Anne Kleinsorge >>

Prototyping Video Final Project – Innovation Class

For our Innovation class we had to prepare a prototyping video about a critical part/process of our final project.

Our product is a service which shall help to integrate language learning into daily life and provide people with an efficient way to learn quickly in a social environment. We decided to prototype the part of the “experiences” our clients can have with us.

Of course the video can’t show the whole process and isn’t a commercial, but it helped us to detect possible problems with the project.

Please watch the link below and let us know what you think. Critics are welcome!

Click here to view the embedded video.


Enviar comentario / 19 ene 2012 por Anne Kleinsorge
GlobalMBA /

Aurelia Emond >>

Final project prototype video

Any feedback will be appreciated

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_fXATLy98M


Enviar comentario / 18 ene 2012 por Aurélia
GlobalMBA /

Judith del Carmen Cuellar Azocar >>

About CSR in oil companies

Repsol, one of the 10 largest oil companies in the world with presence in 30 countries, has been developed a Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) strategy in which the company commits with safety, environment, human rights, ethics and improve the creation of efficient and sustainable energy models. Although some accidents, as a consequence of their activities, caused adverse effects over environment and communities, in my opinion Repsol efforts focus on the continuous improvement of their activities, connection with their people and the society in order to progressive decrease accidents and not desirable effects and achieve the goal of being really a sustainable company, integrated with society and environment needs. It will depend of the fully commitment and supervision of their strategy that they will achieve their objectives.

 


Enviar comentario / 27 dic 2011 por Judith del Carmen Cuellar Azocar
GlobalMBA /

Mercedes Rodriguez Carrillo >>

A second thought about textile companies

The post I am presenting you today is about the corporate social responsibility (CSR) at Inditex. Before starting we should know what Inditex does and what CSR means.

The Inditex Group is made up of more than 100 companies operating in textile design, manufacturing and distribution. The group’s business model has made Inditex one of the biggest fashion retailers in the world, welcoming shoppers at its eight store formats:

Inditex was the first Spanish company in execute a CSR Department. The goal of CSR is to embrace responsibility for the company’s actions and encourage a positive impact through its activities on the environment and the public sphere. At the end it is just a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into the business model.

The CSR division in Inditex was opened in 2001 with the aim of forging a new direction for the company. The opening was an attempt to distant themselves of other international companies (Nike, Ikea…) that were trying to overcome child labour scandals. Despite the great effort Inditex has always made to appear to have different codes of conduct, some scandals have shaken its reputation.

Inditex has faced several stories related to child or cheap labour always with the same arguments. The group use to blame its suppliers and the impossibility of controlling them. Inditex business model requires fast fashion that means many times outsource of competences and thereby more difficulties to manage the process.

The theory says that the company should take care of what the suppliers do, but it makes me wonder it viability. In any case Inditex’ efforts should be considered. The group has increased the control over all its factories and has also developed an important CSR philosophy in Spain. That is why I wonder: Does social and environmental commitment exist in our companies, or is it just the shortest answer to what the society is forcing them to do?

 

 


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Mercedes Rodriguez Carrillo
GlobalMBA /

Mercedes Rodriguez Carrillo >>

A second thought about textile companies

The post I am presenting you today is about the corporate social responsibility (CSR) at Inditex. Before starting we should know what Inditex does and what CSR means.

The Inditex Group is made up of more than 100 companies operating in textile design, manufacturing and distribution. The group’s business model has made Inditex one of the biggest fashion retailers in the world, welcoming shoppers at its eight store formats:

Inditex was the first Spanish company in execute a CSR Department. The goal of CSR is to embrace responsibility for the company’s actions and encourage a positive impact through its activities on the environment and the public sphere. At the end it is just a form of corporate self-regulation integrated into the business model.

The CSR division in Inditex was opened in 2001 with the aim of forging a new direction for the company. The opening was an attempt to distant themselves of other international companies (Nike, Ikea…) that were trying to overcome child labour scandals. Despite the great effort Inditex has always made to appear to have different codes of conduct, some scandals have shaken its reputation.

Inditex has faced several stories related to child or cheap labour always with the same arguments. The group use to blame its suppliers and the impossibility of controlling them. Inditex business model requires fast fashion that means many times outsource of competences and thereby more difficulties to manage the process.

