The soccer superstar talks about becoming an informal team leader, why he came out of retirement to join the New York Cosmos, and what he thinks about money in sports.

An ambitious executive is about to leave his employer in order to launch his own Pan-African venture. Should he start up in a rapidly growing, but already competitive, market or in a series of smaller, untapped markets? Expert commentary comes from Ashish J. Thakkar, founder of Mara Group, and Iqbal Surve, founder and chairman of the Sekunjalo Group.

An ambitious executive is about to leave his employer in order to launch his own Pan-African venture. Should he start up in a rapidly growing, but already competitive, market or in a series of smaller, untapped markets? Expert commentary comes from Ashish J. Thakkar, founder of Mara Group, and Iqbal Surve, founder and chairman of the Sekunjalo Group.

In 2013 Sharp Electronics shareholders expressed their outrage in the face of the company's unmet technological challenges, plunging share price, and governance missteps. To turn Sharp around, President Kozo Takahashi would be forced to undo decisions that his predecessors had made and break with past traditions concerning Sharp's corporate governance. Would Takahashi be successful in steering Sharp away from insolvency and towards a more competitive position in the worldwide consumer electronics industry?

Linktone was formed in September 1999 to develop text messaging applications and content for the Chinese market. Starting as a division within Intrinsic China Technology Ltd., a Shanghai-based wireless technology company, it was spun out as an independent venture in April 2001. After two years in the market, the company saw its revenues grow, but it was not yet profitable and faced intense competition. In 2003, Raymond Yang, a successful businessman and entrepreneur in both China and Silicon Valley, California, joined Linktone as CEO. He brought some of the management style he had adopted in Silicon Valley, built a national sales network to work with local service provider offices, and sourced new products from Chinese, Japanese, and Western content providers. The mobile telecommunications market was undergoing explosive growth and constant change in China at the time, and acquisition activity was accelerating. Yang was considering an acquisition offer from China.com, a NASDAQ-traded Chinese service provider, and also the possibility of taking Linktone public on the NASDAQ.

Leaders trying to transform company culture can learn from an unexpected source: addiction treatment programs. Changing individual behavior is the key--and many of the tenets used by 12-step groups can give managers insight into that difficult challenge and how to overcome it.

Companies that invest heavily in R&D are often torn between emerging technologies, wondering which will win in the marketplace and is therefore the one to develop (remember VHS versus Betamax). Conventional wisdom suggests there's a steep price for getting it wrong. But new research shows that betting on a losing technology and then switching to the winner can position a company to come out ahead, because it forces a steep learning curve.

Growing an exclusive brand by moving down market can be tricky: It risks tarnishing the brand among core customers. New research shows that under certain conditions, however, downward extensions can actually intensify a brand's prestige. It all depends on how the noncore consumers are framed--whether they are presented as part of the core community ("brand immigrants"), a situation that tends to diminish the brand's image, or whether they are positioned as "brand tourists"--consumers who admire the brand without seeking to be part of the core community. The research findings suggest several strategies for companies who want to extend a brand without alienating core consumers.

When it comes to what customers want in products, creativity isn't the icing on the cake, says Professor Jennifer Mueller. It is the cake. But a focus on feasibility and profits may prevent managers from even recognizing ideas that could be hits.

The author, a globally known business adviser and speaker, proposes that traditional HR departments divide into two strands: One would primarily manage compensation and benefits and would report to the CFO. The other would focus on improving the people capabilities of the business and would report to the CEO.

A former Wall Street analyst, Girsky learned the importance of synthesizing all the messages coming out of a company into one strong story line. "You'd be surprised," he writes, "how many companies change their messages often or present differing agendas to different audiences."

A look at the components of executive compensation--salary, bonuses, stock options, restricted stock, and others--and the forces that have caused some to rise and others to fall in the years since 1992. Draws on research by Kevin J. Murphy, a USC professor who is an expert on executive pay.

By 2004, the Industrial Finance Corporation of India ("IFCI") is on the verge of collapse; its profitability has become negative. Non-performing assets ("NPAs") have reached their peak, and the company does not have enough money to do business. It begins selling off and renting out its premises to get money to sustain its operations, going door-to-door to save itself. Employee morale is at its lowest level. IFCI's operations become unsustainable and are no longer viable. Against this backdrop, the IFCI board of directors and the government of India are in a quandary as they try to decide on IFCI's future course. After evaluating all possible options, IFCI and the government decide to restructure IFCI. IFCI's turnaround, which catapults it on the path to growth includes multiple factors such as converting debt into equity, creating provisions for bad loans, restructuring liabilities, retiring high-cost debt, managing NPAs aggressively, voluntarily retiring staff, focusing on short-term projects, adopting a selective approach in identifying projects for assistance and monitoring projects more effectively. The most critical factor that enables the turnaround of the state financial institution is the able leadership that not only changes IFCI's public sector culture but also brings a new work culture and ethics to the organization. ICFI's turnaround from the financial crisis inspires a lasting motivation in the hearts of its employees.

