TOSHIBA

Toshiba, a world leader in high technology, is a diversified manufacturer and marketer of advanced electronic and electrical products, spanning information & communications equipment and systems, Internet-based solutions and services, electronic components and materials, power systems, industrial and social infrastructure systems, and household appliances.

Under its mid term business plan, Toshiba is working for enhanced recognition as a highly profitable group of companies, active in both high growth and stable growth businesses.

source: toshiba

ASUS - Vision & Mission

ASUS, a technology-oriented company blessed with one of the world's top R&D teams, is well known for high-quality and innovative technology. As a leading provider of 3C (computers, communications and consumer electronics) total solutions, ASUS offers a complete product portfolio to compete in the new millennium.

Corporate Vision
Imagine innovations that simplify our lives and enable us to realize our full potential. It is technologies' responsibility to accommodate us, not the other way around, because all devices should perform and communicate seamlessly anytime, anywhere.

ASUS thrives to become an integrated 3C solution provider. (Computer, Communications, Consumer electronics.)

Mission and Value
As a major player of the IT industry, ASUS has established its corporate mission: Provide innovative IT solutions that empower people and businesses reaching their full potential.

The philosophy of ASUS product development is to do the fundamentals well first before moving forward. Started with computer components such as motherboards, graphic cards, and optical storage devices, ASUS now has now over 16 product lines, including desktop barebone systems, servers, notebooks, handhelds, network devices, broadband communications, LCD monitors, TVs, wireless applications, and CPT (chassis, power supply and thermal) products.

Achieving Our Mission
Passion for Technology
Technology is the heart of ASUS. We continue to invest in our world-class Research and Development so that we are always able to provide leading-edge innovations to people and businesses.

Quality
Quality is of utmost importance to ASUS. We continue to refine our quality management process to ensure customers receive quality solutions cost effectively.

Long-term Relationships
Whether they are our customers, media, shareholders or consumers, we believe in growing with our partners at all levels. Relationships with those key stakeholders are one of the most important factors of our continuing success.

Perseverance
All ASUS employees share the same sense of purpose. We thrive under pressure and we look forward to challenges. And all of us are working to accomplish the same mission, to empower people with innovative IT solutions.

source : asus

TELKOMSEL - Vision & Mission

VISION
The Indonesian wireless telecommunications solutions company.

MISSION
First choice wireless telecommunications solutions provider in Indonesia working in partnership with shareholders and other alliances to create value for investors, employees and the nation.

COVER STORY
Like a painter conjuring up images to fully complete a painting, Telkomsel reaffirmed such notion. Our growth in almost every aspect of the business during 2004 continued to be phenomenal. We recorded unparalleled growth in the size of our customer base, the coverage and capacity of our network, as well as in our revenues and profits.

We continued to extend coverage in 2004. We are pleased to say that we have Indonesia covered. Telkomsel’s signal can now be found in all main cities in all counties throughout Indonesia. Similar to the painter on the cover, we have painted Indonesia in Telkomsel’s red.

More importantly, we were not just growing. We maintained leadership. Despite more intense competition, Telkomsel managed to outpace market growth and expand market share to 54%.

Our ever extending coverage will provide basis for further sustainable growth. Maintaining Leadership Through Continuous Growth best describes the company in its current condition and its future aim. Telkomsel is confident to step into the future, to face the challenge of continuously growing in terms of skills, organization, technology, system and processes. While doing so, Telkomsel will strive to maintain leadership.

source : telkomsel

One Track, One Train - Employee Alignment to Strategy, Vision & Mission

The speed of engine, they say, is the speed of the train. Imagine, if the train was running not on one track but a number of tracks. What if the number of tracks was equal to the number of employees in a company?

Consider the case of a fast growing private sector bank, plagued with an epithet of 'Aggressive Sales, Regressive Service' .The email of a senior manager outlines the focus for the year "Our aim is to have zero unhappy customers!"