The theory says that the company should take care of what the suppliers do, but it makes me wonder it viability. In any case Inditex’ efforts should be considered. The group has increased the control over all its factories and has also developed an important CSR philosophy in Spain. That is why I wonder: Does social and environmental commitment exist in our companies, or is it just the shortest answer to what the society is forcing them to do?

 

 


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Mercedes Rodriguez Carrillo
GlobalMBA /

Anne Kleinsorge >>

Risk Management and Reputational Risk at Grupo Santander

At Grupo Santander a risk committee and the board of Santander are responsible for the risk management within the company. The committee proposes to the board the group’s risk policy, which needs to be approved by the board under its powers of administration and supervision. The committee also ensures the consistency of risk tolerance level of the group’s activities and establishes the global limits for the main risk exposures, reviewing them systematically and resolving those operations that exceed the powers delegated down the hierarchy.

The committee’s nature is executive and takes those decisions assigned and delegated by the board. It consists of the third vice-chairman of Grupo Santander and four other board members.

They developed some principles of risk management for Santander in order to provide security:

In order to manage and control the risks Santander introduces various phases:

Within the Santander group, quality risk management is a key activity and its priority role has increased its importance since the beginning of the European financial crisis. Santander considers various risks as important for the company and their business: Credit Risk (loosing obligations of clients – measuring degree of risk by assessment), Market Risk (financial and liquidity risk of products and markets – measurement of maximum expected loss (Value at Risk)), Operational Risk (loss of internal defects and mistakes by processes, employees, systems – identify and eliminate those risks), Reputation Risk (perception of bank by stakeholders).

Santander’s risk policy is focused mainly into maintaining a medium – low and predictable profile in all risks. This actually became even more important  after the turmoil of 2007, when Santander was able to maintain a leading position in this sector, because of its risk management.

 

Which are actually the Reputational risks for the company?

The reputation risks are managed by the Risk Committee, the Corporate Committee of Product and Services Marketing, Global Consultative Committee and Corporate Office of Reputation Risk Management.

The Corporate Committee of Product and Services Marketing is the group’s maximum decision making body for approving and monitoring products and services. It is divided into the Corporate and the Local Committee of Marketing. The LCM has to channel new product proposals to the CCM and approve the  existing products and marketing campaigns. The Global Consultative Committee functions as an advisor for the CCM for regulatory and market risks.

The Corporate Office of Reputation Risk is integrated in the Corporate Area of Compliance and Reputation Risk. Its task is to provide the board with necessary information to analyse the risks for the bank and the customer as well as to monitor the products throughout their life cycles. In order to help them with this decisions there is a set of Risk Guidelines which have been written by the board’s committee, as well as a Manual of Procedures for the Marketing of Financial Products.This help them to adapt their policy by adjusting it to a specific situation.

The bank faces various reputation risks by being unfaithful regarding its various stakeholders. These can be done by unlawful behaviour like money-laundry, financial support of terrorism, scandal involvement and breaking their own set CSR objectives.

One of Santander’s advantages is that the group operates in markets via subsidiaries, autonomous in terms of capital as well as liquidity and compatible within corporate control. This gives Santander the possibility to adjust bad reputation within different markets as it has never been presented as a widely connected bank (e.g. bad reputation in UK – renaming into Abbey National).

In my personal opinion a bank like Santander will always have a difficult situation to convince their customer that they are trustworthy, because they are working in a very dirty field. Money is dirty in many people’s eyes and used for unfaithful reasons, so anybody who is within this business is not trustworthy either. Therefore it has never been easy for Santander to make the right choice as always critical voices will come up. In terms of risk management and especially reputational risk Santander is doing a great job to prevent any inconvenience for their customer. They are much more careful and occupied than other banks in the retail business. Unfortunately they had some big scandals over the past few years such as the Medoff case and the big crisis in the UK where customers lost absolute trust. This is for a service like banking crucial and unfortunate. I hope for them, that their customers gain faith again and see their efforts made over the last few years within the economic crisis where they have done a much better job than any other european bank in order to survive and protect their customers in the best manner by a good and decent risk management. I know there are many people out there who would never trust business within the banking sector, but by the end of the day we need to leave our money somewhere. I’m pretty sure most of these aversion is against the person of Botín so I guess grupo Santander could rise to new horizons with new leading figures.


