Wednesday,

February 25, 1998

The course now has its own web page!

Thanks to

Wayne Ball!

IB1 discussed potential liability issues associated with putting projects on the web. Members felt strongly that they wanted to continue using acquired company names and logos.

It was agreed that a disclaimer was needed for the web site.

Steven Huntley agreed to consult the college lawyer, and let us know his advice.

Power Point presentations, and any other Office applications can be put on the site.

Bibliographies are required from each group on disk by the time of the first presentations. Web addresses will be links from the class page.

Group e-mail addresses should be arranged.

Accomplished independent goals.

Each member took a separate search engine:

Yahoo, Alta Vista, Excite, Info-Seek.

Searching for Austria and 3M. Different results for each engine.

Sent e-mail to 3M home page requesting information.

E-mail to SyQuest resulted in a large package of information including gifts.

The internet is really slow. –Find a faster computer, particular ones in the library, Bates. Printers are weak everywhere.

Britannica Online was very helpful for general country information. The school has a free account. Access from the school web page.

Rather than going to separate search engines, each member went to a different topic: economy, pictures, oil industry, Malawi, company home page. So each member went to multiple sources. Broke it down by topics identified in the press release.

General Business File ASAP was great.

Value line, good for numbers, comparison to other companies.

Sears used topics first, then engines.

The sources listed inside front cover of the text were especially good.

From the WSC home page: Cornell Law Review. Excellent for export laws.

Moody’s offered every aspect of the company, financials, Industry information.

For more specific information, search

All three groups felt they were successful.

Country Commercial Guides were very helpful. Culture, barriers…Exhaustive!

Hardest part if figuring out what you’re going to do in a foreign country. We’ve changed our minds several times about what we’ll do, based on research.

Chose topics based on what would be fun and interesting, and what would enable us to be successful. All marketing majors. Tried to be innovative from the beginning. Relied primarily on internet, Moody’s, and books on the country.

Hamilton Standard has an "intranet," which was a source.

Organized team by groups of topics. To allow independent, complementary research. Did not want to be confined in terms of sources.

Another group organized by major topics, already oriented to the country.

Sources in Spanish that needed translation. AT&T has free trial software for translation. Students of Spanish on campus can do some translation.

Periodicals need ordering.

Problem: filtering information on the internet. Much of it is pure promotion. More focused searches, more key words are helpful.

The reference librarians are very helpful.

Everything that sounds really good seems to require registration and payment.

Going in circles. –Try different search engines. Try to keep track of where you’ve been.

2/26/98

Strategic Management

Problem for Time Warner:

Cant find mission statement, home page is fluff. Alternative approaches are being pursued.

Solution, if you cant find it. Infer it from what is available, and general knowledge of what a statement should include. Then revise.

At American Honda, it wasn’t called the "mission," it was called the "Company Principle."

In doing the research, Hoover’s offers free subscription for a limited time. Why is it free, but they ask for your credit card number? A come-on, hoping you will inadvertently continue after the free period.

Great Sources:

Home pages.

Problems:

Computers freeze up because too many users.

Too little money in budget.

Go at off times.

Home pages too commercial. Lycos offered better information. Honda parent home page was better.

Telephone! Called Delta, United Air, other competitors. Delta was very rude.

Wall Street Directories.