Global Entrepreneurship Institute

Discussion About The Benefits of a Networked Enterprise

It is important that your networked components of business become an extension of your business model and business practices rather than just some adjunct service to a complex revenue event or a small element of your value chain. Continue reading ‘How will the Internet help your business?’ »

Managing in High-Growth Environments

When a venture reaches Stage Five on the entrepreneurial life cycle, Full Launch and Growth, the venture team needs to be sensitive to certain high-growth management issues. Usually, rapid growth is seen as a positive sign of success. However, uncharted rapid growth can quickly change the status of an emerging growth venture from profitable to bankruptcy. Continue reading ‘How will you manage in the high-growth environment?’ »

Hitting the Growth Wall

According to Michael Porter, “The desire to grow has perhaps the most perverse effect on strategy.” Factors that drive initial successes are seldom enough to sustain a venture as it begins to accelerate through the growth stage. The external demands and opportunities change constantly, the venture’s value chain and internal capabilities must adapt, and the venture’s growth and evolution will ultimately necessitate a shift to professional management. Simply put by Jack Stack in his book The Great Game of Business, “The more successful you are, the bigger the challenges you have to deal with.” Continue reading ‘How will you avoid hitting the growth wall?’ »

Building Organizational Change Capabilities

It takes little time to destroy a high growth-potential venture. One turn-around expert says, “Ninety-five percent of the failures are due to internal problems. I can’t tell you how many companies I’ve been to that have the fast-growing-company plaque on the wall and are about to go under. They don’t have the systems and the people in place. Accounting is lagging. Purchasing is not done in the most efficient manner. Inventory gets out of control. All of a sudden, all these mistakes compound, and the least little burp kills them.” Continue reading ‘Is your company ready for your growth strategy?’ »

Transitioning: Entrepreneurial Management to Professional Management

When an organization is born, the emphasis is on creating a product and surviving in the ecosystem. Certain features characterize an entrepreneurial management style and structure. Continue reading ‘How will you manage the growth of your company?’ »

Getting Your Framework for Growth in Place Today

 Growth is a strategic issue; it is willed, not wished. For example, 59 percent of the 2002 Inc. 500 CEOs said their industry had been growing slowly or not at all in the past five years. Coming from a unique group of CEOs, where the average five-year growth rate was 1,521 percent, prompts this question: “How did they do it?” Continue reading ‘Do you have a sound growth strategy?’ »

Managing A Global Business Enterprise

Developing organization and human resource strategies across multiple borders should not simply be a matter of adapting a domestic model to accommodate changes in distance and global scale. Starting with a global mindset discussed earlier, you will have to develop a fresh perspective in order to take into consideration the unique challenges of doing business globally. Continue reading ‘What are the challenges to managing a global business?’ »

Discussions About Investing To Go Global

Before making the decision to commit critical capital resources overseas, the venture needs to have a clear understanding of why it is doing so. Before discussing the reasons for investing overseas, we first want to discuss Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). For statistical purposes FDI is usually defined as ownership of at least 10 to 25 percent of the equity of one venture in one country, by another venture based in another country. Continue reading ‘What are the capital investment decisions for going global?’ »

Creating Your Global Business Strategy

As we have discussed, strategic motives must drive the decisions to conduct business globally. But what is your action plan? Where do you begin? How do you begin? Which markets should be entered first? What would be the optimal mode of entry? How rapidly should you expand globally? Continue reading ‘What is your strategy for going global?’ »

Discussion About The Benefits To Going Global

There are many benefits for entrepreneurs participating in global business activities. We group them in three categories: strategic, financial, and production related. Continue reading ‘What are the benefits to going global?’ »

Created in September 1995 by Pierre Omidyar, eBay is “The World’s Online Marketplace” for the sale of goods and services by a diverse community of individuals and businesses. Eight years later the eBay “biosphere” included some 62 million registered members from around the world. It is the most popular shopping destination on the Internet. Continue reading ‘Case In Point: eBay and Its Digital Biosphere’ »

In the early 1980s Stanford University had some 5,000 computers of various types. There was no campus-wide network, the systems were like islands. Bridges were needed to connect them together. Cisco Systems was founded in 1983 in the living room where Len Bosack and his wife Sandy Lerner lived. Their solution was to create the bridge that networked the networks. Continue reading ‘Case In Point: Cisco Systems’ »

Around 1890, during the height of the Industrial Revolution, the U.S. Census Bureau was in an information crisis. As a result, the Bureau sponsored a contest to find a more efficient means of tabulating census data. The winner was Herman Hollerith. His Punch Card Tabulating Machine used an electric current to sense holes in punched cards and keep a running total of data. Capitalizing on his success, Hollerith formed the Tabulating Machine Company in 1896. It was the world’s first electric tabulating and accounting machine company. Continue reading ‘Case In Point: IBM’ »

Who is the best CEO candidate? An insider with intimate knowledge of your company, or an outsider who is ready to put sacred cows out to pasture? The answer, says Harvard Business School professor Joseph L. Bower, is both. In this Q&A, he discusses his new book, The CEO Within, and why inside-outsiders are the key to succession planning.
>>Read More

The CEO Within: Why Insider Outsiders Are the Key to Succession Planning
by Joseph Bower

With rising CEO turnover, companies are increasingly looking outside for qualified candidates. Sure, externally recruited CEOs bring fresh perspectives and connections. But they lack the in-depth knowledge of the company’s culture and history that they need to succeed. Result? Many deliver disappointing performances. Companies can avoid this scenario, contends Joseph Bower in “The CEO Within.” Continue reading ‘Book Review: Keys to Succession Planning’ »

Howard Schultz, who led the purchase of Seattle-based Starbucks Coffee in 1987 for $250,000, later boasted, “Starbucks is going to be a global brand, in the same genre as Coke and Disney.” By 2003, Starbucks has grown from 15 stores and 100 employees in 1987 to more than 65,000 employees serving more than 22 million customers worldwide each week. It is the leading retailer, roaster and brand of specialty coffee in the world, earning more than $3.3 billion in revenues from 6,200 retail locations in 30 countries. Continue reading ‘Case In Point: Starbucks Coffee–Going Global One Cup at a Time’ »

Discussions About Using the Internet To Grow Your Business 

We now have to accept that the value of a venture is no longer multiples of the top line revenue, but the combined value of the venture’s customers. In fact, we found that the best customer care of the industry becomes the standard by which all others are measured. Besides recurring revenues, there are other ways a networked organization can increase a venture’s bottom line. Continue reading ‘How can we use the Internet to grow our business?’ »

Discussions about Creating Your Growth Strategy

Growth is the very essence of entrepreneurship. Growth is the only vehicle that will deliver returns to your investors. And as we discuss in a previous Article, uncertainty and risk are a vicious cycle in high growth-potential ventures. Uncertainty and risk increase because the number of elements in the venture increases, the differences among those elements increase, and the interdependencies among those elements also increase. Continue reading ‘Why do we need a growth strategy?’ »

Your Business Plan: The Roadmap That Guides You to Success

Your business plan acts as a reflection of you, showing that you have really thought things through. It requires advance preparation, delegation, refinement, and, most importantly, a disciplined approach. Writing a business plan forces you into disciplined thinking if you do an intellectually honest job. An idea may sound great in your mind, but when you put down the details and numbers, it may fall apart. Continue reading ‘Why do we need a business plan?’ »

Benefits to Going Global

There are many benefits for entrepreneurs participating in global business activities. We group them in three categories: strategic, financial, and production related. Continue reading ‘What are the benefits to going global?’ »