PRATIBIMB The Reflection of Management FINANCE | GENERAL MANAGEMENT | HUMAN RESOURCE | MARKETING | HEALTHCARE | OPERATIONS | SYSTEMS
Cloud Services in Retail Business By Vishal Kumar Sinha, Great Lakes, Chennai
Social Media: Samosa Style By Ashish Verma and Tejas Choudhari, IIM Lucknow
Diversity and Inclusion By Jagriti Bhadra, Xavier Institute of Social Service, Ranchi
Interview: Mr. Sameer Kaul Emerging Trends in Talent Acquisition By Purva Bhatnagar, XIMB
Advertising Innocence: Use of children for advertising By Meenal Maheshwari & Biswarup Saha
Building a Model for Measuring Customer Satisfaction By Asad Khan, NITIE
Catching the Eye of the Public: Live Advertising By Mary John Thalody and Naresh Jawni, NITIE
A Students’ Initiative
Volume II, Issue XVI
December 2012
A Monthly e-Magazine
T. A. Pai Management Institute Manipal, Karnataka
About TAPMI T. A. Pai Management Institute (TAPMI) is a premier management institute situated in Manipal and is well known for its academic rigor & faculty-student interaction. The Institute has been recently ranked amongst top 1 per cent of B-schools in India & 4th in the South Zone by The Week Magazine. Founded by the visionary, Late Shri. T. A. Pai, TAPMI‖s mission is to provide much needed impetus to the task of building professional management capability in the country. In the process, it has also played a role in strengthening the existing educational and health infrastructure of Manipal.
Our Mission TAPMI is committed to excellence in post graduate management education, research and practice by nurturing and developing global wealth creators and leaders. We shall continually benchmark ourselves against the best-in-class institutions. We shall foster continuous learning and reflection, achievement-orientation, creative interdependence, and respect for diversity with a holistic concern for ethics, environment and society.
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PRATIBIMB TAPMI’S MONTHLY e-MAGAZINE
VOLUME 2, ISSUE XV
NOVEMBER, 2012
TAPMI‖s e-Magazine - is the conglomeration of the various specializations in MBA (Marketing, Finance, HR, Systems and Operations). It is primarily intended to provide insights into the plethora of knowledge that relate to the various departments of Management and to give an opportunity to the students of TAPMI and the best brains across country to exhibit their creative cells. The magazine also strives to bring expert inputs from industries, thereby bringing the academia and industry together. Pratibimb the e-Magazine of TAPMI had its first issue in December 2010. The issue comprised of an interview of well known writer Ms. Rashmi Bansal along with a series of articles by students and industry experts like MadhuSudan Rao (AVPDelivery, Mahindra Satyam) & Ed Cohen who is a global leader and chief learning officer who led Booz Allen Hamilton & Satyam Computer Services to the first rank globally for learning & development . It also included a hugely successful and engrossing game for finance geeks called “Beat the Market” to bring out the application based knowledge of students by providing them the platform where they were expected to predict the stock prices of two selected stocks on a future date. The magazine is primarily intended for the development of all around management knowledge by providing unbiased critical insights into the modern developments. TAPMI believes that learning is a continuous process and is not limited to the four walls of the classroom. This viewpoint is further enhanced through Pratibimb wherein students manage and contribute to create a refreshing learning environment outside the classrooms which eventually leads to a holistic development process. The magazine provides a competitive platform and opportunity to the students where they can compete with the best brains in the B-Schools of the country. The magazine also provides a platform for prominent industry stalwarts to communicate their views and learning about and from the recent developments from their respective fields of business which in turn helps to create a collaborative learning base for its readers. Pratibimb is committed in continuing this initiative by bringing in continuous improvement in the magazine by including quality articles related to various management issues and eventually creating a more engaging relationship with its readers by providing them a platform to showcase their talent. We invite all the best brains across country to be part of this initiative and help us take this to the next level. Pratibimb | December 2012 | 3
Director’s Message
It is always a pleasure to witness that certain efforts of the students are sustained and carried forward; Pratibimb is one such. The oft-beaten track, “We are here to learn,” ends up as a mere platitude when there are no visible actions and documentation. Whereas there is no dearth of actions at TAPMI, documentation is not something that many—other than scholars—choose to engage in; it is normally viewed as uninteresting, drab and a drudgery. TAPMIans have proved that they are equally capable of actions and of documentation without losing the intellectual flavour of it. Scholarship is too important a phenomenon to be left to scholars alone, especially in the field of management. As future practicing managers who will be engaged in rigorous action in different fields of business, TAPMIans have manifested both the penchant to produce research works and also get their counterparts in other leading business schools to contribute their thoughts to this endeavour. In this regard, TAPMIans have truly demonstrated the evidence for creative interdependence, an important aspect of TAPMI‖s mission. I sincerely appreciate the students and the faculty of TAPMI who have made Pratibimb a possibility through their scholarly works, co-ordination efforts and support. I wish the team the very best. Dr. R. C. Natarajan
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Editor’s corner Dear Readers, Yet another year draws to an end. So much has happened. We saw inclusion of fresh blood in Pratibimb. Several events like Episode, Brandscan, JoyFest and the conclaves held by MGM,HR and IT fora kept TAPMIANs on their feet. And last but not the least, TAPMI continues to be one of the top management institutes in the country retaining Crisil's A*** rating. The December edition boasts of a plethora of articles on diverse fields in management. Vishal Kumar Sinha of Great Lakes, Chennai, in his article "Cloud Services in Retail Business" ,discusses how Cloud services provide a viable cost effective IT service entity for retail industries.Ashish Verma and Tejas Choudhari of IIM Lucknow talks about the lesser known social portal called Social Samosa in their article "Social Media: Samosa Style". Jagriti Bhadra of Xavier Institute of Social Service lets us have a taste of HR issues in her article "Diversity and Inclusion". This issue also carries an Interview of Mr Sameer Kaul( Chief Marketing officer, Dr Lal Path Labs) where he talks about the do's and don'ts in the healthcare industry. This issue's Best Article Contest winner is "Advertising Innocence:Use of children for advertising" by Meenal Maheshwari & Biswarup Saha. The article is as interesting as its name. I am sure that it will be an eye -opener to many of us. And coming to the most important part. Team Pratibimb would like to wish all the readers a wonderful new year and of course, a smashing Christmas. Make new resolutions. Break them. Let the tradition continue. And yes, keep reading Pratibimb! Stay updated, like our page to hear more from us at http://www.facebook.com/pratibimb.reflecting.management We would like to thank all faculty members who have provided their valuable feedback to help maintain the standards we have strived to achieve. Also, send in your valuable suggestions or feedback to pratibimb@tapmi.edu.in Enjoy Reading! ~ Devi Kailas
Editor in Chief Sushmit Sinha Marketing & Advertising Manish Mishra Design Abhishek Dubey Creative & Cover Design Namrata Mahapatra Communications Divyanshu Varun Anant Sub-Editors Abhishek Raghupungav Aditya Bhat Arun Stephen Devi Kailas Kannan Venkat Pallavi Prasad Rithwik Krishnakumar Publishing Vandna Soni Faculty Advisors Prof. Chowdari Prasad
Dean (Branding and Promotions)
Prof. Vinod Madhavan
Asst. Prof. , Marketing
Prof. Srivatsa H S
Associate Prof. , Marketing
Prof. Vrishali N Bhat
Asst. Prof. , Economics & Finance
Prof. Animesh Bahadur
Asst. Prof. , Human Resources
Prof. Sanjay Choudhari
Asst. Prof. , Operations
Prof. Mohan Kumar V
Associate Prof. , Systems
Prof. Jaims K. J.
