4. You are a manager at a local manufacturing plant, and it has come to your attention that the “grapevine” is talking about the fact that the company will soon be purchased by a foreign investor who intends to close the plant and move operations to another country. What are the dangers of allowing this kind of informal communication to continue, and more important, what can or should you do to stop it?

Who are your organization’s competitors? What changes do you see in information technology where you work?

. Discuss the characteristics of a firm that is pursuing an international strategy

1.)Distributive bargaining is sometimes referred to as "win-lose bargaining." Where does this label come from? How can it be misleading? Also, some people casually characterize any negotiate settlement as "a win-win." Why is this accurate in layperson's terms but inaccurate in light of how negotiation experts use the term win-win?

2.)Why is it difficult for labor negotiators to switch from traditional to integrative bargaining? What recommendations would you make for negotiators trying to make this switch? Why is it more difficult for union negotiators to make this change compared to company negotiators.

2.impact of Differentiation on each of Porter’s 5 forces. example.

3.define the sources of cost advantages. example

4. define the impact of Cost Advantage on each of Porter’s 5 forces. example for each one.

Explain the 4 times when you form a work team?

1. What “cost of quality” criteria (i.e., prevention, appraisal, internal failure, and external failure costs) might be included in an analysis at the following stages of a global diamond supply chain---mining, cutting and polishing centers, and retail jewelry store? Explain. Provide examples.

   The Global Value Chain for Diamonds

   A simple way to view the major stages of the diamond value chain is exploration, mining, rough diamonds, polished diamonds, and customer jewelry. It is normally 18 to 36 months from the time a diamond is mined until it reaches a retail store. Rare or large stones often reduce this processing time by one-half. The supply chain is global since no one country or company performs all the work required to bring a diamond to its final resting place – customer jewelry. About one-half of rough diamonds are used in industrial applications such as oil and gas drilling equipment and metal cutting tools. The major stages of the global value chain for diamonds can be defined in numerous ways but usually consists of the following stages.

   Exploration

   A diamond is a unique pyramidal structure of carbon atoms. Billions of years ago heat and pressure deep inside the earth created natural diamonds. The ancient Greek word for diamond means “unbreakable.” Historically, much of the diamond industry involves African countries and sometimes the exploitation of native people. Russia and Africa account for 70 percent of the world’s diamond reserves.

   Major corporations that focus on diamond mining, production, and sales include DeBeers, with about 37% market share. DeBeers is a Kimberley, South Africa based corporation with mines and facilities in South Africa, Tanzania, Botswana, and Namibia.   ALROSA is a Russian state-owned corporation with about 30% market share, and with mines and facilities in Russia and Angola. Rio Tinto is an Australian corporation that mines diamonds, iron, copper, uranium, aluminum, gold, and coal, with about a 5% global market share in diamonds. Its mines and facilities are in Australia, Zimbabwe, Africa, and Canada. Other firms such as Aber, BHP Billiton, and Leviev compete in the diamond industry.

   Mining

   The two major ways to mine rough diamonds are an open-pit method, where rock and soil at the surface are excavated; and underground mining. First-level sorting is done at this stage, to separate gem-quality stones from obvious industrial grade stones.

   The controversies begin at this stage of the diamond value chain. The 2006 movie Blood Diamond, for example, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Jennifer Connelly, and Djimon Hounsou, highlighted militant groups and corrupt governments trying to get their share of “blood diamond” revenues to fund revolutions and wars. Conflict-free diamonds are supposed to be free of other injustices such as child labor, smuggling, worker exploitation, and sexual violence. And, of course, ethical supply chains try to prevent all of the previous cited issues, plus worker accidents, environmental pollution, deceitful grading of diamonds, deforestation, poverty, low wages, and so on.

   Sorting and Grading

   The basic criteria for grading diamonds include size (carats), color, shape, and quality. At this stage second-level sorting and grading begins at separate locations from the mines. About 20-25 percent of rough diamonds are used in the retail value chain while the rest are used for industrial proposes. Human eyes, hands, and expertise assess the quality and value of most diamonds. Advanced machines do some of the sorting and grading process for smaller stones. But sorting and grading diamonds is not an exact science even with current industry regulations and quality standards.

   Cutting and Polishing Centers

   The Four C’s – Cut, Color, Clarity, and Carat weight – are used to further classify diamonds at a production facility, located in cities like Dubai, New York, Johannesburg, Hong Kong, London, Tel Aviv, Antwerp, and Mumbai.

   Normally, by the end of this stage one-half to two-thirds of the rough diamond is waste. For example, a ten-carat rough diamond might result in a three- to five-carat diamond that can be set in customer jewelry. Much of the waste is used in industrial diamond applications or by the cutters themselves for cutting and polishing.

