The new deal at the top

What makes a company strategically agile--able to alter its strategies and business models rapidly in response to major changes in its market space, and to do so repeatedly without major trauma? Three years of in-depth case research on a dozen large companies worldwide showed the authors that one key factor is a new leadership model at the top. Senior executives at agile companies assume collective rather than individual responsibility for results. They build interdependencies among units and divisions, motivating themselves to engage with one another, and carefully manage their dealings to promote collaboration that is frequent, intense, informal, open, and focused on shared issues and the long term. Challenges to conventional thinking are encouraged. This is the new deal, and it's not easy to strike, because it requires executives to act in ways that are far from comfortable. After all, the corporate ladder at most firms favors independent types with a deep need for power and autonomy. At executive meetings, disagreement is suppressed or expressed passive-aggressively, eroding any real sense of belonging to a team. Switching to the new deal almost always requires a huge shift in the company's culture, values, and norms of interaction. The authors describe three approaches to making the shift: Executives can be given formal responsibility not for a business unit but for different stages in the company's value chain. This worked well for SAP, which has a relatively focused business portfolio. When a company's portfolio is less uniform, like Nokia's, business and functional units can be organized to crisscross on a matrix. And when a company is widely diverse, like easyGroup, it can emphasize the learning opportunities that units with common business models may share.     

Communicating the future

A lot of time, money, and wisdom is wasted if the strategic planner fails to communicate his message. A substantial investment in a long and detailed forecasting exercise can only pay dividends if the results of that exercise are effectively brought to the attention of the clients, the people who can act upon the forecast. Here the author argues that this final stage of a forecasting exercise is as important as all the other stages, but that it is an area which is largely ignored by planners. So, using the example of a business environment, he gives simple practical guidance as to how planners can improve their performance in this final stage, the presentation of the results to the executives. Basically, this involves a shift away from the objective of transmitting the maximum amount of information, towards the idea of maximising the amount of information assimilated by the audience.     

应对危机：中国信保推出两款创新产品

为促进银行扩大对企业的出口贸易融资业务，支持中小出口企业做大做强，中国出口信用保险公司（以下简称“中国信保”）于今年7月正式推出银行保单、中小企业综合保险保单两个新产品     

The secularization of science and a new deal for science policy

The secularization of science, by analogy with the separation of Church and state, would divest all science funding from the state, except where it bears directly on matters of public policy. I argue for an intensification of this tendency, which is already occurring across the Euro-American world. I then explore the policy implications in some detail, including historical precedents in New Deal attitudes toward the role of science in public policy. I begin by reviewing the secularization of Christendom, which turns out to be intimately tied with the social ascendency of the natural sciences. I then explore more recent conditions that contribute to the secularization of science itself, during which I claim that the Cold War's scaling up of state support for scientific research should be regarded as a historical aberration that we are currently getting over. However, I still reserve a very strong role for the state in the public distribution of already existing knowledge, the primary vehicle for which will remain the university.     

Retiree health care benefits: new rules, new strategies.

Two recent court decisions in a retiree health care benefits age discrimination case are likely to bring changes to employer-sponsored retiree health care. After reviewing the cases and how the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has responded to them, this article discusses employer implications. Although the court decisions add complexity to retiree health plan design, they also provide employers with the valuable opportunity to analyze the match between their retiree health plans and business needs.     

Negotiating the spirit of the deal

Most experienced negotiators are comfortable working out the terms of an economic contract--they bargain for the best price, haggle over equity splits, and finesse detailed exit clauses. Yet these same seasoned professionals spend so much time ironing out the letter of the deal that they often pay little attention to the spirit of the deal--the social contract. And that can lead to major problems, say the authors, because even though the parties agree to the same terms on paper, they may have very different expectations about how to meet them. Those on one side, for instance, might think they're entering into a long-term partnership, while those on the other believe they're simply making a series of discrete transactions. Because the parties have failed to have a true meeting of the minds, they sign a deal that is likely to fall apart. To avoid such a disastrous outcome, negotiators should explicitly discuss the details of their social contract before inking the deal. They should talk about the underlying social contract, which answers the question, What? For instance, what is the real nature, extent, and duration of the agreement? And they should discuss the ongoing social contract, which answers the question, How? For instance, in practice, how will we make decisions, handle unforeseen events, communicate with one another, and resolve disputes? Drawing on real-life examples, the authors explore the problems that arise when the letter and spirit of the deal are at odds and suggest ways to dovetail them so they are both independently strong and mutually reinforcing. They also highlight risk factors that can lead to misunderstandings and expose common misperceptions about the social contract.     

Communicating total rewards to the generations

This is the first time in American history that four distinct generations have been in the workforce at the same time. Because employers have finite resources with which to compete for talent, they must understand the generations, what matters most to them and what they can do to motivate different generations of workers. Perhaps surprisingly, the author argues that the generations share in most valuing "soft cost" rewards over "hard dollar cost" items. This article advises employers on how to make their company a great place to work for all generations.     