Ask a branch manager about that and she will grin wryly & say 'It's a new mantra... a flavour of the season....like six sigma"

A bank teller asks exasperatedly "What am I supposed to do when the customer is shouting on my throat. Should I keep smiling, keep him happy .... take up the onus of solving the problem when the call center had clearly messed up"

"If you look at data, 70% of the issues are caused by customer's ignorance about the process or the product. Only 30% on account of bank induced errors. So actually customers have no reason to be so unhappy!" says a regional quality champion, after doing an in-depth analysis.

The more employees you talk to, the clearer it becomes that not only there are a number of tracks, but also a number of destinations. And suddenly the organization looks more like a multiple headed hydra, a complex puzzle.We could unfold the mystery of how the organization still conspires to reach somewhere OR look at a simple word 'Alignment'.

Alignment: neat, clean & purposeful.

Like a single track, a single train & a single destination.

Alignment does not happen by default

A lot of senior management time is spent in formulation the strategy. Senior managers huddle into workshops and debate the destiny/mission of the company. The workshops are followed by a phase when the missionary zeal takes over and you find vision/mission statements, engraved in gold letters, up on company walls.

Employees look blankly at these 'gold lettered mantras'. Some dismiss them as vestiges of an annual 'Strategy Festival' for senior management-much sound & fury signifying nothing.Others try and take part in the festivities. They try to understand what the 'Strategy Festival' has in store for them. But even if he tried, what could a factory supervisor do to "leverage technology & relationships to create a competitive advantage" or a counter salesman do about "being the preferred brand of choice for Gen Y consumers"

• What are the top three things that the purchase manager should do to 'leverage technology and relationship'?


• How can a training manager measure whether training programme meant for the distributors is 'building bonds'?


• What would change in the 'Day in the Life of' an institutional salesman if the office equipment company has decided to diversify into construction?

Most employees are not part of strategy formulation. They have simple questions.

• What is the need for a new strategy/vision? What changes, what does not?


• Does it address the challenges/problems that the company was confronted with?


• How does it affect my life?


• How would I know whether I am on the right path?


• How will it affect my appraisal?


• How will it affect my boss, my colleagues, and other departments?

Most of these questions remain unanswered or better still, employees develop their own answers based on assumptions, hearsay and scattered bits of information.And this widens the gulf between strategy formulation & strategy execution.

Alignment has to be built like a bridge, connecting the world of theory & the world of execution.

It is a necessary bridge to build. The bridge may not be sufficient to ensure that the strategy gets executed well. But without this bridge, strategy will never cross over to the world of execution.

source : articlesbase

Interest Rate Risk Management

The traditional method of managing interest rate risk has been fixed -rate borrowing in the form of loans . If is simple , & companies know how much they will need each year to service the debt, However, it is not always possible to obtain a loan at the rates, or for the amounts required.

An enterprise may wish to take precautions against interest rates moving up or down in the future , or many wish to change the existing structure of its funding or deposits , for instance for a fixed rate of interest to a floating rate. With the devolopmentof the financial markets & , in particular , the financial futures markets , a number of instruments have arisen which allow the treasurer to hedge interest rate risk.

Interest Rate Swaps.

An interest rate swap is an exchange of interest rate commitments , serch that a fixed -rate.

Commitment is exchanged for a floating-rate commitment. The parties to a swap retain their obligations to the orginal lenders . Which means that the swap parties must accept counter - party risk.Interest rate swaps are used for purposes other than obtaining a cheaper financing rate. They could , for example- be used to change future case flows or to enhance returns.Interest rate swaps are off balance sheet items , as the principal amount of the contract is not paid , & it is just an agreement to swap future cash flows. However, the existece of the swap should be maintained in the notes to the financial statements. The interest payments & receipts should be accrued over the life of the swap on a straight-line basis. Financial institutions which actively trade swaps revalue their positions the current market value.

Forward Rate Agreements.