Associate Prof. , Marketing
Prof. Sulagna Mukherjee
Asst. Prof. , Economics
Mr. Vendantam Krishnan
Guest Faculty
Pratibimb | December 2012 | 5
Contents Cloud Services in Retail Business
7
Social Media: Samosa Style
11
by Vishal Kumar Sinha, Great Lakes, Chennai
by Ashish Verma and Tejas Choudhari, IIM Lucknow
Diversity and Inclusion
14
Interview: Mr. Sameer Kaul
16
Emerging Trends in Talent Acquisition
18
Advertising Innocence: Use of children for advertising
21
by Jagriti Bhadra, Xavier Institute of Social Service, Ranchi
by Purva Bhatnagar, XIMB
by Meenal Maheshwari & Biswarup Saha, IIM Kozhikode
Building a Model for Measuring Customer Satisfaction
26
Catching the Eye of the Public: Live Advertising
30
by Asad Khan, NITIE
by Mary John Thalody and Naresh Jawni, NITIE
Pratibimb | December 2012 | 6
Cloud Services in Retail Business by Vishal Kumar Sinha, Great Lakes, Chennai
Introduction Retail industries spend a huge amount of revenue in purchasing or managing the software which are core to their business. Present business competitive environment forces industry to innovate and optimize their business processes. Therefore developing applications which are error free and reliable is challenging. Constant improvements in supply chain management, inventory management, and customer experience and shrinkage control are the norms of the day to expand profits. With the advent of retailing giants like Wal-Mart, Carrefour and Metro, the operations have spread out far and wide and state of the art technology is needed to keep track of the operations. Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) was the available and feasible solution to retailers who integrated into their operations. Over the years ERP has helped retailers earn profits by streamlining operations. However the benefits of deploying ERP system came with many unintentional costs to the retailers. The housing of servers, maintenance, upgrade and a separate IT staff was an added burden. Moreover simulating the software under real business conditions could be riskier and incurs huge cost. Cloud services are the answer to such problems and provide a viable cost effective IT service entity for retail industries. On-Site Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) - Current Retail IT Landscape: Enterprise Resource Planning is a business management system that integrates all the departments and functions ensuring proper communication flow between the departments. A retail ERP system facilitates faster and better management decisions by providing crucial information in a timely manner. When implemented properly, ERP Systems have been found to deliver high ROI despite their high initial and maintenance costs (capex and opex).
Fig 1: Benefits of ERP in Retail
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Challenges with the ERP in Retail Industry
customer needs.
The retail industry faces specific ERP challenges: Transparency and Tracking: As the retail landscape changes, new applications are needed to add muscle to the existing infrastructure. These new applications need to be integrated with the present systems to aid the organisation but the architecture of the legacy ERP systems does not allow this flexibility and the organisation is usually caught up with an inflexible and obsolete system. Customer Data: Information overload is a challenge for retailers because they need to collect and sift through large chunk of data to convert it into useful information in a customer-centric industry. This necessitates the addition of extra data servers that can be counterproductive when it comes to cost management. Cost: IT solutions such as ERP require a huge maintenance cost. ERP also requires the retail business to set up large number of servers to store various data related to purchase, inventory, and customer info which involves high expenditure and manpower. High switching cost prevents retailers from upgrading or changing the software and they continue to work on the out-dated software. Brownfield deployments: ERP servers incur huge power consumption and dissipate considerable heat - which calls for optimum cooling solutions to be installed on site. Servers also occupy huge space which adds to the renting cost to the retailers. Cloud Technology: Future IT Service for Retail Industry Cloud computing is a model for enabling ubiquitous, convenient, on-demand network access to a shared pool of configurable computing resources (e.g., networks, servers, storage, applications, and services) that can be rapidly provisioned and released with minimal management effort or service provider interaction. The bigger advantage of cloud technology is the “pay-as-you-use”/ service based/ aligned to business/ model. Flexible and agile business modelling allows the retailers to mould the software (fig 3.). Cloud allows retailers to manage huge data centrally thereby reducing training costs and complexity in terms of maintaining hundreds of workstations (VDI/ VXI solutions, thin clients, zero clients, security). With the cloud technology, the retailer does not have to worry about the traditional software licenses, administration and data storage. Retailers also save cost in trainings and have the privilege of increasing the capacity as per the
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Fig 2: Comparative study of the Retail Business expansion - with and without Cloud technology (src: http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs) Benefits of Cloud Computing in Retail Industry: Cloud provides virtualized resource to the retailers. The user does not have to know of the nitty-gritty technical aspects of cloud computing for handling the operations. The Cloud helps the retailer in the following ways: Enhanced capabilities: Centralized deployment of resources and usage of common repository adds up new capabilities. The interoperability and agility of the systems makes it beneficial for all the parties involved. It reduces the complexity for retailers, enables faster access to customer data and ensures higher throughput in transactions. Customer experience is enhanced through more responsive systems and faster transactions. This ensures happy customers and higher returns. Efficiency in usage of IT resources: Cloud allows significant reuse of the existing computational capacity, storage and data access capabilities, thus saving enormous deployment cost. Operational and infrastructure cost is enormously reduced due to the pay-as-you-go service of cloud computing. It enables retailers to increase capacity as the business expands rather than as an upfront payment. Retailers can take advantage of remote unused servers rather than buying software and servers and trying to house them. Investment in activities like acquiring licences, investment in new infrastructure and IT staff training can be minimized by the use of cloud computing services. Retailers can also choose to adjust the number of licenses they buy rather than buy all the components of the system. Virtualization on Infrastructure and
Services: Decades of installing servers, operating systems, applications, middleware and databases have taken their toll, as retailers are nearing their limits for physical space, power usage and cooling. Cloud service is the answer for such issues. Virtualization technology can be used to isolate applications, data, operating system instances or transaction services. Virtualization also provides centralized security system to retailing business. Since the system runs on the concept of virtualization, the simulation for the demand and operations can also be carried out with confidence and without any loss.
Security: Majority of the cloud based services are designed with multiple layers. This makes them fail safe and in the event the failure of an element, the multiple layers ensure that there is no interruption in service. In addition to this all the data is stored simultaneously in multiple locations which ensure that the data is safe in case of any calamity. In traditional systems these security measures are usually taken care by the IT division of the company but services through cloud computing ensures that the company can focus on its business rather than on IT management. Updates and Improvements: With constant change in the retail landscape and the identification of new business opportunities, it is imperative that the ERP system also undergoes change and updates are required at regular intervals to ensure the business keep pace with the demand. With the cloud based ERP services there are the benefits of shorter rollout times for new applications, faster update and improvement cycles resulting in more up-to -date functionality, and the ability to scale up or down based on demand.
Cost Effective Study of Implementing Cloud Technology in Retailing: Business typically pays for the servers, networks, IT staffs, rent, electricity, and air conditioning. With cloud technology this changes. With the new model the retailer pays for the value received and not the cost of infrastructure that deliver the value. Business cost can be broadly classified into: fixed costs – include cost incurred for servers, networks, salaries, renting place and variable costs – include cost incurred in paying bills for electricity, RFID tagging cost – especially in the retailing context.
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Fixed Costs: Cloud Minimizes the Hardware and Middleware cost (Fixed Cost) – cloud service minimizes cost of housing of servers, maintenance, up gradation and deployment of dedicated IT staff. Variable Costs: RFID tagging costs is a variable cost to the retailers. However this cost is unavoidable for the retailers because of the following benefits associated with tagging:
Fig 3: Cost Diagram – Cloud in Retailing
RFID tagging helps retailers in asset tracking. Assets are automatically recorded as they move through the RFID equipped doors providing location information. RFID also helps reducing cost and time for the inventory management. Time is reduced to 90% of overall time from manual inventory handling to RFID controlled inventory management. E.g.: Wal-Mart was able to reduce monthly inventory from 10 man-days (4 people for 2.5 days) to one hour for one person.
