An Economics Novel?

Economics is hard for me to grasp most of the time. However, my economics class introduced me to a novel about economics and free trade. It’s titled, The Choice, by Russell Roberts. This book has helped me learn more about economics while keeping me entertained.

The book is about the ghost of the nineteenth-century economist, David Ricardo. While in heaven, David Ricardo is observing how a television manufacturer, Ed Johnson, is pushing for protectionism of American industries by putting restrictions on free trade. David Ricardo is sent down to show Ed what the world would be like without free trade (kind of like the story of It’s a Wonderful Life).

As the story progresses, we see the United States as it is today with innovation and new industries. However, the story also shows what life would be if the U.S. had limited trade. According to economic theory, trade benefits everyone by improving our standard of living. Trade allows us to buy products at lower prices. The main point of the book is to dispel the horrible misconception that America is being harmed by foreign industries. When it comes to free trade, people think there is some sort of competition among countries. This is a false belief.

John Maynard Keynes said that a country should specialize in certain products and services. When each country specializes, production can increase. Through trade, everyone can have more goods at a lower price. So why is there so many people against free trade and protectionism?

Many people who push for protectionism (tariffs, quotas, subsidies) think they are protecting American jobs. It’s true that when foreign industries sell in America, some jobs may be lost in the short-run. Just look at how the Japanese car industry has changed the domestic car industry. While the case for protectionism may seem beneficial, it may harm us in the long run. Economists say that that allowing free trade will cut jobs in one area; however, when jobs are lost in one sector, new jobs and industries can emerge. Innovation can occur and people will work to acquire the proper skills to fill those jobs. Free trade is necessary for growth of the United States.

There are many other factors in economics that influence free trade. I highly recommend The Choice anyone who wants to understand more about this issue.

Measuring Success

When you think of successful people in the business world, you might think of a CEO or a Wall Street investor. You might also think about the power and wealth that these people possess. Just like these people, you want to be successful and enjoy power, wealth, and the “easy life.” However, being “successful” usually isn’t easy. Some of the most successful people have spent countless hours studying and working to get to the top. Even when they’re at the top, they still work stressfully long hours (70 to 80 hours per week). But all this hard work yields outstanding rewards.

To obtain success, you need a strategy. John M. Brausch of the Institute of Management Accountants wrote, “Success is all about getting your strategy right, working smarter not harder, and managing the risks that come along with growth.” He also suggested to look at your past successes, explain why you were successful, and create a strategy to duplicate that success in the future (Brausch).

My friend who is an electrical engineer said, “You can’t improve what you do not measure. When you measure your success, you always find things you would do different or improve. Take a moment to look back on your success and ask yourself if you could produce the same results today. If not, find a way to improve and hone your skills that you may be successful with everything you aspire to do.

Brausch, John M. “Managing for Success.” Strategic Finance. April 2010. Pg.6

Five Traits Employers Look for According to Me

Campbell Scientific Incorporated is a manufacturing company that builds instruments to measure the weather. Their mission statement consists of four elements. It reads that they are committed to workmanship, quality, service, and improvement. These traits can be likened to the skills employers look for when they’re hiring new personnel. I will discuss these four traits and add a fifth, which is enthusiasm.

Workmanship is the product of effort and endeavor.

When you think of workmanship, you might think of the work done by a builder or craftsperson. Examples of excellent workmanship can be seen in the sculptures and paintings of Michelangelo. Michelangelo painstakingly put minute details into all of his paintings and sculptures, and his work is admired to the present day. Think about how you approach a job at hand. Do you put full heart and effort into the project, or do you put in the bare minimum? As you prepare to enter the work force, remember to always have good “workmanship.” This means to always endeavor to put time and effort into your job.

Quality refers to the character of being superior, or a grade of excellence.

Good workmanship leads to quality, which is the second trait. Knowledge and education is vital to providing quality work. When you gain the right skills, you will be a valuable asset to the company for which you work for because you will you will be able to work efficiently, therefore giving you the ability to incorporate quality into your work.

Service is the act of helpful activity.

Always remember to be helpful to people. Employers will admire those who are willing to help out in anyway they can. When you show service in a business, you help resolve someone else’s concerns and help them with their work.

Improvement means to make more useful, profitable, or valuable.

