ORGS 1000 Lecture Notes - Lecture 4: Laissez-Faire, Profit Motive, Oligopoly

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coppermule990

24 Dec 2015

School

York University

Department

Organization Studies

Course

ORGS 1000

Professor

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Document Summary

Ford and general motors"s suvs have a high chance of rolling over from collision (26- . This chapter addresses the following topics: definition of capitalism and historical context. Four key features of capitalism (companies, profit motive, competition and private property: two classical moral justifications, criticisms of capitalism. Laissez faire = to let do (french word) Jessica gahtan: capital = money that is invested for the purpose of making money, agape = selfless love. Its opposite is socialism: today countries have adopted a mixed economy. Profit motive: making a profit is key, profit sustains the capitalism system, relates to self- interests as human beings. Laissez faire = to let do (french word: competition regulars individual economic activity. Smith believes government intervention should not exist. Supply and demand will solve the economic problems (e. g. labour wages) Children who are born in poor families do not have same opportunities as the wealthy ones.

Related Questions

As you may recall in the work of Triplett (1898), the presence of others in a bicycle race was found to enhance individual performance. This is called social facilitation (Williams, Harkins, & Karau, 2007). At times, however, the presence of others can detract from individual performance, which is termed social inhibition (Crisp & Turner, 2007). Similarly, social loafing can occur when an individualâs performance within a group decreases due to his or her reliance on others in the group (Crisp & Turner, 2007).

For this Discussion, review the media program, Week 5: The Virtual Office. Focus on the characters in the media and determine which characters displayed social facilitation, social inhibition, and social loafing.

With these thoughts in mind:

Post by Day 3 a description of the characters in the media program demonstrating social loafing, social inhibition, and social facilitation. Explain how you identified them. Then, select one of the characters and, using the current literature, explain two ways you might mitigate their behavior.

Media Program

(Onscreen Text: The employees at the United Cardboard Company often work individually on projects, but as with most environments, they are occasionally asked to participate in group projects. One such group is about to meet right now to plan a presentation for the Board of Directors. Observe the conversation and reactions of various group members to determine which group members exhibit signs of the following: Social Loafing, Social Inhibition, and Social Facilitation.)

(Interior of an office. Ken stands at the front of the conference room.)

KEN: OK, I guess we might as well all get started. As we all know, the big man has requested the five of us to get together and write and conceptualize a presentation to the board on our new packaging system. Maybe we can start by going around and throwing out some initial ideas.

KATHY: Sounds good to me. I think a PowerPoint presentation would do the job well.

GAVIN: I agree. We could follow it up with a physical demonstration of how the packaging looks and folds-- maybe a video of the larger pieces that won't fit into the boardroom.

KEN: Sounds perfect to me. Amanda, Brian, what do you guys think?

BRIAN: Yeah, what you guys said sounds fine.

(Amanda thinks, âI donât know what to say!â)

KEN: Amanda?

AMANDA: I don't know. I didn't really get much chance to think about this. We only found out we needed to do this together three days ago.

KEN: OK, no worries. Let's focus on the PowerPoint idea. I've been doing a lot of them lately, so I'm happy to take the lead on the design aspect. What do you guys think we should all incorporate into the slides?

GAVIN: I think we should start with where we got the idea for this new packaging -- the company that designed it and the different sizes that it comes in.

KATHY: We should follow that with a graph comparing the old prices to the new ones to illustrate how much we'll be saving over time. Amanda, didn't you have most of that information collected at some point?

(Amanda thinks, âOh no! What if I deleted that?)

AMANDA: I don't know, maybe, it's been so long. I didn't think I'd need it again for a group project like this.

(Gavin thinks, âI wonder whatâs gotten into her. Sheâs not usually this tense.â)

KEN: That's OK, Amanda, I'm sure we can easily dig it up again. Brian, do you have any other ideas for the PowerPoint slides?

BRIAN: Nah, I think what you guys mentioned sounds right.

(Kathy thinks, âWow. Way to contribute Brian.â)

KEN: OK then, Kathy and Gavin why don't you send me all of the info and I'll write it up and make the slides. Amanda, don't worry about the cost saving document, I'm sure I can dig it up from my old emails and put it into that slide too.

AMANDA: Are you sure? I'm happy to look. I mean I'm sure I have it somewhere. (Kathy thinks, âShe really needs to get it together. Why is she so nervous?â) At least I think I have it somewhere. You won't tell the Board of Directors if I lost it, will you?

KEN: Of course not, we're in it together. So as I was saying, I'll write up and prepare all the PowerPoint slides. Then we can start our presentation with reading and explaining each slide. Then, what?