Money Saved/Increase in Profits: a.
b.
c.
Labor costs / Waste / Inventory: Cloud technology reduces cost in managing hundreds of servers tracking the inventory and sales (an issue with ERP); the same could be easily provided by the software on demand from the server on pay per usage basis. Shrinkage: Cloud minimizes shrinkage by providing a centralized security system and also reduces the overall cost for carrying out the major IT based operations. Inventory Recalls: Handling inventory recall requires specific software from the vendor. This also includes cost of license procurement for the software. With the cloud technology, the data is transmitted on real time basis and thus avoid the delay in transmitting the information to the supplier and reduces the “lead time” in
d.
procurement. Shifting Cost: Security issue is addressed by ERP-On-Cloud technology. Retailers can upgrade the software and retain the customizations and integrations without additional investment – an issue with the usage of the traditional ERP software.
Conclusion: Cloud computing for retail business provides cost savings. Streamlined processes, increased productivity, convenience, simplicity, flexibility, scalability, and better customer experience are among its advantages. Cloud Technology not only provides short term opportunity for value creation but also helps in building long-term competitive advantage to retailers. Cloud technology which is sometimes known as “smarter computing” leverages data at the point of sales (POS) to provide customers with consistent shopping experience. Cloud overall helps retailers satisfy customer needs.
References
http://www.dmsretail.com/erp.htm
http://www.netsuite.com/portal/resource/articles/on -premise-cloud-erp.shtml
http://www.idc.com/prodserv/idc_cloud.jsp
http://www.trcb.com/Business/Management/CloudComputing--The-Four-Factors-Retail-Businesses-Must -Consider-40983.htm
http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/news/press/2008/ apr08/04- 29RetailVirtualizationPR.aspx
http://www.alvarezandmarsal.com/en/about/ action_matters/FTFCloudCompu_MMtmp7e8e6d02/ FTFCloudComputing.aspx
http://csrc.nist.gov/publications/nistpubs/800-145/ SP800-145.pdf
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Social Media: Samosa Style by Ashish Verma and Tejas Choudhari, IIM Lucknow
“When you give everyone a voice and give people power, the system usually ends up in a really good place.� -Mark Zuckerberg, CEO & Founder of Facebook It is very hard to describe social media and social networking in one definition. More you ask about it and more definitions you will get. It is difficult to get one agreeable answer. Social networks were always been there, but now they‖ve gained concrete reality in the online fabric of modern life. With the arrival of many social networking sites the companies across the world have seen a great potential in social media. Social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn have made their places not only in foreign countries but also in country like India also. Currently, there are more than 59 million Facebook users in the India, which makes it number 3 in the ranking of all Facebook statistics by Country. However, the total penetration of Facebook is only 5% in India as compared to U.S where the 167 million users contribute in the total penetration of more than 50% in the country. The SMS of the Internet better known as twitter and LinkedIn have over 15 million users in India. This has created a huge opportunities for Companies which they are trying to cash in. The number of users is not only the criteria for social media advertising for the companies. Social networks have also brought the transformational change in consumer behavior. As per current surveys, approximately two third of people believes that social media fills many gaps between customer and clients. The expenditure by many companies on these social media clearly shows that this is one the effective platform for the marketing. Social media marketing has a quite impact on the increased sales, increased leads, and increased brand awareness. Social media marketing gives lots of fresh ideas, content and perspectives. What is Social Samosa? This must have caught you wondering that a Samosa which is shared or something socially. But to your surprise Social Samosa is knowledge repository of thoughts, ideas and dialogue about social media scenario in India. The portal aims to be the enabler of growth of an individual, a brand or an organization within the industry. They want people to go to this website for anything related to social media. The reason for picking this website is that very less has been written about it. The potential of Social media and Social Samosa go hand in hand. There is so much happening today on Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn and where not. Every other day a company launches an ad campaign on social media. Today, people hardly
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log out of Facebook and that leads to lot of brand stories, campaign successes and failure. The success and failure is difficult to predict but the outcome being measure from number of likes, shares, retweets, etc is easy to evaluate.
aspects. Also, they have features Indian social media courses. The website also features Indian social media agencies which work in this field and are active in creating campaigns for digital media spaces. Agencies also play instrumental in providing content by sharing the details of the campaigns they create and execute. Social Samosa also offers jobs in Social media. Jobs exist for people looking for interns, full timers and free lancers. Today, social media jobs are one area where many marketers would want to go for the sheer market potential and some also for the love of it.
Social Samosa‖s Reach (socialsamosa.com) Social Samosa is led by energetic entrepreneurs who are social media experts themselves. From the profiles, they seem to be adventurers and fun loving people. Currently, they earn money from the banner advertisements on the website. Content is a key element of this website. Contributors to the website are not just the founders but established Social Media specialists, graduates, managers (those who have successfully executed a bunch of social media campaigns) and active social media users who have been using social media platforms from the time dot com hit India and have monitored the growth of social media from day one. They share the topics with these people and based on their submission they publish it. Also, there is an option for amateurs like us to contribute. So what does this website do? It has case studies, campaign reviews, expert interviews, industry updates and what not. A peculiar thing is everything on this website is related to India. This shows the fact that India is huge potential for social media and marketing efforts towards social media is increasing by almost all companies. Analysis provided on this website is extremely structured and clear. So it becomes a reference for many studying the particular campaign. The articles are also categorized with respect to individual social media networks like Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc. This website provides a platform for many social media workshops and related events. Everyone on Facebook/Twitter thinks that they know how to use social media but few know how important it is for the company to be strong, clear and correct in social media. These workshops revolve around these
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jobs.socialsamosa.com The fun part of the website includes free downloads for social media enthusiasts. Downloads include ebooks on social media, background templates for various social networks. But the download link is way too down for users to notice it. Also, it has very limited resources to download. It can be one of the ways to drive in traffic for free resources apart from the core reason of social media knowledge. There can be some improvement which we would like to point out. First thing which comes to my mind is Why the name Social Samosa? A story on the same can be conveyed to the people that will make people feel more connected to the brand. The founders do think that social media is going to go mobile why not have an application just for that.
?
The advertisements placed on the website are relevant but there is duplication of the banners.
socialsamosa.com The effectiveness of Social media results into popping up of many social media websites. Many websites are posting social media analytics using various data mining techniques. Many others are coming up with case studies, blogs, social media apps and many others. Social Samosa is not only the website which is active in this space. Ogilvy and Mather have come up with a website which is totally focused on the social media named as social@ogilvy. Within a very few days it has attracted a vast number of internet users who are interested in social media. It posts about the new ideas, blogs, planning, practice, insights from leader into its website. Social Mention is active in social media search and analysis platform for aggregation of user generated content. Social Baker is the one which deals with Social media analytics and markets insight.
Lighthouse Insights is another innovative website which covers about Indian social media news, case studies, researched articles, social media app reviews. The list is endless. Social media surely is at steep growth stage. A term already catching up in this context is SoLoMo – Social, Local, Mobile. More brands will hop on and use social media to reach out to their customers.
