CalPERS vs. JC Penney Overview CalPERS investment program began on February 22, 2000 when they included JC Penney on their annual Focus List. CalPERS further exclaimed that due to declining sales and a deteriorating customer base they had lost confidence in Penney’s management. Subsequent to the release of their focus list JC Penney made numerous strategic decisions to revitalize and boost the value of the company. Penney forced their current CEO James Oesterreicher to retire. Next instead of promoting from within, they searched for new blood and hired former Barney’s CEO Allen Questrom.
Jack Welch was the CEO of General Electric between 1981 and 2001. During his tenure at GE, the company's value rose 4000%. In 1961, Welch planned to quit his job as junior engineer because he was dissatisfied with the raise offered to him and was unhappy with the bureaucracy he observed at GE. Welch was persuaded to remain at GE by Reuben Gutoff, an executive at the company, who promised him that he would help create the small company atmosphere Welch desired Welch was named a vice president of GE in 1972. He became senior vice president in 1977 and vice chairman in 1979.
After two straight years of financial losses in 1994, CEO Ron Allen rolled out a new strategy called “Leadership 7.5.” Allen targeted to reduce Delta’s cost per each available seat mile from more than 10 cents to 7.5 cents, which would match that of major competitor Southwest Airlines (Bryant, 1997). Along with a new company strategy a change followed with Delta’s human resource strategy. This changing policy devastated employee morale and resulted in a decline of customer service, efforts to unionize, and dissatisfaction among personnel. Delta couldn’t keep the past primary policy about human resources so there were several significant changes in Delta’s organization and corporate culture. There are many programs that Delta has built after passing through the cost-cutting reformation in 1997 for getting back its capabilities on customer relationships like rewards and recognition program above and beyond and more.
Jeff Skilling created performance evaluation process for all Enron employees called “rank and yank”. Every six months employees were ranked with the bottom 20 percent being fired. The “rank and yank” system created an urgency to excel at any cost. I can only imagine the pressure in that work place. It put pressure on its employees to show profits by using any methods possible.
Superstore Blues All across North America, huge retail stores, or otherwise known as “superstores”, have been popping up since late 1980 and took off in 1990 at an unimaginable rate. Take Wal-Mart for example, when only ten months ago, Wal-Mart was planning to open a new store in America every 26.5 hours according to an article in The Huffington Post (Wal-Mart Cancels 45 Superstore Projects, par. 5).And everywhere they pop up, they destroy the market for much of the local businesses. These superstores not only burst many hopes for growth in the small business world, but create a work environment that most would call, “the last resort”. In Douglas Couplands The Gum Thief, there are a group of characters that all work in an office super-store, staples.
In 1990 the company suffered a £20 million loss and was forced to completely restructure and a new management team was brought in headed by Michael O’Leary who made major changes to the airline. Ryanair restructured itself and became a low-fares, no –frills carrier. After the next few years Ryan air significantly slashed its fares further and managed to open up many new routes. Today, Ryan Air has destinations in 26 countries with 950 routes. Also the headquartered in Dublin, employs about 4,200 people, operates with a fleet size of 120 Boeing 737-800, carries approximately 35 Mio passengers a year and had a turnover of 1,692.5 Mio in 2006 with a net profitability of about 10% (Mayor, 2007).
Case Study #5: Solving Team Challenges at DocSystems Billing, Inc. What problems exist in this organization? How do these problems differ based on the employees’ roles? Why do employees object to Jim’s proposed solution? This organization has recently restructured their organization due to financial problems. DocSystems recently outsourced 100 of their employees to another company.
There can be a lot of factors as to why companies file for bankruptcy and closure. In the case of Enron, the first set of problems in the company manifested when traders reluctantly gambled with company assets in the oil market. They lost $90 million in a period of five days. Since then company reserves disappeared and auditors saved the company by reporting fake net worth and imprecise trading revenues resulting to accounting scandals in the company. Due to the company’s compound business model and unethical practices, they required that the balance sheet is to be modified accordingly to illustrate satisfactory
MKT 555 – Case Study The Maculan Group: International Growth Through Acquisitions Maculan Group: International Growth Through Acquisitions discusses the rapid expansion of an Austrian construction company The Maculan Group. After decades of growth, the company declined and crashed quickly in 1994. While there are many factors that could be blamed for the company’s collapse, this paper will identify three avoidable problems, discuss them, and then present a solution that would have benefited the company and perhaps prevented collapse. The three problem areas of interest are cultural, governmental and communication. CULTURAL After its beginnings in the domestic market of Austria and maintaining a very conservative growth strategy, the Maculan Group experienced two decades of growth that turned them into a major construction player in Eastern Europe.
Case Study: GE's Two-Decade Transformation: Jack Welch's Leadership Case • How difficult a challenge did Welch face in 1981. How effectively did he take charge? Jack Welch encountered a very difficult situation in 1981; the economy was in a recession, almost one of the worst recessions any organization has witnessed since the Great Depression of 1929. The strong dollar was losing value and the unemployment rate was at an all-time high. Interest rates were consistently on the incline during the time Welch took over as CEO of GE.