From new deal institutions to capital markets: Commercial consumer risk scores and the making of subprime mortgage finance

The investment fueled US mortgage market has traditionally been sustained by New Deal institutions called government sponsored enterprises (GSEs). Known as Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, the GSEs once dominated mortgage backed securities underwriting. The recent subprime mortgage crisis has drawn attention to the fact that during the real estate boom, these agencies were temporarily overtaken by risk tolerant channels of lending, securitization, and investment, driven by investment banks and private capital players. This research traces the movement of a specific brand of commercial consumer credit analytics into mortgage underwriting. It demonstrates that what might look like the spontaneous rise (and fall) of a ‘free’ market divested of direct government intervention has been thoroughly embedded in the concerted movement of calculative risk management technologies. The transformations began with a sequence of GSE decisions taken in the mid-1990’s to implement a consumer risk score called a FICO^® into automated underwriting systems. Having been endorsed by the GSEs, this scoring tool was gradually hardwired throughout the industry to become a distributed and collective ‘market device’. As the paper will show, once modified by specific GSE interpretations the calculative properties generated by these credit bureau scores reconfigured mortgage finance into two parts: the conventional, risk-adverse, GSE conforming ‘prime’ and an infrastructurally distinct, risk-avaricious, investment grade ‘subprime’.     

学会与资本斡旋

企业金融力,正在成为中国企业的核心竞争力。如果说我们依靠强大的生产能力、研发能力、营销能力、管理能力赢得了过去30年竞争的话,那么我们将依靠企业金融力引领未来30年     

Universal basic benefits preempt mandated benefits

Many states seek to expand health care access to uninsured people. As part of their efforts, states must define a basic level of health services to which all residents would have access. Presumably, this level of services would be leaner than that now covered by most health care policies. As it is, private insurers are already mandated by all states to include certain benefits, which differ widely from state to state. However, simple fairness argues that once a state defines a basic level of health services, that level should function as a floor for everyone and replace the previously mandated benefits (which, nonetheless, may be a useful guide in defining a basic level of health services).     

协调沟通服务 确保考试工作顺利实施

贵州省经济文化发展较落后．注册资产评估师资格报名考试工作总体也表现为“三少一低”．即报考人员少．出考人员少．考试收费少．考试合格率低。如2003年报考943人，出考348人．有8人全科合格；2004年报考757人．出考324人．综合合格率为13．28％．有5人全科合格；2005年报考650人．出考251人．综合合格率为18.01％．有15人全科合格。考试报名收费自2002年开始维持在报考一科或两科收120元，报考三科收150元、报考四科收180元、报考五科收220元的标准上。     

Communicating decision alternatives graphically using the point of indifference

In the search for more effective communication of decision alternatives, managerial accountants and educators have developed useful graphic presentations. For certain types of decisions, this study proposes the use of indifference points, or points where the decision maker would theoretically be indifferent between two alternatives. The indifference point concept is useful for presenting to students the analysis of such management choices as capital equipment acquisition (operating leverage), debt versus equity financing (financial leverage), and operating decisions such as make or buy.     

克服经济失衡引起的宏观波动

如何透过这些纷繁复杂的现象理解中国经济当前的问题,尤其是宏观经济问题?刚刚公布的7月份物价指数引发了新一轮关于中国宏观经济的讨论。在一系列令人眼花缭乱的数据和名词中,我们可以看到中国的宏观经济出现了许多似乎是"问题"的现象:比如投资增长速度仍然比消费增长速度快;CPI达到了5.6%这样的高水平;房价和股价不断上涨;贸易顺     

如何应对汇率波动风险

中国信保专家指出:人民币升值对出口导向型行业是一个重新洗牌的过程.随着人民币汇率浮动范围的加大和升值趋势的延续,汇率风险将长期性存在,企业需要树立外汇风险防范意识     

应对拖欠余款的方案与启示

中国国内A公司向买方出运五票摩托车散件,买方承兑后仅支付第一笔货款,余款拖欠。A公司随后向中国信保通报可损,同时委托中国信保进行海外追讨,这场拖欠风波源于环保标准.     

Making the deal real: how GE Capital integrates acquisitions

Most companies view acquisitions and mergers as onetime events managed with heroic effort--anxiety-producing experiences that often result in lost jobs, restructured responsibilities, derailed careers, and diminished power. Little wonder, then, that most managers think about how to get them over with--not how to do them better. But even as the number of mergers and acquisitions rises in the United States, studies show the performance of the resulting companies falls below industry averages more often than not. To improve these statistics, executives need to view acquisition integration as a manageable process, not a unique event. One company that has done exactly that is GE Capital Services, which has assimilated more than 100 acquisitions in the past five years alone and, in the process, has developed a formal model for melding new acquisitions into the corporate fold. Drawing on their experiences working with the company to develop the model, consultants Ron Ashkenas and Suzanne Francis, together with GE Capital's Lawrence DeMonaco, offer four lessons from the company's successful run. First, begin the integration process before the deal is signed. Second, dedicate a full-time individual to managing the integration process. Third, implement any necessary restructuring sooner rather than later. And fourth, integrate not only the business operations but also the corporate cultures. These guidelines won't erase all of the discomfort that accompanies many mergers, but they can make the process more transparent and predictable for those involved.     

改革需辩证处理十个方面关系

此次不谈PE,不谈股权投资,不谈股票交易,谈一些有关改革的思考,或许对这些有意义,我认为要辩证处理这样十个方面的关系, 第一,关于系统配套与突出重点.改革需要系统配套,其一是因为全面深化改革本身就体现着改革系统性、整体性和协同性的内涵;其二,改革处于攻坚阶段,单兵突进难以取得成功,任何一项改革的有效推进都有赖于其他改革的协同与支撑,许多改革事项是互为条件的;其三,改革越向前深入,越是到框架完善和内容集成阶段,系统配套要求越强,但系统配套仍然要突出重点.