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References
Social Samosa: Indian Social Media Knowledge Storehouse; http://www.socialsamosa.com/about/
Swati Maheshwari. (2012) Social Samosa – Aiming to be the one stop shop for Indian Social Media News and Reviews; Retrieved from http:// yourstory.in/2012/01/social-samosa-aiming-to-be-the -one-stop-shop-for-indian-social-media-news-andreviews/
Social Media Jobs India | Social Samosa; http:// jobs.socialsamosa.com/
Social Bakers: Social Media Statistics and Monitoring; http://www.socialbakers.com/
Social@Ogilvy; https://social.ogilvy.com/ Real Time Search socialmention.com/
–
Social
Mention;
http://
Diversity and Inclusion by Jagriti Bhadra, Xavier Institute of Social Service, Ranchi
1. INTRODUCTION ―Diversity and Inclusion‖ (D&I) has been a much used term these days. Many a times we hear about D& I professionals. So, let us begin by defining the terms Diversity and Inclusion. The University of Arizona has a broad definition of ―Diversity’ which include but is not restricted to, race, ethnicity, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, gender expression, disability, nationality, language, religion, and socioeconomic background[1].On the other hand ―Inclusion’ is defined as, “The active, intentional, and ongoing engagement with diversity—in people, in the curriculum, in the co-curriculum, and in communities (intellectual, social, cultural, geographical) with which individuals might connect—in ways that increase one‖s awareness, content knowledge, cognitive sophistication, and empathic understanding of the complex ways individuals interact within systems and institutions” (AAC&U, 2009, p 3) [2].Before 1990, most large companies had an Employment Equity and Affirmative Action Officer, usually a lower-level employee who worked in the organization compiling statistics about how many employees were in targeted groups, e.g., people of colour and women. But throughout 1990-2000, ―Diversity‖ came to include many dimensions beyond gender, sexual orientation, casts, disability, ethnicity etc. Companies started to pay attention to the representation of the groups. There has been a shift in trendfocus of efforts in companies has shifted from ―Diversity‖ to ―Inclusion‖. Today special attention is being given to the inclusion policy of this diverse workgroup. 2. CREATIVITY AND INNOVATION With heightened global competitions amongst organizations, globalization, technology sophistication, flattened organizational structure there is a definite need of Diversity and Inclusion for success of any organization. With the changing role of HR professions in organizations, Diversity and Inclusion has been a major area of focus for HR practitioners. Executives globally have understood that a Diverse and Inclusive workforce is needed to drive innovation, foster creativity, and guide business strategies. It is considered as a major factor for success. It is no longer a creation of heterogeneous workforce and compliance to the legal mandate but driving the workforce to think out of the box, generate new ideas, and work on new services and voice new opinions. Companies operate on a global scale, so Diversity and Inclusive has to change as different markets have different definitions of the meaning of Diversity. These days D &I is not considered as a separate business practice, but rather it is viewed as a brilliant policy by the organizations that can help them to have an edge over their competitors. For example, to focus on the area of D&I NIKE Inc appointed its first VP of Diversity [4]. The new D&I team mainly focussed on three major areas: Engaging Employees
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Providing Business Consultation Developing Innovative Tools, Models and Designs
for India and China whereas something else should be the area of focus for Hong-Kong, United States and United Kingdom.
The approach of focussing on innovation has been lauded by external diversity professionals as a best practice and has been highlighted at several global innovation conferences including the Medici Summit and Innotown. Voice of a diverse workforce is especially needed for powering innovation strategies. Rosalind Hudnell, director of global Diversity and Inclusion at chip maker Intel rightly said “Because of our diverse workforce we―ve experienced a boost in productivity. When you can move people to contribute to their fullest, it has a tremendous impact”.[3].It must also be mentioned that in these days of increased competitions, clients‖ requirement of different demography are met with diverse workforce.
5. CONCLUSION: There has been significant progress made to develop and retain a diverse workforce but barriers still exist. Budget factor sometimes pose as the major deterrent for the implementation of the D&I programs. On the other hand sometimes it is the fault of the middlelevel management to implement the D&I programs. Another factor that sometimes poses as a threat to the implementation of these programs is the gloomy economic scenario which restricts an organization from hiring people. Based on some studies it can be inferred that in the coming days organizations will struggle with some serious issues like dearth of talent, an ageing workforce and multigenerational workforce but if they place D & I as their topmost priority in their list of priorities they will seriously weather all these challenges and can come ahead in competitions.
3. PROMOTING D&I Talent acquisition and talent retention have been a major HR challenge for today‖s competitive world. So, in this respect Diversity and Inclusion policies are designed specifically to recruit and retain talent, expand an organization‖s talent pool. It also helps an organization to build an employment brand that is viewed as fully inclusive. Companies reach out to talents by attending job fairs, community events and university tie-ups. Especially technology companies like Microsoft are making serious effort to incorporate women and minorities into fields like Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM). Much of the ―Diversity and Inclusion‖ success depends on an organization‖s ability to execute on its promise to provide job-advancement opportunity. For example: Mention must be made about “Know and Grow” initiative of AT&T which makes significant effort to expose highly potential and talented employees particularly women to higher management in order to get them mentored and trained. 4. CHALLENGES FOR D&I Companies spend considerable amounts of money and time in recruiting, training and developing their associates. So retention of diverse talent is a challenge. On the other hand many executives are of the opinion that diverse teams and companies make better decisions-especially post financial meltdown Workforce Diversity is even more of a priority globally. Organizations also craft the D& I policies according to various demographics -like focus should be more on persons with disabilities, persons with special needs
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References:
http://www.arizona.edu/diversity/what-aredefinitions-diversity-and-inclusion
http://www.aacu.org/compass/ inclusive_excellence.cfm
http://www.forbes.com/forbesinsights/ innovation_diversity/index.html
.http://www.nikebiz.com/crreport/content/peopleand-culture/6-3-1-our-approach.php?cat=diversityand-inclusion
INTERVIEW Mr. Sameer Kaul Chief Marketing Officer, Dr Lal Path Labs healthcare accessible to all.
4. You have had an exposure to many industries and are now the CMO at a healthcare company. What is the relevance of tailor-made Health Care Management programs like ours?
1. What motivated your move towards the healthcare industry? Fastest growing sectors, a new evolving concept of wellness, caring and giving, with my past experiences in consumer brands – I could leverage this in the diagnostics (healthcare business).
2. In a rapidly saturating healthcare market, how does a business differentiate itself from the competition? By creating a unique positioning. Gaining insights on what the target customer needs, finding hidden needs. Basically it should be outside –inside, rather than inside –outside. It should be a customer based business strategy.
3. What, according to you, is the role that PublicPrivate Partnerships should have in the healthcare Space? In my view, PPP concept is a great way to make
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Healthcare will be one of the fastest growing sectors in years to come and a 100 billion USD market in India by 2015. The skill sets needed are different and there is a big scope for institutes to align to this reality when the market is lucrative. Also the institutes have to realize the importance to design case studies and syllabus as per industry needs and situation and hence an industry interface is important.
5. Many commentators want the healthcare and financial services industries to come up with financial instruments which can better help the patients with their bills, than the current health care insurance, cashless transactions regime. What is your take on that? Any innovation is welcome as long as it creates value for all stakeholders. Only then will it sustain.
6. Is there a role for technology to play in the growing healthcare business? Yes, today CMO‖s role is not complete without the IT guys, and in the new age of digital medium, technology is the order of the day in terms of customer engagement, customer connect, customer experience and the way brands communicate with customers. The fifth ―P‖ of marketing today is Participation and
technology enables this in all facets.
7. Are there any major differences, in the organizational cultures , between Indian organizations and those in the countries where you have worked? Say, Australia? Yes, the customer demographics and environment are a bit different.
8. Where do you see the industry, five years from now? Healthcare, Education and Retail, Entertainment are the big four. Healthcare paradigm also seems to be moving from ILLNESS to WELLNESS, PRESCRIPTIVE TO PREVENTIVE, and in the years to come, even a step further – PREDICTIVE.
9. What would be your suggestions to TAPMI, for improving its healthcare management program?
Customer focus and work backwards to design the education product – course ware, case studies and the syllabus.
Define your customer segments well and find your unique positioning and your right segment.
10. What would be your advice for the budding healthcare management professionals at TAPMI? You are in the right industry – now all you need is to prove yourself and ensure you do a great job wherever you are placed.
