through the Apple name. One brand in particular, Nike, has come up with products that correspond with Ipod such as sports arm bands that fit the Ipod. On a much larger scale, the Nike + Ipod sports kit was designed as well as appropriate shoes that can hold the product which also increases sales for the company’s shoe department. Although the sports kit is a Nike product, it is highly associated with the Ipod since that is the only source of its use. Runners can not only track their mileage and calories burnt on the Nano while they run, but they can also log into iTunes and nikeplus.com to evaluate their performance on the computer. These are only a portion of the many features it provides. The reviews at http://store.apple.com generally state that they love the product and price but were dissatisfied with the battery life. With their $30 product, they have positioned themselves much lower on the price end than Ipod did in their market. They don’t really have any competitors yet unless you count mere pedometers which only contain just a very small fraction of what the sports kit can do. Other running shoe companies, like Asics, could possibly try to find a way to compete by focusing on the problems, but they would have to have a contract with Ipod or another competitor. They could find ways to incorporate more features and longer battery life at maybe even a higher price. Some people enjoy bringing their phones while running so they could look at making a device that works with phones. They could even try to make more shoes that fit the device and compete more within the shoe department. If other brands start coming in, Nike could try to dominate the market much like Ipod and continue making new products that are increasingly adding value and price while decreasing the price of the old product. The Nike + is overall increasing Ipods image while people are becoming more active and health conscious. However, they need to be cautious that brands such as Nike don’t give them a bad rap because mere association of products could bring negative thoughts about their own brand. Therefore, they should really push Nike to form even better products that meet the needs of the consumers such as making battery life longer.

A Victim of Feature Fatigue

Like many consumers in today’s ever changing world of technology, I hate to admit that I have as well fallen victim of feature fatigue. When in dire need of a new cell phone, I went to the Cingular store in hopes of just finding a phone that gets the job done—calling people. However, the salesperson, kept talking up Nokia’s N75 and the price was too comparable to simpler phones. Why pay $30 less for a phone that has much less use when I could get a phone, camera, music player, and more for an asking price that was so hard to pass up? The phone was extremely confusing with so many different features, and I realized that I didn’t use about 95% of them. Things that were supposed to be simple, such as putting it on silent mode and setting the alarm, were a much longer process. Also, because of the many features, the phone supplied low battery life. When my phone broke, I asked the insurance company if they could instead send me a cheaper phone to replace it. They could not help me with this so I ended up just taking my friends old Samsung which is much easier to use.

As the article stated, companies really need to tap into not only what customers say they want and think they want before they buy the product, but also what they want after the purchase and use of the product. As we have previously learned in the class, it is not always good to ask customers what they want because sometimes they don’t even know. Instead, companies should learn from past mistakes in this instance and realize that the majority prefer easier to use products with less features. Making this assumption can help the return rate of products, future purchases, and word-of-mouth. Building simpler products is also key in product development. The product should be able to easily and fully carry out the demands of what it was initially meant to do. The article also suggests that decision aids should be used to help consumers decide on a product that is right for them. In my case, the salesperson talked me into getting a more complicated phone which later caused negative word of mouth and a halt to repeat purchases of the brand in general. Instead, salespeople could be trained to better serve a consumer’s needs or perhaps a computer could be placed in the stores with a list of special features. While consumers click on the features they want in a phone, the search engine narrows down the specific phones that match the priorities to increase customer satisfaction.

While companies should focus on either decreasing product features or meeting consumers’ needs, they should also find better ways to compensate customers if they are unhappy with the product. This would not help them with that product line specifically, but it may save some negative word of mouth from spreading and keep customers more loyal to the brand.