A forward rate agreement ( FRA) is an agreement whereby an enterprise can lock in an interest rate today for a period of time starting in the future. On the future date the two counter parts in the FRA settleup & , depending on which way rates go , one will pay an amount of money to the other representing the difference between the FRA rate & the actual rate.

source : articlesbase

MARTHA TILAAR Group - SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY

Martha Tilaar Group recognizes that human rights and environmental issues are counterparts. As a market leader for local cosmetics, the group is strongly concerned about the above issues raised by the company’s surrounding community and is eager to do its part in maintaining the well being of the society. The implementation is done through some community development programs and based on the following principles:

HUMAN RIGHTS ISSUES:

• Supports and respect the protection of international human rights within the company’s sphere of influence;
• Make sure the company is not complicit in human rights abuses;

LABOUR ISSUES:

• Upholds the freedom of association and the effective recognition of the right collective bargaining;
• The elimination of all forms of forced and compulsory LABOUR;
• The effective abolition of child labour;
• The elimination of discrimination in respect of employment and occupation;

ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES:

• Supports a precautionary approach to environmental changes;
• Undertakes initiatives to promote greater environmental responsibility;
• Encourages the development and diffusion of environmentally friendly technologies.

source : http://www.marthatilaar.com/company_social.html

Business Intelligence Resources on Better Management

Business Intelligence (BI) incorporates a wide range of information and data management techniques, beginning with data extraction, collection, cleansing, integration, aggregation, analysis and manipulation through the use of data marts, cubes, data warehouses and databases. The use of metadata and data modeling helps standardize data definitions and use across the enterprise. From these information sources, department and enterprise level reporting, monitoring, queries and analysis can be performed, and results presented as either ad hoc or standardized reports, dashboards, triggers and alerts.

Beyond reporting, business intelligence provides complex statistical capabilities such as trend analysis, predictive forecasting, pattern detection and analysis, optimization, guided decision-making and experiment design, among others. Through enterprise portals, business intelligence technologies can provide a wide range of users with the timely access to high quality data and advanced analytics they need to make smart strategic decisions and improve operational effectiveness.

Knowledge management methodologies record and disseminate both explicit and tacit process and performance strategies and actions to identify and share best practices and innovative techniques and ideas.

BetterManagement presents an extensive library of Business Intelligence topics and resources to help you implement effective information strategies that return the highest value. Live and archived webcasts, business management articles and editorials, business books, and many other industry-focused resources provide guidance and advice from Business Intelligence, Data Warehousing and Knowledge Management experts, as well as real-life examples from companies who are using business intelligence to maximize the value of their information resources.

source : http://www.bettermanagement.com/topic/whatis.aspx?f=10

SWOT ANALYSIS

SWOT Analysis is a strategic planning method used to evaluate the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats involved in a project or in a business venture. It involves specifying the objective of the business venture or project and identifying the internal and external factors that are favourable and unfavourable to achieving that objective. The technique is credited to Albert Humphrey, who led a research project at Stanford University in the 1960s and 1970s using data from Fortune 500 companies.

Strategic and Creative Use of SWOT Analysis

If a SWOT analysis does not start with defining a desired end state or objective, it runs the risk of being useless. A SWOT analysis may be incorporated into the strategic planning model. An example of a strategic planning technique that incorporates an objective-driven SWOT analysis is SCAN analysis. Strategic Planning, including SWOT and SCAN analysis, has been the subject of much research.

• Strengths: attributes of the organization that are helpful to achieving the objective.
• Weaknesses: attributes of the organization that are harmful to achieving the objective.
• Opportunities: external conditions that are helpful to achieving the objective.
• Threats: external conditions which could do damage to the business's performance.

Identification of SWOTs is essential because subsequent steps in the process of planning for achievement of the selected objective may be derived from the SWOTs.

First, the decision makers have to determine whether the objective is attainable, given the SWOTs. If the objective is NOT attainable a different objective must be selected and the process repeated.

The SWOT analysis is often used in academia to highlight and identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. It is particuarly helpful in identifying areas for development.

source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SWOT_analysis