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Emerging Trends in Talent Acquisition by Purva Bhatnagar, XIMB
Introduction: What is Talent Acquisition? Organizations today are operating in a highly competitive business environment, characterised by uncertainty and ever expanding boundaries. There is no wonder why then the demand and supply dynamics of highly skilled knowledge workers is of major concern to any organization. The modern day workforce recognizes no local or regional boundaries and is highly mobile and global. Therefore it has become imperative for companies to strategize in an organized manner to attract and eventually retain the top talent which is vital to their progress. Talent Acquisition is this process of attracting, finding, and selecting highly talented individuals (those who align with the business strategy, possess required competencies and skill set, and will integrate smoothly and productively into the organization and its culture) to meet current and future employment needs. The Talent acquisition mechanism has changed drastically in the past few years. With a seemingly endless pool of applicants it has become essential for companies to filter the right fit for their requirement. With unemployment soaring because of the global economic meltdown organizations, cannot afford to settle for the wrong candidate. Why is Talent Acquisition Important? Today‖s times can be aptly described as a dog-eats-dog world. The operational competencies of organizations are improving fast. Unlike the recruiters in the past who were more keen on filling the positions quickly and in a cost effective manner, often overlooking the quality of the hire; the focus of the new age recruiters is on the overall skills, qualifications and attitude of the prospective candidates. Hence new tools like psychometric test and scenario based questionnaires have been developed. Various researches have irrefutably pointed out that most of the employee turnover happens due to faulty hiring. It is estimated that at least 1/3 of business failures are due to poor hiring decisions and inability to attract and retain the right people. The cost of replacing an employee is 1.5-3 times the salary and can be higher for some managerial positions. An effective acquisition sets the stage for success of both the employee and the organization and also helps in cutting the costs incurred due to unrealized and lost opportunities. Talent acquisition assumes more importance and complexity during the times of recession where according to a study the top 10% of the Talent Pool is in more demand than ever. Also this pool is more reluctant, understanding the inherent risk. Thus companies require maximizing their talent search and identification as economies world over recover gradually.
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Emerging Trends: Strengthening Talent Acquisition Looking at the increased importance of talent acquisition, organizations have revamped the existing systems. The emerging tactics are being put to use by companies to become the “Employer of Choice”
of skills and expertise. Thus it is very important for the organizations to invest both resources and time in acquiring employees who are the Right Fit for the organization.
2012 has been touted as the year of Social Media. Led by the likes of Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter; the networking platforms provide the ideal sources to the organizations to attract referrals. Studies by various behavioural experts have pointed out that the social media will be dominant among best practices in recruitment and development. The number of vendors offering services to employ social media in an effective manner for strategic talent acquisition is no surprise then. These tools are being used for talent assessment, both Pre and Post hire and also to collate candidate/employee experience.
Employer Branding
The term was officially introduced in management circles in 1990 and pointed out that it is an organization‖s reputation as an employer. Employer Brand refers to ―the image of an organisation as a great place to work‖; creating this ―image‖ is known as Employer Branding. It‖s the employer‖s unique characteristics that are valued by the employees and the prospective employees, and is used to differentiate the organization both externally and internally. Employer Branding is a unique application of the marketing principles of branding in the field of HR, making it a part of the employer‖s marketing strategy. An EVP or Employee Value Proposition is an organization‖s offer of facilities, services and assistances that the recruits can employ to further their career. Employer Branding is a two way process; the employer ―Sells the Job‖ to the candidate and they weigh the offer considering the Employer Brand and make a decision whether to accept or reject. Leading organizations have conducted detailed studies to identify career aspirations, expectations and other incentives required to attract and motivate the requisite talent.
Right Fit
Researchers have linked high attrition rates to poor chemistry between the organization and the employee, Bad Fit. Most people leave a company because of faulty selections. Considering this, many companies have started to hire people on the “Hire for attitude, Train for skill” principle. Companies have expanded the requirement criterion to include Team work, Leadership potential and innovative skills besides good analytical abilities and structured approach to problem solving. During the interview stage the employer delves deeper to recognize the candidates who have the right attitude, would be passionate workers and add value to the organization. The costs of an employee to be replaced are high and it may not lead to a selection with the required level
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Social Media & Mobile Platforms
Another trend that is revolutionising Talent Acquisition is the Mobile flow of communication. There is no doubt that devices like smart phones, tablet PC‖s and Notebooks are fast becoming the most preferred platforms for interactions. With these devices information is exchanged in the blink of an eye and this fact bears a crucial implication on the companies‖ recruiting strategies. Various portals like naukri.com and dedicated networking partners like Linked In and Glassdoor are developing systems to mark their presence in the mobile platform field. Organizations have to not only monitor the various networking and job portals but also keep up with the constant requirements of the IT era by refurbishing its infrastructure not only to ensure more efficient operations but also lure more effective employees.
Application Tracking System
An application tracking system is software that helps an organization manage and co ordinate job application data and its recruitment needs. An ATS (Also known as Talent Acquisition System) maintains candidate resumes in a database, thus allowing effective search, filter, and routing of applicants. Organizations employ it to improve productivity of the recruiting process. The efficient handling of the data being done electronically reduces anomalies caused otherwise and allows the organization to keep a talent pool ready and in case of a vacancy it leads to quick
recruitment decisions, thus leading to reduced cost and time per hire. The ATS or Talent Acquisition systems market is changing dramatically, growing at a pace of any upcoming HR technology application. Despite the obvious advantages many organizations are hesitant to choose a more effective solution provider and thus the sales cycle can take up to 3 years. A major reason cited for this is the fact that the success of the Talent Acquisition team is often measured against these technology decisions. The recruiting team is afraid especially in these times of uncertainty, about retaining their jobs. Another reason contributing to this hesitation could be the increasing complexity of the proposal requests. The talent acquisition team is not the only stake holder; IT and Procurement are becoming a critical part of the selection process. Each of these groups has a different set of expectations and priorities. In such cases the organization needs to clearly spell out the “Must haves” and the elements that would be an added value but can be “Done Without”. Conclusion: Adapt and Adopt All these trends coupled with rapid globalisation, increasing competition among various agencies and the continual innovation in mobile solutions is changing the face of the Talent Acquisition process. An organization has to be mindful of all the changes and be quick to respond by modifying its existing practices to adopt the best practices. The pressing issues of Talent Acquisition need to be addressed equipped with the combined knowledge of human resources and the shifts in the dynamics of market consolidation.
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References
Dorothy Berger, Talent Management Handbook Recent Trends in Talent Acquisition and Retention by DK Ribifa Jain http://www.slideshare.net/imsosarah/5-strategictrends-in-recruiting Talent Acquisition Systems, 2011 By Sarah White
Advertising Innocence: Use of children for advertising by Meenal Maheshwari & Biswarup Saha, IIM-K
There are advertisements. And then there are advertisements which grab your attention. Marketers use specific tools to ―hook‖ the customers. An advertisement has two parts - technical constructs and psychological construct. Technical constructs, like camera angle and special effects, etc. depend on the creative team of the advertising campaign. However, it is the psychological construct that is crucial for delivering the right message. The various psychological hooks that marketer employ are sex, embarrassment, fear, humor, hype, etc.
There are four basic models of advertising as shown in Fig. 1 (Source:http:// drypen.in/advertising/advertising-frameworks.html). These four frameworks are grouped into functional roots, comprising sales framework and salience framework, and peripheral root, comprising the remaining two frameworks. Markets have traditionally used the functional roots for advertising. However, with increasing competition and diminishing product differentiation, they are now turning to the peripheral roots. As a result, marketers are increasingly using the ―cute‖ hook to grab customers‖ attention by using children in advertisements.