This Reading explores the multi-faceted nature of channels of distribution. The Reading provides guidelines for how producers of goods and services should cultivate, execute, and manage their go-to-market strategies. They can achieve success by implementing the notion of channel stewardship, and by applying its three main disciplines: mapping the industry channels, building & updating the channel value chain, and aligning & influencing the channel value chain. Managers are guided on whether to pursue direct and/or indirect channels of distribution. The author presents a seven-step framework for building the channel value chain. In aligning & influencing the channel system, readers discover the importance of aligning the network of suppliers and intermediaries to address customer needs, and how participating members should be rewarded commensurate with their efforts. Hard and soft power as key influential levers are discussed, and readers are also introduced to a four-step alignment process for programming a high-performance channel system. This discipline also involves managing horizontal channel conflict. The Reading closes with an eCommerce supplement, which discusses how online channel capabilities have caused varying degrees of disruption among certain product categories.

This Core Curriculum Reading introduces the fundamentals of getting price right. First, it introduces value pricing, which requires a detailed understanding of the true economic value (TEV) that a firm's product creates for a specific customer. Value pricing also requires a decision to divide that value between the firm (providing the firm its incentive to sell) and the customer (providing the customer with an incentive to buy). After covering the key elements of the value-pricing approach, the Reading explains the concepts of price customization, consumer sensitivity to price, and the impact of price on the organization's profitability. Readers also learn how both quantitative research and managerial judgment are used to make optimal pricing decisions. For classroom use in higher education, this Reading is accompanied by a Teaching Note, test bank, and exhibit slides.

This Core Curriculum Reading introduces (1) the importance of sales force design in implementing organizational strategy, and (2) the role of sales force management in linking structures and processes to behaviors. The material combines theoretical perspectives with real-world examples, drawn from the business-to-business (B2B), business-to-consumer (B2C) and nonprofit sectors, to illustrate the range of challenges and opportunities in this field.

Core Curriculum Readings in Marketing cover fundamental concepts, theories, and frameworks in marketing. For classroom use in higher education, this Reading is accompanied by a Teaching Note, test bank, and exhibit slides. This reading provides an introduction to the framework for marketing strategy: how a business creates and retains a customer, as well as the growing importance of making customers active ambassadors for its brands. The reading begins with a description of the 5Cs analysis for developing a marketing strategy (customer, company, collaborators, competitors, and context). It then discusses two sets of decisions every organization needs to make: the Aspiration Decision (what the company hopes to achieve in the market) and the Action Plan Decision (or "marketing mix" of the 4Ps-product, promotion, placement, and price). Finally, it considers the different kinds of actions required for customer acquisition vs. customer retention.

This Reading on customer management sheds light on how companies should evaluate and manage their customers in order to grow profitably. Customer management allows marketing managers to inform investment decisions by drilling down into each customer's profitability or customer lifetime value (CLV). Historically, marketing managers have focused on providing value to customers, while largely ignoring the value they could get from customers. Realizing that customer lifetime value is a more important metric than simply increasing sales or market share, many companies are beginning to understand how the viability of their businesses is tightly linked to acquiring, retaining, and developing the right customers.

Core Curriculum Readings in Marketing cover fundamental concepts, theories, and frameworks in marketing. For classroom use in higher education, this Reading is accompanied by a Teaching Note, test bank, and exhibit slides. "Consumer Behavior and the Buying Process" describes and analyzes 4 frameworks for understanding how consumers make decisions: cognitive versus emotional, high-involvement versus low-involvement, optimizing versus "satisficing," and compensatory versus noncompensatory decision making. This Core Curriculum Reading then presents the activities that occur during the 3 phases in the consumer buying process: pre-purchase, purchase, and post-purchase. It also analyzes consumer decision-making units, including roles played within such units, such as buyer, influencer, gatekeeper, and approver. The Reading includes an in-depth example of how a pharmaceutical company analyzed decision-making processes and decision-making units to develop marketing campaigns for a new product. It concludes with an exploration of 3 developments that profoundly affect consumers' decision-making process and units: social media, co-creation and customer involvement, and "conscience" marketing. Ultimately, this Reading prepares students to become marketers who can design effective advertising and marketing campaigns for products and services.

Without customers, businesses could not succeed. The term "Customer Centric" has therefore become synonymous with proactive business strategy worldwide. Primarily due to advances in technology, we are experiencing a fundamental shift in marketing - from a previous focus on companies to a spotlight on consumers - giving customers a much stronger voice in both the Business-to-Business (B2B) and Business-to-Consumer (B2C) sectors. Customer centricity fits three ways into an organization: as part of a knowledge management system (understanding the customer), as part of the development of strategic competence as a learning organization (building a customer-centric culture), and as a foundation for corporate strategy development and execution (serving the customer). This reading is organized into three main sections covering these topics and uses many examples from diverse industries to illustrate successes in each area. In addition, a Supplemental Reading examines the dynamic between customer centricity and innovation and also provides a contrarian view to the topic.