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Anne Kleinsorge
GlobalMBA /

Anne Kleinsorge >>

Risk Management and Reputational Risk at Grupo Santander

At Grupo Santander a risk committee and the board of Santander are responsible for the risk management within the company. The committee proposes to the board the group’s risk policy, which needs to be approved by the board under its powers of administration and supervision. The committee also ensures the consistency of risk tolerance level of the group’s activities and establishes the global limits for the main risk exposures, reviewing them systematically and resolving those operations that exceed the powers delegated down the hierarchy.

The committee’s nature is executive and takes those decisions assigned and delegated by the board. It consists of the third vice-chairman of Grupo Santander and four other board members.

They developed some principles of risk management for Santander in order to provide security:

In order to manage and control the risks Santander introduces various phases:

Within the Santander group, quality risk management is a key activity and its priority role has increased its importance since the beginning of the European financial crisis. Santander considers various risks as important for the company and their business: Credit Risk (loosing obligations of clients – measuring degree of risk by assessment), Market Risk (financial and liquidity risk of products and markets – measurement of maximum expected loss (Value at Risk)), Operational Risk (loss of internal defects and mistakes by processes, employees, systems – identify and eliminate those risks), Reputation Risk (perception of bank by stakeholders).

Santander’s risk policy is focused mainly into maintaining a medium – low and predictable profile in all risks. This actually became even more important  after the turmoil of 2007, when Santander was able to maintain a leading position in this sector, because of its risk management.

 

Which are actually the Reputational risks for the company?

The reputation risks are managed by the Risk Committee, the Corporate Committee of Product and Services Marketing, Global Consultative Committee and Corporate Office of Reputation Risk Management.

The Corporate Committee of Product and Services Marketing is the group’s maximum decision making body for approving and monitoring products and services. It is divided into the Corporate and the Local Committee of Marketing. The LCM has to channel new product proposals to the CCM and approve the  existing products and marketing campaigns. The Global Consultative Committee functions as an advisor for the CCM for regulatory and market risks.

The Corporate Office of Reputation Risk is integrated in the Corporate Area of Compliance and Reputation Risk. Its task is to provide the board with necessary information to analyse the risks for the bank and the customer as well as to monitor the products throughout their life cycles. In order to help them with this decisions there is a set of Risk Guidelines which have been written by the board’s committee, as well as a Manual of Procedures for the Marketing of Financial Products.This help them to adapt their policy by adjusting it to a specific situation.

The bank faces various reputation risks by being unfaithful regarding its various stakeholders. These can be done by unlawful behaviour like money-laundry, financial support of terrorism, scandal involvement and breaking their own set CSR objectives.

One of Santander’s advantages is that the group operates in markets via subsidiaries, autonomous in terms of capital as well as liquidity and compatible within corporate control. This gives Santander the possibility to adjust bad reputation within different markets as it has never been presented as a widely connected bank (e.g. bad reputation in UK – renaming into Abbey National).

In my personal opinion a bank like Santander will always have a difficult situation to convince their customer that they are trustworthy, because they are working in a very dirty field. Money is dirty in many people’s eyes and used for unfaithful reasons, so anybody who is within this business is not trustworthy either. Therefore it has never been easy for Santander to make the right choice as always critical voices will come up. In terms of risk management and especially reputational risk Santander is doing a great job to prevent any inconvenience for their customer. They are much more careful and occupied than other banks in the retail business. Unfortunately they had some big scandals over the past few years such as the Medoff case and the big crisis in the UK where customers lost absolute trust. This is for a service like banking crucial and unfortunate. I hope for them, that their customers gain faith again and see their efforts made over the last few years within the economic crisis where they have done a much better job than any other european bank in order to survive and protect their customers in the best manner by a good and decent risk management. I know there are many people out there who would never trust business within the banking sector, but by the end of the day we need to leave our money somewhere. I’m pretty sure most of these aversion is against the person of Botín so I guess grupo Santander could rise to new horizons with new leading figures.