Evolution of Advertisements using Children Early advertising rarely mentioned children as the protagonist of the advert for the obvious reason that latest toys and games meant for kids were not affordable by masses. Also the children formed the passive background of the advert in the early 1960s. Children used in these advertisements belonged to age groups ranging from infants to preschoolers. The late 1980s saw the surge of advertising using children. This coincided with the fact that children were gaining freedom and influencing purchase decision in the family. Other factors which influenced the use of children were increased competition and low product differentiation due to globalization in the early 1990s.
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Marketers started employing tweens and early teenagers for selling their products through television commercials. The current phase is drastically different from the previous phases, on two counts. Firstly, the number of adverts portraying children as the central character has increased exponentially. Secondly, children are now being used to market a variety of products which are probably not being used by them. The second point is fervently debated amongst practitioners and theoreticians. Some call such adverts as unethical, while some label using children in advertising as child labor.
Corporates’ Rationale Children have come a long way from advertising dairy products and detergents. They are now selling a plethora of products, varying from financial services, real estate, automobile, manufactured products, etc. Corporates employ children to communicate a clear message in the jungle of advertisements that surround a consumer today. "We wanted to communicate what we do in the simplest manner, which has been achieved with the use of kid-speak quite effectively," says Swati Bhattacharya, vice-president, corporate relations and branding, at Ingersoll Rand, which makes temperature control units for trucks, trailers, trains and ships to help keep food cold. In its commercial, a kid eating ice -cream says, "My daddy makes refrigerators for trucks that carry loads and loads of ice-cream." Prasoon Joshi, executive chairman, McCann Worldgroup said that the use of children is in line with the change in the social structure and the purchasing behavior of the consumers. Researchers suggest that using children can become an easy and effective way to communicate. Another reason companies are using children is for shedding the serious image associated with their products. Children are effective in grabbing consumers‖ attentions by providing a refreshing take. An example is the GreenPly advert, which communicated the long life of the products using reincarnation of a child. (See advertisement on http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uakI_QIQaYs) Such methods of selling products is not limited in
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practice to the private organizations. LIC, in order to communicate the different premium payment options available, portrayed children having different flavored ice-creams. Moreover, looking at the number of successful adverts featuring children, marketers consider that successful sales of their products promoted by adverts with children is a trade heuristic.
Consumers’ Perspective There is a stark difference in the social pattern today compared to a decade back. Joint families have been substituted with nuclear families. Gone are the days when the head of the house was the sole bread winner of the family. Today the kids enjoy an equal stand, as not less, as the mother in being the biggest influencer of purchase decision. As seen in most urban households now-a-days, both the parents are working and hence are unable to spend quality time with their children. As a mode to express affection or to get rid of their guilt trips, parents often allow children to make purchase decisions, regarding the model, color, etc. Practitioners believe that a child now influences the purchase decisions of such young parents. Hence it is important to connect with the kid rather than the parents. Moreover, the population structure of any region will show that the economy is now controlled by the millennials- people who are now in their early thirties and twenties. Research shows that this segment of population has grown in an environment with constant changes. Hence they long for the innocence they possessed during their childhood. Marketers have capitalized on this insight to sell their product. An example would be the advertisement of McDonald‖s wherein a boy and a girl, who are pre schoolers, have a conversation that would have mostly taken place between two late teenagers. (See advertisement on http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=jmNrvlQ73pU). The target group has responded well to this advertisement. Children are also used to target consumers who are not adept with the technological advances that have taken place. A classic example of this are the Flipkart adverts which portray tweens as adults, who make online purchase. “No kidding, no worries” is how Flipkart has positioned itself, portraying that it‖s so
simple to use, that even a child can use it. (see advertisement on http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=rLnJJ0CNBok) Another insight that marketers work on is the safety of their children. Products are portrayed to protect their children. Classic example the Dettol adverts (see advert on http://www.youtube.com/watch? v=Wq_h2VgifGE). More recently, financial firms give the child angle when marketing their insurance policies (see advert on http://www.youtube.com/ watch?v=3ylzY5dM9F0)
Hazards of Children Advertising Although marketers realize the benefits of portraying children in the adverts, they are fully aware of the drawbacks of such a campaign. Future Brands CEO Santosh Desai warns that such campaigns will fall flat if children are not depicted well. "At times it becomes an easy way and not necessarily an effective way to speak. The way it is spun around for relevance to the product is crucial," he says. United Colors of Benetton has used many controversial adverts with children to draw attention. However, these advertisements and the brand have come under severe criticism. An example of one such advertisement is show in Fig. 2. The advert has been categorized racist in nature.
Sexualization of Children in Advertising In a survey in UK, 88% of parents admitted to the fact that children were under pressure to grow up very quickly with 58% conforming it to the celebrity culture. Fashion industry, as capitalized on this aspiration of young children, and has often portrayed children as women. An example of such an advertisement is shown in Fig. 3. Adverts 1, 3 and 4 were printed by French Vogue Magazine and had stirred up reasonable controversy for the content of the ad and the sexualization of 10 year old kids. Print adverts 1 and 3 have a famous celebrity kid reclining in provocative poses and wearing revealing outfits. Similarly in ad 4, the models have been made to dress up like adults. Print advert 2 shows a teenager outrageously dressed in vests and stockings. The girls in all the ads are wearing heavy makeup and their expressions seem to be strictly fabricated.
These kind of advertisements generally encourage paedophiles. A former psychiatrist in University of Melbourne says that paedophiles see these adverts sexualizing the children and justify their thinking sexually about them. One report based on 11 case studies of pedophiles concluded that offenders generate their own erotic materials from relatively innocent sources such as television advertisements, clothing catalogues featuring children modelling underwear, and similar sources (La Nauze and Rush 2006). Child-psychologists are however, not impressed with the current trend labelling the commodification of child psyche as an “unhealthy� pattern. “It's a kind of child labor," says Dr Jitendra Nagpal, senior psychiatrist and in-charge of department of mental health at Moolchand Medcity in Delhi. Some of the negative outcomes are discussed below.
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Unhealthy body images A survey by a fitness firm, Fit vs Fiction, suggests that as per toddlers there is 0.003% chance of their becoming a lawyer while there is a 42% chance of their willing to be thinner by the time they turns eight. This is a clear indication of the fact that advertising campaigns with skinny models tend to create a mental pressure on tweens to stay thin & look good.
reported where a Hyundai advert was banned because it encouraged children to drive on their own. Fig. 6, an advert by Nintendo shows a communion background where young girls are standing attentively while the young men behind them are apparently busy with their video games. The usual perception has been put to use: sincere girls while boys defying rules and attentive towards sports. Fig. 7, an advert by Lamborghini, is an attempt to break free from the usual stereotype of girls playing with dolls while boys playing with cars. Unusual body images have also been used to grab attention and market specific products. Fig. 4 exhibits an advert of UCB. Ever popular for its astounding eye grabbing print ads, United Colors of Benetton came up with yet under advert campaign, in its attempt to defy traditional advertisement themes. This one caught the eye because it is not only appalling to look at a mucous covered new-born but also that it could be used to endorse a brand.
Similarly, the 42nd International Children's Games came up with print adverts (Fig. 5) showcasing “aggressive� kids in 12-15 age group. In order to put across the message of the seriousness of these sports in kids, the models endorsed a miniature golf stick as an ear piercing and hair trimmed and dyed in football checkers. The advert went viral with kids claiming free haircuts and henna tattoos to gain a fierce look. It is estimated that by giving free makeovers to hundreds of kids the event was successful in attracting huge attention.