When you interview for a job, there may be skills that you are not completely comfortable with. Show the employer that you are willing to improve your skills while you work for his or her company.

Enthusiasm means to have a lively interest or pursuit.

There is an old saying that says that part of the key to happiness is to wake up and go to a job that you enjoy. Employers will notice and admire you if you have enthusiasm for the job for which you are applying. Enthusiasm increases productivity and motivates other people.

Definitions taken from www.dictionary.com

Listening and Communication

I’ve heard that you only retain 20 percent of what you hear. So maybe if you hear something five times you’ll be at 100 percent! Unfortunately, I don’t think many lecturers, orators, or teachers want to be stuck on one subject for days. Instead it is up to you, the listener, to extract as much knowledge from a speaker as possible.

Sometimes it is easy to listen to a speaker because you are genuinely interested in what they’re saying. For example, it’s easy for me to listen to others talk about the NCAA basketball tournament because I love basketball. However, if people talk to me about economics it will be harder to keep my attention. Listening is difficult when you are distracted or you’re just not interested in what the speaker has to say. I had a professor who told his students, “Even if you aren’t interested my class, at least pretend that you are listening. Those who pretend they’re listening will do better.” I’ve actually used this strategy for some of my “less intriguing” classes, and I must say I believe I got better grades out of those classes for pretending to listen. However, pretending to listen doesn’t cut it when important situations arise and you know you should pay more attention.

Listening skills are important to the communication process, and can be the difference between success and failure in a business setting. For example, salesmen and saleswomen need to listen to customers for their request for goods and services. Employees of a business need to listen to managers for instruction and training. Managers need to listen to employees for feedback. Really listening to what people have to say makes things sail along more smoothly.

The next time you listen to someone, ask yourself if you’re really listening and not just hearing words. After all, the first thing we’re taught as children is to stop, look, and listen. Although these are instructions for crossing a street, it also applies to communication. When you are listening to someone, stop your thoughts and limit your distractions. Look at the speaker and give him or her your undivided attention. Finally, really listen by understanding the feelings, opinions, and point-of-view of the speaker.

"Seek first to understand, then to be understood."

Stephen R. Covey

7 Habits of Highly Effective People

Cover Letters!

Do you really need a cover letter when you submit your resume? According to Sarah E. Needleman of the Wall Street Journal thinks so. She says, "applicants who take the time to craft a cover letter stand a fair chance at setting themselves apart. And given the stiff competition for jobs these days, career experts say writing an introductory note may be worth the effort, especially for career-changers and individuals whose resumes show a red flag, such as employment gap."

I'd never heard of a cover letter until recently, but I can see the benefits of writing one. Instead of just submitting a resume filled with data and facts, you should write a cover letter to accompany it so you'll stand out to an employer. A cover letter allows you to speak and "sell yourself" before meeting a potential employer face-to-face. Consider a cover letter to be an ice-breaker and a head start on an interview. Sarah E. Needleman also stated, "cover letters are ideal for clearing up anything in a resume that might confuse or concern recruiters."

Cover letters should be brief and focus on how your strengths and skills apply to the job you want. Make sure you proofread your cover letter before attaching it to your resume. Sarah E. Needleman quoted an employer, Ms. Shanahan, who looks at cover letters. Ms. Shanahan says, "Sloppiness can automatically eliminate an applicant from consideration. The person's resume and credentials would have to be really outstanding to compensate, and many recruiters may not look past the cover letter to make that assessment."

You need a cover letter to persuade an employer to hire you. I'm convinced that a well written cover letter allows you to stand out. All you need to do is take the time to write one for each specific job you apply for.

Business and Movies

The Oscars are this weekend and I’m excited to see which movies will win. I really enjoyed Avatar and Sherlock Holmes. I like to go to the theater to watch movies and I also like to buy movies to watch on DVD. The movie industry is big business. According to Strategic Finance magazine, the major studios spend an average of $72 million to produce and $37 million to promote. This magazine also showed how movies revenue has changed over the years.

Until the 1970s, consumers could only watch movies in theaters, attend film festivals, or wait until the movie was released to one of the major television networks (ABC, NBC, or CBS). Then videotapes (VHS) were invented which started to change the revenue streams for movies. Today movies make revenues from DVDs, pay-per-view, premium pay channels, and television license revenue. Recently the Internet has provided downloadable movies.

