Managing organizations and people Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2500 words

Managing organizations and people - Essay Example The external environment is hostile and it is a matter of survival from day one. Forces nearest to a company, which affect its capability of serving its customers are micro environmental factors. For example, customers, competitors, suppliers, marketing teams are some such factors (Kotler, et al, 2004, p.164). In perfect competition, there is no limit to the number of these different players and equilibrium is maintained in the form of reasonable profits and market share for each supplier. In this competitive condition, â€Å"Price changes act as the mechanism whereby demand and supply are balanced (Sloman et al., 2006, Ch.4)†, and a win-win situation is created for the seller and the buyer. However, such an equilibrium can be disturbed by any number of factors, When he started out his career, Mr. Will Chase, the promoter of Tyrrells Crisps was producing potatoes which, as a commodity with no added value and no differentiation from other suppliers, was giving him wafer thin margins. Terms could be dictated by the buyers, who play one supplier against the other to beat down the prices or set unjustified conditions. Chase decided to counter this situation by diversifying his business, converting the potatoes into a branded product namely Tyrrells Crisps and thus adding value to his produce. It was a right step, with the margins on chips being better than those on potatoes since he was producing the raw materials himself. His innovative modifications of the hand-fryer resulted in a dramatically successful product – hand fried crisps, made from potatoes from own farms. He continued with his innovative efforts adding new flavours and newer vegetables to his line of products. Branching out from local farm shops and delicatessens, he tapped the big stores like Harrods, Selfridges and Villandry (Hirchkorn, Telegraph, 2004) with their marketing strength and

Socially Responsible Investing Research Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1750 words

Socially Responsible Investing - Research Paper Example Empirical research that has been conducted by different people has shown that in selecting a portfolio, potential investors not only consider statistical measures like risk and return but also psychological factors such as sentiment, overconfidence, and overreaction. In short, it is a general observation that heuristic-driven bias, frame dependence, and market inefficiency plays a crucial role in shaping the kind of portfolios that investors make the preference to, the type of securities they find attractive, as well as the biases to which they are considered subject to. For a long period, the process of socially responsible investing has been the subject of significant attention in practitioner and academic literature. The process has so far attracted research process that has been geared towards examining and discussing the financial advantages associated with the process, its effects on social change, pertinent issues and challenges associated with SRI logistics as well as the motives and inspiration that drive investors. While it may be easy to know and comprehend some of the demographic makeup, associated with socially responsible investors, what distinguishes them from non-socially responsible investors as well as what their motives and inspirations are. Our understanding of the decision process behind SRI is still limited; this is influenced by the fact that only a few studies have tested hypotheses about investor behavior in the context of socially responsible investing.