Gender Stereotyping There is widespread gender stereotyping in adverts using children. Boys generally portrayed as playful, energetic and aggressive while girls are shown as docile, giggly and passive. In Australia a case had been
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Conclusion Children have long served the purpose of marketers to sell their products. However, with social activist groups and media watchdogs gaining ground, this strategy has been inviting a lot of flak. Marketers are straddling the thin line between ethical and unethical when it comes to portraying children in advertisements. Some activist groups have gone on to say that this is a form of child labor. There are stringent rules in many countries regarding advertising to children. For example, in Sweden, it is banned to advertise to children below the age of 12. In Greece, there is a complete ban on advertisement of war toys. However, with policy makers introducing
new reforms regulating the use of children in advertisements, marketers would have to be more careful in their portrayal of children in advertisements.
September 2012
<http://www.ppu.org.uk/chidren/ advertising_toys_eu.html> last accessed on 14th September 2012
<http://www.onextrapixel.com/2010/05/04/75advertisements-featuring-cute-children-and-adorable -babies/> last accessed on 14th September 2012
<http://www.scribd.com/doc/13771383/Analysis-of-6 -Indian-Advertisements> last accessed on 14th September 2012
<http://blogs.siliconindia.com/Manisha09/ Why_children_are_used_in_advertisementsHow_they_ bcome_the_targeted_young_consumers_of_the_produ cts-bid-61ifZbU791664692.html> last accessed on 14th September 2012
References
Michel Syrett, Jean Lamminman, (2004),"Advertising and millennials", Young Consumers: Insight and Ideas for Responsible Marketers, Vol. 5 Iss: 4 pp. 62 – 73
J.S. Panwar, Milan Agnihotri, (2006),"Advertising message processing amongst urban children: An Indian experience - with special reference to TV advertising", Asia Pacific Journal of Marketing and Logistics, Vol. 18 Iss: 4 pp. 303 – 327
Helen Gabriel, Rita Kottasz, Roger Bennett, (2006),"Advertising planning, ad-agency use of advertising models, and the academic practitioner divide", Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Vol. 24 Iss: 5 pp. 505 – 527
Margaret-Anne Lawlor, Andrea Prothero, (2008),"Exploring children's understanding of television advertising - beyond the advertiser's perspective", European Journal of Marketing, Vol. 42 Iss: 11 pp. 1203 – 1223
Chris Hackley, (2003),"From consumer insight to advertising strategy: the account planner's integrative role in creative advertising development", Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Vol. 21 Iss: 7 pp. 446 - 452
<http://drypen.in/advertising/advertisingframeworks.html> last accessed on 12th September 2012
<http://www.fitvsfiction.com/Fit_vs_Fiction/ What_is_Fit_vs._Fiction.html> last accessed on 12th September 2012
<http://medialiteracy.net/pdfs/hooks.pdf> accessed on 12th September 2012
<http://www.medialit.org/reading-room/how-analyze -advertisement> last accessed on 13th September 2012
<http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/201110-05/news/30246900_1_clutter-advertisementsmccann-worldgroup> last accessed on 13th September 2012
<http://toostep.com/debate/using-children-inadvertisements-is-ethical-or-unethical-for> accessed on 13th September 2012
<http://brandconsultant.hubpages.com/hub/ advertisingtochildren> last accessed on
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last
last
14th
Building a Model for Measuring Customer Satisfaction by Asad Khan, NITIE
In a world of social media every organization is trying its best to know its customers and evaluate how it fared in servicing its customers.
Are my customers happy with the current products/services?
Are they looking for something different?
Do they perceive us customer friendly?
These are some of the questions whose answers every company wants to know but how does it go about it? Usually whenever companies have to measure customer satisfaction they go for customer review questionnaires or polls which help them to know customer pain points, but in some cases it is not possible to reach out to customers. Today customer preferences & expectations change very quickly and it is not possible to take surveys frequently, as the effectiveness of customer survey reduces when the customer doesn‖t feel comfortable in filling these questionnaires. Therefore there is a need of a mechanism where customer satisfaction could be measured from internal data which is captured whenever customer interacts with the company‖s service points. Here data could be anything ranging from customer complaints, positive reviews, defects encountered in the delivered products, etc. To address this challenge, a research was conducted on various techniques which could be used to accomplish the objective. It was observed that,
Customer satisfaction surveys suffered from the drawback of customers likely being emotionally influenced while filling out these questionnaires
Customer satisfaction measurement obtained through surveys represents perceived feedback rather than impartial feedback
It does not imply that companies do not get any value from customer-filled review forms. But it must be recognized that responses can be emotionally biased, and that the customer is not one person, but an organization representing multiple people. This gives rise to the need for a way to compute a Customer Satisfaction rating based on internal data - data that is free from bias and that gives a realistic metric on customer satisfaction. The following case will take you through the approach and step by step methodology used to achieve the desired results.
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Customer Satisfaction Measurement Model Case Mortgage Services department of one of the four leading banks of Australia which deals in mortgage products for its retail customers, has been going through a series of transformations to improve customer experience and brand image. Customer complaint resolution is a crucial area which is impacting customer experience. Quality Team of one of the leading BPO service providers undertook this project to reduce customer complaints which are contributed by Mortgage Services Team as a part of the initiative to continuously provide value addition to Client. Methodology Adopted
Project was divided into different phases and following methodology was adopted to build the model.
Each Rating represents the factors which contribute to customer satisfaction
Each Rating has a mathematical formula to measure the factor
Each rating will have different weights based on its proportion in type of complaints
Each rating will be multiplied with its respective weights to obtain Composite Customer Satisfaction Rating on a scale of 5
Identification of Customer Dissatisfaction factors After data collection and data analysis, different factors were identified which were contributing to customer dissatisfaction. Six sigma tools like Pareto chart analysis & Fishbone Diagram were used to identify the root cause for customer dissatisfaction. Next step was to quantify the identified factors using the data acquired from different sources. Each factor was quantified into a rating through application of mathematical formulas. The diagram below highlights each rating and their integration to calculate composite customer satisfaction rating.
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Quantification of Factors 1. Quality Rating
Defects (Refunds) occur due to committed during the loan processing
Defect Density can be calculated in terms of defects per total loan files processed over the period which is under measurement
It is important to select the same sample size and time period for all the measurements
Accepted defect density would be as per the agreed terms or sigma level used for the process
errors
2. Response Rating
affecting disbursal schedule
This takes into account the response time of the customer services team
Turn-Around Time is the time taken by team to respond to the complaint or enquiry filed by the customer date. It needs to be measured and compared against a standard response time
It will also take into account the cases in which loan was not disbursed within the standard timeframe
3. Charges Rating
Whenever the customer has to pay more than the agreed or fixed value, the customer is dissatisfied Whenever extra money is requested from the customer, then resultant negotiations can certainly frustrate the customer
4. Specification Rating
Unclear specifications understanding the specs
or
a
lack
Improper understanding of the requirements
Failure to meet these expectations cause dissatisfaction in customers
of
5. Cooperation Rating
Sometimes customer may request for change in loan application when it is under process
This rating will measure, the flexibility of the process to incorporate change request without
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Composite Customer Satisfaction Rating
Composite Customer Satisfaction Rating (CCSR) • All five ratings do not carry the same importance in achieving customer satisfaction. • These ratings can also vary from business to business, and from customer to customer. • Some customers may perceive quality as being the most important aspect of a product or a service, while some may perceive delivery as the most important aspect. Still for others, the highest of importance might be placed on price. • Taking into account these differences in customers‖ perceptions and preferences, necessary weights needs to be assigned to each of the five ratings in order to arrive at a reasonably accurate CCSR. • The sum of all the weights must equal 1.00 in order to calculate a meaningful CCSR. CCSR = 5 – (QR*W1 + RR*W2 + CR*W3 + SR*W4 + CR*W5)
Rating Quality Respon se Char ges Specificati on Cooper ation
W ei gh t W 1 W 2 W 3 W 4 W 5
W
Total Weig ht
Simulation of Model
Ratings Quality Rating (QR) Response Rating (RR) Charges Rating (CR) Specification Rating (SR) Cooperation Rating (CR) CCSR
Inputs
Results Actual Defect Density QR 0.01250 1.013
Defects (Errors in Loan Processing) No. of files processed Accepted defect density (4 Sigma) Actual days taken for loan disbursal
95 7600 0.00621 44
Accepted days for loan disbursal Actual amount charged
35 2000
RR 0.2571 4 CR
Amount on the Contract
1900
0.053
No. of specification mismatch No. of loan files processed Standard Mismatch Density No. of change requests received No. of change requests implemented without affecting the disbursal date
600 7600 0.02632 100
3.907
78%
Actual Mismatch Density 0.0789
60
Weightage 0.3
0.1538 0.1077
SR 2.0000 0.3385
CR 0.6666 7
0.1
Results Four key drivers shown below will help to increase customer satisfaction.