This article was directed toward management accountants to help them understand the lifecycle costs and revenues in knowledge-based industries such as motion pictures. I liked this article because it shows how an industry can change over time. The movie industry took advantage of new technologies to maximize their profits. I believe that for business people to succeed, they need to understand their industry. Business people also need to be able to anticipate and adapt to changes that will inevitably happen over time.

Young, Mark S. “The Business of Making Money with Movies.” Strategic Finance. February 2010. Pg 35-40.

Google Docs

I recently learned how to use Google Documents, and it’s amazing. There are so many ways a business could use this website to enhance their communication and their performance. Google docs is a free website that allows you to make documents, spreadsheets, presentation slideshows, and survey forms. The best thing about this site is that it facilitates the sharing of information among large groups of people. Instead of attaching files to emails, people can be invited to view or edit documents within Google docs. This saves people time by not having to send and resend e-mails with attachments.

I found this site useful when working on group projects at school. If I have a collaboration project to write a group paper, I can use Google docs to write my share of the paper while other people write their shares on the same document. I can do this anywhere I have Internet access and I can view the changes and revisions other people make in real-time. To relate this to business let’s say a sales team is working on a sales report. Members of this sales team travel to different parts of the country. They can use Google docs to compile all their information together quickly and efficiently without having to send bits and pieces through e-mail. Instead, all their information appears quickly on the document in Google docs. For more information on how businesses can use Google docs, go to: www.google.com/apps/collaboration.

Customer Service

I used to work at Lee’s Marketplace in Smithfield, Utah. There was always one topic that would come up during our training meetings: customer service. When customers came to the grocery store I was supposed to greet them using the 10-4 rule. This rule meant I had to greet a customer if they were within ten feet of me, and I had four seconds to do it. Another rule was to ask customers if they needed help finding anything. I memorized where to find every last item in that store so I could help shoppers find what they needed. Also, we were told to resolve conflicts peacefully. For example, if a customer had a price disagreement we were to call for a price check from a manager. Basically, my training in customer service meant that I needed to be courteous and kind and keep to the rule “the customer is always right.”

I did my best to use these rules of customer service. However, sometimes I thought these rules were ridiculous because I thought it was tedious and unnecessary to talk to everyone. I only began to appreciate the customer service at Lee’s after I saw the customer service at other stores. For example, I was shopping at Wal-Mart and I asked a worker where to find cream of tartar (I was making cookies). He didn’t know where to find it so he asked three other coworkers. None of them knew where to find it! I finally found the cream of tartar after hunting through several aisles. I felt so un-helped by the Wal-Mart employees. I also felt ignored because I walked by several workers who never greeted me or asked if I needed help finding anything (apparently they couldn’t help me anyway).

Another example of bad customer service is when my sister and I shopped at K-Mart. My sister bought a Halloween costume that was clearly marked 50 percent off. When we got to the checkout, the cashier rang the costume in at the full price of $20. My sister and I told the cashier it was marked down 50 percent to $10 dollars. The cashier was rude and accused us of reading the sign wrong. My sister paid the full price of $20, but we went back and asked a manager if the costume really was $20 dollars. The manager said the 50 percent off sign was correct but it wasn’t in the computer system. So my sister got $10 back and our rude cashier got in trouble.

I really admire good customer service after having these experiences. As a message to my peers at USU that are going into business I just want to say that good customer service is a great skill to learn. I believe that having good customer service skills helps promote a positive image of a business. A business can succeed by having customers who come back after having positive experiences with customer service. However, if customers have negative experiences they may never come back and the business will fail. “When customer service is handled without any effort to establish a relationship or connection, it often leads to stressful interactions and frustration on both ends. You can build greater customer loyalty by exhibiting compassion and making the person feel as if he or she has been listened to and understood” (Gullickson).

Gullickson, Betsy Raskin. “The Start of a Beautiful Friendship.” Strategic Finance. June 2009. Pg. 8

Ethics

When I think of ethics I think of being honest in everything I do. I believe I would never do anything to be dishonest. However, I also ask myself if I would give into doing something unethical if enough pressure and stress was put on me. I was reading in my Intermediate Accounting textbook when I found a section on ethics. In this section, Robert Sack, a noted commentator on ethics, said,” It’s very dangerous to think that your armor is all in place and say to yourself, ‘I would never give in to that.’ The pressures don’t explode on us; they build, and we often don’t recognize them until they have us.”

