Strategy & Management

✒ Agreed. Especially regarding areas on corporate finance and accounting. “Not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted.”– William Bruce Cameron

✒ Common sense / clichés one might think, these are nonetheless good reminders that motivate disengaged employees to make the most out of any job, and focus the energy on the opportunities that the job can provide. Skill building: Consider ways you can turn your current job into a “curriculum” of growth that will help … Read More

✒ Primark stuck with the stack-it-high-sell-it-cheap approach, key takeaways: Contrary to other fast fashion giants which grow by embracing speed, Primark stays in the slower lane. The premise is that shoppers will accept being a little less cutting-edge in return for big savings. Unlike fancier rivals who boast about unique assortment of regularly updated goods, … Read More

✒ A useful (and funny) guide for those who are contemplating WFH arrangements.

✒ A common trait for the up-and-coming professionals in law, finance, consulting and the like may be “personal insecurity”, due to the inherent intangibility of knowledge work and the deliberate hiring of “insecure overachievers” by elite professional organisations. According to the article, “insecure overachievers are exceptionally capable and fiercely ambitious, yet driven by a profound … Read More

✒ A candid account of the workplace practices at China’s large tech companies. Some slangs / terms mentioned in the article: Forced ranking — at the end of the financial year, nearly everyone gets a hefty bonus. The losers – those bottom-ranked by management – get little or nothing no matter how productive they are. … Read More

✒ The idea to integrate member firms makes business sense given the amount of cross-border work that the Big Four carry out, particularly on consulting. It can encourage better exchange of ideas, staff, and greater shared interest in investments made by member firms. However, under the traditional federated or network model, each of the member … Read More

✒ Some practical tips by Tim Harford to free us from the perceived governing rules of etiquette, and improve our productivity to get things done instead. In sum: 1. Use the tools that many email programs offer E.g. If you want to send an email to a large group while ensuring that only you receive … Read More

✒ For good corporate governance, the general rules are that “the roles of chair and chief executive should not be exercised by the same individual” and “a chief executive should not become chair of the same company”. As Jeff Bezos is stepping down as the CEO and moving to become executive chair, only seven out … Read More

✒ A good timing for Walmart to step further into financial services as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp has just approved new rules that will make it easier for non-banks to get into banking. The company has a huge customer base to sell financial products to, has access to plenty of financial information about its … Read More

✒ Content is king. Disney+ has 87m streaming subscribers and expects 230m to 260m by 2024. If Hulu and ESPN+ are included, Disney has 137 streaming subscribers, quickly catching up with Netflix’s 195m. Disney+ can afford to raise its price too. Even after the increase of $1 next March, the cost of $7.99 will still … Read More

✒ The answer: meatball. The hypothesis: hungry customers were distracted customers. If sufficiently satiated, they’d be likely to stay longer, talk about their purchases, and make a decision without leaving the store — thus buying more. The strategy: Losing money on purpose by offering the cheapest meal within a certain radius of the store. Being … Read More

✒ Shifting from the income approach to the market approach in valuing employee salary.

✒ Making up for salary cut by getting more stock or options.

✒ Oil. Data. Water.

✒ Shifting from a sellers’ to a buyers’ market.

✒ When the tide goes out.

✒ “Momentary victory by a rich country in controlling the virus at a national level, coupled with travel bans and border closures, may give a semblance of accomplishment. But we all know this is a stopgap. Only global victory can bring this pandemic to an end.”

✒ Surveillance may well be needed to cope with Covid-19. But rules with sunset clauses and scrutiny built in are needed to help stop it at that.