   During the Great Recession smaller diamond cutters and polishers went out of business while larger firms gained market share. Cutting and polishing costs-per-carat range from about $100 in Antwerp, New York, and Tel Aviv; to $10 to $50 in India, China, and Thailand. Diamond defects and errors can take many forms in this industry: impurities, optical flaws, mixed colors, crystal flaws, cutting mistakes, and non-ethical diamonds. The cutter must decide how best to cut the rough diamond to remove defects, keep the most carat weight possible, and make the diamond as perfect as possible.

   The quality of a rough diamond can be enhanced or hindered by the way the rough diamond is cut and polished. High-quality rough diamonds of over 20 carats almost always go to the world’s best cutters and polishers.

   Trading Centers

   A current industry trend is the consolidation of cutting and polishing with trading centers into a “diamond hub” in cities like New York, Tel Aviv, Antwerp, Dubai, and Mumbai. Major producers like DeBeers sell most of their diamonds based on long-term contracts to a select group of buyers and sellers. Long-term contracts provide price and demand stability, predictable buyers and sellers, and large sales volumes. Trading centers and producers are sometimes accused of forming price-controlled cartels by holding back diamond stocks (reserves) to maintain retail prices. Another way to limit supply in the global diamond market is for major producers to sell diamonds only to their “site holders.” A site holder can be a company or individual who can only buy direct from major producers. If all reserves of diamonds were released, supply would greatly exceed demand, and diamond prices would plummet.

   However, new sales channels are emerging that take advantage of Internet capabilities such as on line auctions and virtual sales platforms. Sales take many forms such as face-to-face negotiations, take-it-or-leave it on line offers at fixed prices, live on line auctions with multiple bidding rounds, and time limited on line auctions. In addition, physical diamond auctions take place at Sotheby’s and Christie’s.

   Jewelry Manufacturing

   Manufacturing transforms cut, polished, and graded diamonds into customer jewelry. Often a custom setting for the stones includes pouring hot metal into a ring or jewelry mold; and/or metal machine fabrication, milling, and polishing. Standard diamond ring production exhibits both job and flow shop characteristics while custom jewelry is a job shop. Diamond defects can be hidden by the clever design of customer jewelry. Here the jewelry artist or customer designs how the finished diamond will be displayed

   . Over $50 billion in value is added at the jewelry manufacturing and retail store stages.

   Retailing

   In the diamond value chain, Tiffany & Company and Cartier are two examples of luxury goods retailers that enjoy high margins. The price per carat (value) of a typical diamond usually increases eight to ten times from mining to retail store as each stage of the value chain adds its profit margin. After the original sale, most diamonds don’t wear out so they are resold (recycled) many times within the value chain. The “diamond is forever” slogan also applies to generating repeat sale profits.  

   To further complicate customer- and trading-center buying decisions, diamond buyers must cope with whether the diamond is synthetic. In one audit by the International Gemological Institute with a sample of 1,000 stones over one-half were found to be synthetic diamonds. Moreover, the synthetic diamonds had human-engineered flaws to make them appear as natural stones. Only expert gemologists with special equipment can tell the difference between a natural and synthetic stone.

   From the viewpoint of natural diamond producers, synthetic diamond pollution is an ever-increasing industry problem. A four-carat synthetic diamond might sell for a few hundred dollars. In addition, synthetic diamond producers argue their diamonds are brighter and clearer than natural stones, and the only true ethical diamonds.

   The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme (KPCS)

   A multitude of industry-related associations, governments, and corporations have adopted quality and sustainability standards, trade regulations and laws, and certification programs to ensure no conflict or blood diamonds enter their value chain. But diamond traceability along the value chain is very poor. Few diamond producers or retailers actually investigate the route their diamonds take along the supply chain. Diamond smugglers and corrupt governments often certify diamonds without complete investigations while worker exploitation and environmental pollution continues.

   In 2003 in Kimberly, South Africa the KPCS was designed to certify rough diamond shipments as “conflict-free” and prevent conflict diamonds from entering the value chain. This initiative has been somewhat successful but fake KPCS certification documents have been found throughout the value chain. A recent initiative is to etch a serial number on each non-conflict diamond with a laser that is not visible to the human eye. The KPCS process is criticized for focusing on front-room customer perceptions, not back-room supply chain practices.

Social Media and HR It is happening more and more that a candidate’s social media profile has caused him or her not to be hired. Review all of the online materials available about you—Facebook, LinkedIn, blog postings you have made, photographs uploaded from the perspective of a potential employer. Do you have any materials that might keep you from being hired? What do you think of the privacy issues surrounding this practice?

The daily requirements for patrol officers are: M T W TH F SA SU

4 5 6 7 10 9 9

Question: Each officer works 5 days a week and must have 2 consecutive days off. You are scheduling officers to work the appropriate days of the week. The second officer you schedule is to work which days of the week?