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Anne Kleinsorge
GlobalMBA /

Angela Cristina Cedeño Lopez >>

Corporate Social Responsibility in Inditex

This week we had the opportunity to debate about a really interesting subject: The Corporate Social Responsibility strategy of 3 companies Inditex, Repsol and Grupo Santander.

Talking about Inditex Sustainability strategy they been developed a model that integrate all their stakeholders based in 3 aspects:

 

The main tool that Inditex used is its Code of Conduct , the code is the formal declaration of the values of Inditex which regulates the relations with each of its stakeholders.

The CSR strategy with each of the group of interest for the company is the following:

Suppliers

All Inditex suppliers must fulfill the requirements identified in the Code of Conduct; the main objective for the company is to introduce the sustainability variable in the production chain.

I identified as its main tool the social audits better known in the company as the Tested to wear methodology. This process includes an intensive evaluation of the suppliers with interviews, documentary review,  visit to facilities, risk detection and corrective actions. As a result of this action the company decides if the supplier could be part of the process chain or not.

Employees

One of the main reputational risks of the company is the syndicates in the Textile Sector. In 2007 they signed the agreement with the (ITGWF) International Textile Garment & leather workers federation, which is the global union trade of the sector.

The framework agreement makes it possible to collaborate in such different areas:

 

In addition to the agreement they also have the following initiatives:

Customers

With the purpose of guarantee that all the articles that Inditex sells do not involve risks to the health and safety to the users they create two different audits:

Clear to wear:  A process which objective is to eliminate and regulate the use of substances that if there are present in the product above certain levels, could be harmful in the health of the clients.

Safe to wear: A methodology to prevent the articles sell  by Inditex from presenting problems for the physical safety of the customer (examples: laces and cords of shoes, small pieces for child, objects with pointed/sharp edges, metallic contamination /broken needles, inflammability)

 

Society

Inditex collaborate with local, national and international communities where it has a presence, focus its strategy on social investment r with the following initiatives:

Community Development Programmes : Training and generation of opportunities to improve the standard of leaving of the people examples : construction of educational spaces, access to decent and quality education and training .

Monitoring programmes : Programs of humanitarian aid and rehabilitation,  including programs of medical humanitarian action and educational monitoring programs for people who have been separated from their homes as a result of conflicts natural disasters or violation of human rights.

Emergency programmes: design and implementation of emergency plans to alleviate the consequences of natural catastrophes which have occurred anywhere in the world

Network of universities : investment in education

Programmes for the integration in the workplace of persons with a disability which was created in 2002

Sponsorship The company made actions of sponsorship as social investment supporting institutions links with the society in areas like health, culture, sport, training, social aid and business promotion

 

After this summary we could see that Inditex has a really complete and well structured CSR strategy.

Unfortunately we still hear about some scandals that involves this company, the latest one was in Brazil, Inditex was accused about using slave work in the textile factories in thtah country. For me is amazing how this type of Global Companies could not realize the situation, and that still keep doubts in my mind about the commitment of the company with the society.

Even that they are doing an effort creating processes and designing best practices about Social Responsibility and Sustainability,  Inditex should extends its responsibility in terms of suppliers, is not been enough the initial evaluation they have to be aware of what happening with the external manufactures until they deliver their final product.

Another conclusion is that the commitment of Inditex depends on how demanding are the society and the expectations that it has with the companies in all the sectors of the industry. The importance of Social Responsibility in business is increasing and every time more people cares about this aspect, consequently  the companies will have to respond to the society creating successful CSR strategies.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Angela Cedeño
GlobalMBA /

Aurelia Emond >>

Santander

In order to understand my point of view, let me explain you first the general Corporate Social Responsibility of Santander.

Santander states that a great importance is given to conducting business in a responsible way. They take into account the impact they have on their stakeholders : customers, employees, suppliers, shareholders, environment and communities.
They aim to make a positive contribution to society, not just through providing banking services for their retail and business customers, but also by sharing their success and contribution to the communities where they operate.

This CSR strategy is meant to be aligned with the bank’s business strategy, being its main focus two key points:

  1. Integrate social and environmental responsibility into its global strategy.
    This is based on supporting higher education, social action and environmental protection, which in their point of view is the best way to contribute to the growth and to economic and social progress of communities. For example, in 2010, Santander invested 100.000.000 euros in their different agreements with the universities. They offered scolarships and facilitate the entry of these students in their professional life.