References
Summer Internship Project at a leading
newTMC_89.htm
Business Process Management Organization
http://www.ubank.com.au/ub/web/who -weare/backed -by-nab
http://www.westpac.com.au/contact -us/ customer -feedback/
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http://www.mindtools.com/pages/article/
http://www.isixsigma.com/tools -templates/ cause-effect/determine -root-cause-5-whys/
Catching the Eye of the Public: Live Advertising by Mary John Thalody and Naresh Jawni, NITIE
There‖s a storm coming, blowing the winds of change, knocking down age old formulas and tired gimmicks. It brings with it fresh ideas, uncharted horizons and a new world open to the unknown. This is the world of live advertising. Live advertising is the concept of using people participation and external concepts to create an ad that happens live and in a public area. There are very few records of live advertisements as it is still relatively new and untried. Honda created a live Ad with the theme “Difficult is worth doing” when they got an elite team of sky divers to create the name Honda in sky diving formation. The advertisement however was made by recording the event and showing it on Television and hence may not be the best example of live advertising. In the Summer Olympics of 2006, Adidas created an outdoor ad by enlisting climbers to race up 33 story buildings in a vertical climb for a Winner‖s Prize of $10,000. The latest advertisement to catch people‖s attention has been the Coke advertisement in collaboration with ―Skyfall‖, the latest James Bond movie slotted for release on 26th October 2012 in the UK. The advert has people undergoing an adventure to get their free ticket for Skyfall. The advert starts when a passerby goes to a vending machine at a railway station in the UK to get a bottle of Coke Zero. Out comes the bottle along with instructions to enter his details. Instructions follow asking him to reach Platform 6 in 70 seconds. This is the James Bond adventure offered to the consumer to spice up his life. It takes him away from his mundane daily life into a more exciting one for 70 seconds and at the end of those 70 seconds he is a hero, albeit a movie ticket winning one.
(Source: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDiZOnzajNU)
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What are the advantages that live advertising offer?
Live Attention: Nothing grabs more attention than an ordinary guy doing/getting something extraordinary in public. Live ads grab the attention of the viewer through the newness of the process and the surprise element. Every viewer is a new viewer: Unlike television advertisements, live advertisements are viewed by people who pass through when the event is happening. Hence, there are very few chances of the event being viewed by the same group of people. More cost efficient than traditional print or TV advertisements: Booking slots on prime time, creating a repeatable ad, buying print space all take money. All this is eliminated when the ad is performed willing by the consumer himself. If the advertisement involves external paid participation, the costs involved will be lesser than other mediums. Chances of going viral on the social media space: With Youtube causing videos to go viral, the imaginative concept of a live Ad has all the chances of marketing itself on virtual space. The Coke 007 ad is an example with it garnering 1,375,397 views in two days since Oct 18, 2012 when it was published on Youtube.
Some issues that dissuade companies from trying live advertising:
Unpredictability of external surroundings: The advertisement is far too dependent on the weather, the mood of the subject, the success/ failure of the stunt and so on. Failure of the stunt has the potential to backfire on the brand Permissions: Government laws and permissions and safety factors of different countries vary and hence might pose a problem to different stunts. The response of the consumer: If the advert involves performing a surprise on the consumer without prior notice, there is chance that he/she may respond unfavorably. This may lead to unexpected and unnecessary issues, bad media and bad publicity
Live advertising has been initiated in India too. The Ambipur “Freshness Surprise” ad had the brand playing pranks on unsuspecting visitors to a mall in Mumbai. Some visitors‖ cars had unexpected Pujas
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performed on them by a hired priest, some cars got decorated with flower garlands and ribbons, others had pretty young ladies walk around the car admiring it to the open mouthed wonder of its passengers.
(Source: Website- http://www.youtube.com/user/ AmbiPurIndia) It is yet to be seen whether this new medium of advertising will take off in India yet, but anyone who has watched the event performed in their now viral video on Youtube will definitely register one thing. The visitors will definitely recall the name Ambipur for a very long time. And so will anyone who sees that Ad. So what if there are a few disadvantages to this new kind of advertising. It gives a brand the chance to endear itself to the customer. The average man on the street goes home smiling thanks to a brand that‖s made his day. What better way to make a loyal customer? After all that is what marketing is all about.
References
Collins,Oisin (This Coke Zero advert is easily the coolest 'Skyfall' related thing we've seen yet)
Introduction `Does the stock market overreact?' De Bondt and Thaler in 1985 gave start to a new wave of thinking known as behavioural finance. Weak form inefficiency of the stock market was discovered by them after analysing how people are systematically overreacting to unexpected and dramatic news events which were surprising and profound. The Efficient Market Hypothesis as proposed by Fama (1970) asserts that the stock prices reflect the relevant information. The asset prices follow a random walk path i.e. they are merely random numbers. The study conducted by Caginalp G. and H. Laurent (1998) by the predictive power of price patterns finds patterns and confirms that they are statistically significant even in out-ofsample testing and report. The pattern of the stock index might help in predicting some of the effects of the various events. The calendar anomalies tends to exist which goes against the efficient market hypothesis. The researchers have used Gregorian calendar to investigate the calendar anomalies. There are various countries and societies which follow their own calendar on the basis of their religion. For example, the Hebrew calendar is followed by the Jewish society, which is strictly based on luni-solar, the Christian society follows the Gregorian, which is based on solar, and similarly Hindu and Chinese follow their own. The Hindu calendar is called “Panchanga” and it is based on both movements of the sun and the moon. The festival of “Diwali” is typically occurs at the end of October and beginning of November. The special ritual called “Mahurat Trading” can be observed on major stock exchanges like NSE, BSE, NCDEX to name a few lasts for about an hour. It is performed as a symbolic ritual since many years. It marks a link with the rich past and brokers look at it on a positive note. It marks an auspicious beginning to the Hindu New Year. The investors place token orders and buy stocks for their children, which are sometimes never sold and intraday profits are booked, however small they may be. Thus, it is widely believed that trading on this day will bring wealth and prosperity throughout the year. It is interesting to observe the behaviour of trading activities during the period preceding and succeeding Mahurat Trading. The purpose of this study is to know the effect of the festival prior and post diwali on the the returns.
Econometric methodology us on: compounded daily percentage change in the share price I have measured stock return as the Join continuously index (S&P CNX NIFTY) as shown below: pratibimb@tapmi.edu.in Rt = (lnPt – lnPt-1) x 100 …………………… (1) Visit: http://www.tapmi.edu.in/student-life/pratibimb/overview/ Where, Rt = return at time t Pt, Pt-1 = closing value of the stock price index at time t, t-1. Team Pratibimb I have used S&P CNX Nifty as it has got the most liquid stocks in its portfolio. Further, the National TAPMI Stock Pratibimb Exchange | December is largest 2012in | 32 terms of Market capitalisation and Volume. I have used the data of the P. B. No: 9, Manipal - 576104, Karnataka