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Breaking news: When I see news articles that relate to managem ent, I will posts them here:Thomas, Patrick(2022). “Walmart,Ranchers Team Up on Beef”. Wall Street Journal, 1September. I mentioned the “value chain: last week. It starts with raw materials and ends with thecustomer. It is only as fast as the slowest element. This article refers to Wal-Mart’s investment intoa Nebraska processing plant, f or greater visibility into the food supply. In terms of the valuechain, we call this “backward integration”. It’s more expensive for companies to control so much,but an efficient company can profit from it. When McDonalds’s went into Russia (they havepulled out), they had to invest in cattle breeding for the same reason.******************************We got a quick and enthusiastic start to the class last Monday. We have people from a variety ofstates and countries, which adds so much depth to conversations. I love your interest in the subject—that will help you understand the concepts! As an example, if you are a finance major, you needto manage the resources you need to operate and understand the rules around them.You did a great job of registering for and getting started with Connect. Since this is the first time Ihave used it, your reactions will be very important. So far, everyone who has completed theSmartbook 2.0 exercises has scored 100%-great! Because of a glitch in Connect grading, I haveadjusted grades that showed 100 instead of 25.Many of you want to own your own business, which is an “all in” type of management. Mostentrepreneurs start by doing all the jobs in their business. As it grows, they hire functionalmanagers such as accountants and operations people.Be careful about setting a goal to make a lot of money. It will not necessarily make you happy.Find something that interests you and I promise you can have both wealth and happiness. Startingto save early, especially when your company matches your contributions, will pay lastingdividends.Some entrepreneurs are not great “managers”. Steve Jobs was a good example. Also, managersand leaders often require different skill sets. We’ll cover all of this.In Week 1, you studied why managers are important and how planning, organizing, leading andcontrolling go together to produce results, Many of your introductions referenced careers wheregood management skills are important.Though hierarchies are giving way to flatter organizations, understanding how organizationschoose to organize the different functions is important.You saw from “A Manager’s Challenge” how Zander Lurie used management skills tocommunicate, empower and understand the employees. I cannot stress how important that openattitude is to the workplace.Efficiency, Effectiveness, and Performance are well represented in Figure 1.1. An example of lowefficiency and low effectiveness would be Home Depot when Bob Nardelli took over. Thefounders of Home Depot, whom I know well, created a culture of great effectiveness and highefficiency at the same time. But Nardelli, who came from GE, pulled all purchasing into Atlantainstead of letting regional stores buy what was right for them. Morale cratered, merchandisingsuffered, and Nardelli was given a $200 million exit package. I am fortunate to have witnessedmanagement under several people at Home Depot. In each of the cells in Figure 1.1, you can findexamples of companies you know.Figure 1.2 reviews the four tasks of management: Planning>Controlling>Organizing>Leading.In order to lead well. you must have people who want to “follow you”. Just because someone hasthe title does not mean he or she is a good leader. Leading starts with a vision- I saw that clearly inPresident Cruz Rivera’s Convocation speech. He clearly knows where he wants the University tobe and has plans to get us there.Henry Mintzberg identified roles in Table 1.1. A role may be decisional, such as a CEO, but manymanagers have other decisional roles.Figure 1.2 shows the levels of managers. While roles are flattening, with fewer “levels”, there stillhas to be a structure that employees can use to navigate their roles. Having worked for both GEand J&J, I remember these “levels” being far more rigid at J&J than at GE.Figure 1.5 Shows the types and levels of managers, overlaying levels on functional departments,so that there is a marketing manager, an R&D manager, a manufacturing managers, etc. Each ofthose functional departments has its own hierarchyAs you can imagine, not every manager has done the jobs of the people who report to him or her.That’s where skills like working well with others, a clear vision, and excellent communication andorganizational skills come in.After the pandemic, many companies have restructured to respond to a world where technologyexists to allow people to work outside the office. This has caused some restructuring.Also, Empowerment came out as a way to increase efficiency and effectiveness.Figure 1.6 displays the building blocks of competitive advantage: Efficiency, Quality, Innovationand Flexibility, and Responsiveness to customers. As I stated last week, if any one of theseelements is poor or lacking, it is very difficult to maintain competitive advantageThere is no such thing as a “sustainable competitive advantage”. We see companies every day losetheir competitive edge or go out of business because they took their focus off of those buildingblocks.Page 20 discusses ethical and social standards. This is increasingly important because thenewspaper lists companies every day where huge fines are levied because of managers who madedecisions that were hurtful or illegal. I take this subject very seriously because I have seen somany people think that “just this once” won’t hurt. It will. In the long run, “doing the right thing”creates far better results.Most management books today contain sections about a diverse workforce. This is all good andmanagers have many tools to enable cooperation and communication.This leads into global management. When I first went to work for Leviton, we had an exportmanager and we shipped products to other countries. These days, large companies have plants andoffices all over the world. Though Zoom was a tremendous help during the pandemic, skills totake


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