Most of my business classes at USU teach about ethics. My first accounting professor, Ryan Larkin, said that some people who are faced with desperate situations usually make poor decisions and act unethically. Robert Sack reemphasizes this point about those in the accounting profession. He said, “Companies that concentrate on ‘maximizing the bottom line,’ ‘facing the challenges of competition,’ and ‘stressing short-term results’ place accountants in an environment of conflict and pressure.”

This opened up my mind when I read this section. Business classes at USU teach about ethics and now I understand why. By studying ethics I should be able to make tough ethical decisions when they arise in the future. Before reading this I thought I could just ignore ethical decisions, but even ignoring a situation can be unethical. Robert Sack stated, “Doing the right thing is not always obvious. The pressures to ‘bend the rules’, ‘to play the game’, ‘to just ignore it’ can be considerable.” My accounting textbook also says, "Ethical considerations are presented to help sensitize you to the type of situations you may encounter in the performance of your professional responsibility." I know ethical decisions will arise and I hope I will be prepared to do the right thing.

Professionalism

One of my hobbies is to play musical instruments such as the clarinet, piano, and the organ. Playing in a band or an orchestra at USU has taught me a lot about professionalism. To play an instrument requires hours of study and practice. My clarinet professor, Dr. Nick Morrison, said that when a musician doesn’t practice the whole band suffers. When a businessperson fails to study and prepare, they bring the team down. Musicians are required to arrive on time for rehearsals, and dress appropriately for concerts. Business people should arrive early for meetings and wear business attire.

The greatest musicians I’ve ever known were extremely passionate about what they do. Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm.” I believe the biggest thing about professionalism is being animated. If a student is going to be a professional accountant they better enjoy accounting. Dr. James Kennedy, a retired forestry professor from USU, taught about “becoming a professional.” He emphasized that students need “to care” about what they’re studying. He also said that if a student truly loves the field they study, they wouldn’t have to work a day in their life.

Pass the Word Along

Communications in any business is key to its success and efficiency. I work for a manufacturing company that produces electronic weather equipment such as thermometers, barometers, and rain gauges. Instructions on how to build these product are constantly changing as updates and modifications are made. Therefore, it is very important that the engineers communicate the changes to the production floor by updating the instructions. When an instruction is changed, it requires the approval of the engineer, the manager, and the production worker. This helps to ensure the information is understandable, accurate, and up-to-date.

There have been failures in communication when a set of instructions have been altered. During injection molding, a plastic mold is made to cover circuit boards. The instructions stated to simply place the product in the mold, and press "inject." However, when the worker followed the instructions, the circuit board broke inside the mold. Why did this happen? The engineer who wrote the instructions neglected to write how to put the circuit boards inside the mold. The worker had put the circuit board upside down within the mold. Although the engineer understood what needed to be done, he did not properly communicate it through the system.

The instructions needed to be complete in order to avoid failure. Other examples of failures in the instructions were too much information and data crammed into every page which time consuming to read. It was also impossible to find clear instructions on what needed to be done. Concise writing needs to be practiced. It saves people time and stress from reading meaningless data. Fortunately, since the instructions must be approved by engineer, the manager, and the production worker, miscommunication of instructions do not happen very often. But, all of these people must be on the look out for handling miscommunication errors. This requires asking each other if the information is up-to-date and correct.

What Can Professional Blogs do for Businesses?

There are several companies already using blogs to promote their businesses. Here is a definition from About.com of how businessces can use blogs.

Business Blogs: a corporate tool for communicating with customers or employees to share knowledge and expertise. Business blogs are sweeping the business community. Blogs are an excellent method to share a company's expertise, build additional web traffic, and connect with potential customers (http://sbinformation.about.com/cs/ecommerce/a/bblogs.htm).

One company that is leading in blog communication is General Motors. In fact, it is reported that GM retracted $10M in advertising from the Los Angles Times and started to use blogs for advertising. The blogs GM uses are also helpful in establishing communication with customers. The company can now hear suggestions and complaints about their cars (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/05_18/b3931001_mz001.htm). Business communication is growing rapidly and blogs can help those businesses succeed.