Player A has a $1 bill and a $20 bill, and player B has a $5 bill and a $10 bill. Each player will select a bill from the other player without knowing what bill the other player selected. If the total of the bills is odd, player A gets both of the two bills that were selected, but if the total is even, player B gets both bills.

1. Develop a payoff table for this game. (Place the sum of both bills in each cell.)
2. What are the best strategies for each player?
3. What is the value of the game? Which player would you like to be?

Please be descriptive, thank you!

Use the Hungarian Method to solve the following Assignment Problem.

Consider the following management decision problem: you have 4 employees E1, E2, E3, and E4 that must be reassigned to new jobs J1, J2, J3, and J4 (which they can all "sort of" do, with different training and quality costs) - and you must decide which employee should do which job (i.e., you need to make an assignment which has the least total cost for the company). Below is the cost matrix showing what the costs would be for assigning each employee to one of the jobs. You want to minimize the total cost for an assignment of the employees each to one job,

i.e., to minimize Σ_i (cost for Ei to do job Jπ(i)) where π(i) is the label of the job that employee i is assigned to.

The first of a group of 100 machines requires 75 hours to build. If you expect 80% learning curve, how much time would it take to complete the 60th machine?

1. ___________ refers to determining what information is needed and how that information can be obtained efficiently and effectively.

   	a.	The marketing research objective
   	b.	Secondary data
   	c.	The marketing research problem
   	d.	The management decision problem

4 points   

QUESTION 2

1. Compared to face-to-face focus groups, online focus groups _________________.

   	a.	incur higher costs.
   	b.	have low participation rates.
   	c.	access hard-to-recruit subjects.
   	d.	have a narrow geographic scope.

4 points   

QUESTION 3

1. When conducting marketing research projects, which of the following statements is true of secondary data?

   	a.	It doesn’t provide detailed information to the researcher to help him make decisions.
   	b.	It can result in loss of time and money.
   	c.	It refers to information collected for the first time.
   	d.	It can suggest research methods needed for solving a problem.

4 points   

QUESTION 4

1. Which of the following statements is true of nonprobability samples?

   	a.	In a nonprobability sample, the probability of selection of each sampling unit is not known.
   	b.	Nonprobability samples are expensive.
   	c.	Nonprobability samples cannot be used in marketing research.
   	d.	In a nonprobability sample, every element has a known statistical likelihood of being selected.

4 points   

QUESTION 5

1. _____ is a system for gathering information from respondents by continuously monitoring the advertising, promotion, and pricing they are exposed to and the things they buy.

   	a.	A Web survey system
   	b.	Scanner-based research
   	c.	An online focus group
   	d.	Online research communities

4 points   

QUESTION 6

1. Why do marketers segment their markets and what are the basic criteria for doing so successfully?

   	a.	Segments must be composed of people with different characteristics.
   	b.	Segments must be divided according to the North American Industry Classification System.
   	c.	Segments must be composed of people with different product needs.
   	d.	Segments must be large enough to warrant developing and maintaining a special marketing mix.

4 points   

QUESTION 7

1. Chipotle has become popular with a variety of people. It recently identified a primary customer segment in Millennials. To win over this demographic group, traditional media is less authentic in the perception of Millennials, therefore, Chipotle does not use traditional media, and its marketing and promotion focus on maintaining a large online and social media presence. Here Chipotle is likely to use:

   	a.	concentrated targeting.
   	b.	differentiated marketing.
   	c.	multisegment targeting.
   	d.	undifferentiated targeting.

4 points   

QUESTION 8

1. To develop a successful segmentation scheme, marketers gather data about the population within specific geographic boundaries, the number of people in various age categories, and other social and demographic characteristics. This example describes which of the four basic criteria used to develop useful segment schemes?

   	a.	Identifiability and measurability
   	b.	Responsiveness
   	c.	Sustainability
   	d.	Accessibility

4 points   

QUESTION 9

1. Gamers’ Page is a magazine that primarily caters to people who are enthusiastic about sports and who enjoy gaming. In this scenario, the editorial board of Gamers’ Page uses _____.

   	a.	family life cycle segmentation
   	b.	gender segmentation
   	c.	geographic segmentation
   	d.	psychographic segmentation

4 points   

QUESTION 10

1. Chipotle stated they were "in the market for Mexican food" by competing on quality instead of price. Chipotle is a company that prides itself on serving “food with integrity.” Which mass market targeting strategy did it use when entering the market?

   	a.	Concentrated targeting
   	b.	Differentiated marketing
   	c.	Undifferentiated targeting
   	d.	Multisegment targeting

What is a good set of recommendations and actions to follow when a green swan occurs?

Briefly review the key innovations that culminated in the digital revolution. What is the basic technological process that made the revolution possible?