KATHY: Well, and then I think we should show them the packaging live, and the quick deconstructing techniques.

KEN: Great idea. You and Amanda can demonstrate the folding, while I narrate what you're doing.

(Amanda thinks, âIs he doing too much of the work? And what if I drop everything while heâs talking?â)

GAVIN: And after you all demonstrate the smaller packaging, we could show a quick video of how the really big ones function down at the warehouse. Brian, would you be able to go film that quickly one of these days?

BRIAN: I don't really have any experience with video cameras or anything like that, so...

(Gavin thinks, âI should have seen that one coming.â)

KEN: That's OK. My wife actually just got me this great little camera for our anniversary. It takes great videos. So I can just run down to the warehouse, get some footage, then put it together on this new editing software I just downloaded. Maybe add a little music. It's going to be really slick!

KATHY: Are you sure, I wouldn't mind doing that too.

KEN: Oh no, it's fine. I love this kind of stuff; just leave it to me. But I suppose that's enough planning. Now it's time to get to work and make the presentation a knock out. Go team!

Over the past few years, the number of start-up companies attracted to either doing business themselves in the cloud, or specifically creating applications for others to use in the cloud, has grown significantly. A few but very promising enterprises have launched applications in âcontainerâ technology, which enables companies, programmers, or other enterprises to both launch and run applications solely in the cloud. There is still a lot of room in this emerging marketplace, and you are diving in. The product youâve developed has a unique angle to tap into the local-grown/local-made/local-paid movement thatâs also growing larger every day. Your initial market is your own small city, which operates independently but which is linked economically and via public safety provision to another small city sitting directly across a river separating the two. Once youâve been able to launch your company in your city, you plan to approach the âsister cityâ leaders, then the county, state, and eventually go national. Itâs too soon now, but your future plans entail an IPO offering to accomplish all this. Eventually, you hope to be able to re-imagine your product to go global. You have big plans, are close to being tapped out financially and you now need to plan for additional investors. Address the following considerations as they apply to your product launch. 1.Describe an agency relationship and how it may/will take shape for your small company. As the sole employee and investor in your startup, what agency conflicts might arise? 2.Six months have transpired, and youâve been able to add two employees. In this new arrangement, what agency disputes might now develop that need to be addressed, and how might you address them? What resources do you need to use or consider? 3.Another three months have passed. You are now ready to expand to your sister city and you need more capital. You decide the wisest path is to sell some stock to outside investors, but you will maintain control over your company by holding onto the majority of the stock. In this new scenario, what type of agency conflict might occur? How can you address this in advance? 4.The IPO was a success, and you have a robust number of shareholders. With board support, you determine it is time to hire a financial manager to help your firm achieve current goals and set new ones appropriate to the firmâs growth strategy. What professional strengths and skills will an individual seeking this position need to possess? 5.Another consideration you feel you need to address at this point, now that your firmâs stock is publicly traded, is how to sustain the high ethical standards youâve fostered thus far as you move into the firmâs future. What strategies can your management team implement to conduct your business with both personal and professional integrity? What steps can you take to ensure that ethical considerations for financial and other management decisions are embedded into the firmâs culture? 6.Congratulations - you are now at Year One, and everything is moving along faster than you anticipated. While this is great, you are at the point where you need to raise additional capital from outside lenders. With this decision, what type of agency costs might the company incur? How might a lender mitigate any agency costs? 7.Year Two rolls around. Your company has been able to expand beyond your local communities and into to localities and governments in half the counties of the state. The stakes are getting bigger and you welcome the idea of high-level input to ensure the company keeps growing and expanding. You cash out the majority of your stock and turn the company over to an elected board of directors. Neither you nor any other stockholders own a controlling interest (which is also the situation at most public companies). List six potential managerial behaviors the new board might take that could harm your companyâs value, and what steps overall can put into place to avoid or mitigate these. 8.You are also aware from your prior career and from your research, that corporate governance can affect shareholder value. This greatly concerns you, as you still have lofty plans for your companyâs growth and eventual global trajectory. Questions youâve identified that need to be addressed at this stage include: a) What is corporate governance?; b) What five corporate governance provisions are internal to a firm and are under its control?; c) What characteristics of the board of directors usually lead to effective corporate governance?; d) What characteristics of the board of directors signal ineffective or problematic governance practices?; e) How can regulatory agencies and legal systems affect corporate governance? If there are differences in local versus national levels, expand upon these. 9.Lastly, one of your new board members is very concerned with âblockholders.â What is block ownership? How does it affect corporate governance? Explain the pros and cons.

The above is what we did in the lab