2.   Social and environmental risk analysis in finance operations. Here, the risk committee existing have to study the project and see if it fits with Santander’s objectives and if it implies any Reputational risk. They also study the project from a socio-environmental point of view based on the guidelines approved by the International Finance Corporation.

For example, Santander won’t accept a project if the company :

In theory, it seems to be a brilliant idea. Indeed, Santander seems to have understood in which world we are actually living, and it is totally aware of its environment. Basically, they would like to share that awareness and consciousness through their products and services and encouraging new projects.

Nowadays, people start to be aware of what is our responsibility towards the world. If the crisis did not affect Santander as it affected other bancarial entities, it is mainly due to their huge risk management and their Corporate Social Responsibility which is focused in what really matters in our actual world.

My question is: Is Santander really “conducting a business in a responsible way”?

For example, Santander some years ago offered some safe investments to their customers “100% fondos garantizados”. The different customers trusted Santander and its values and gave them their money. It resulted than finally, Santander totally lost the money they invested. How could they offered safe investment, which customers actually see as highly safe due to the risk management policy of the bank, and not mentionned that they were placing their money in Lehman Brothers, which is the four most important invest bank in the United States? And moreover, how Santander could present this investment as highly safe when the company finally went to bankrupt?

In my point of view, this is not how you should conduct your business in a responsible way. But why the sales of Santander are not affected by this scandals and some others? Personnally I think this is because they always tried to play the role of the one who has been trapped, as well as its customers. The most important is that they always found a way to pay back their customers. So, even if they did it wrong the first time, people does not care that much as they are able to recover their own money.

Santander wants to have a relationship with its customers based on trust, as we can see it in this advertisement used in Spain :

Personnally, I do not trust Santander. Their idea is genious, but unfortunately it seems that they are not able to cope with it or that in some way they do not really respect it. However, paying back their customers when there is a problem and using famous persons as Fernando Alonso in order to promote themselves seems to convince their customers.

 


Enviar comentario / 23 dic 2011 por Aurélia
GlobalMBA /

claustro >>

SABER HACER

 

Si dividimos las áreas del conocimiento en tres (Ser, Saber y Saber Hacer), los contenidos de la materia de Habilidades Directivas se enmarcan claramente dentro del último área, el de SABER HACER.

Esto significa que más allá del contenido teórico de los diferentes módulos que forman parte de la asignatura, lo principal es entenderlos y hacerlos “propios” para usarlos en la medida en que sean necesarios. Como señalan alumnos que cursan el Master, al final son las situaciones las que demandan la necesidad de tener que utilizar las técnicas que se ven en el aula. De ahí, que sea el principio de un camino que uno ya no abandona y que confiemos esté lleno de más éxitos que fracasos y de más alegrías que tristezas.

Lógicamente, el módulo que más uso tiene a corto plazo es el de Presentaciones Eficaces, porque el propio Master está lleno de momentos en los que el alumno debe hablar en público para defender su trabajo, exponer su proyecto, etc.

A este módulo se añaden los demás, como son Liderazgo, Toma de Decisiones, Negociación y Gestión del Tiempo para configurar un amplio abanico de recursos y herramientas, que se suman al del resto de materias para ir “llenando” la mochila del alumno y que esté bien preparado para el desembarco en la vida profesional. Y a partir de ahí, la mochila se irá llenando también de experiencias y emociones, que irán configurando la trayectoria profesional de cada uno.

Un aspecto destacado de esta materia, es el apartado de la metodología. En todos los módulos, se trabajarán casos prácticos para clarificar las herramientas y su puesta en escena. Igualmente, se potenciará el trabajo en equipo como forma de resolver dichos casos. Al final, todos aprendemos de todo y de todos de una manera u otra.

Por último, me gustaría terminar con una imagen que refleja el proceso por el que pasamos las personas ante situaciones nuevas, desconocidas o que nos generan estrés. Está claro que la escalera hay que subirla. Habilidades Directivas persigue contribuir a que esta escalada se haga  de la manera más rápida y con el menor número de tropezones posible.

 

Oscar Cerro Aguirre

Profesor Habilidades Directivas


Enviar comentario / 12 dic 2011 por Mónica López
GlobalMBA /

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