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Supplements the (A) case.

This note provides background information on alternative approaches to evaluation in the workplace. Presented is a discussion of 360-degree feedback; the arguments for and against its use; and some of the requirements for effective application. Also presented is a discussion of the balanced scorecard; its benefits and main sources of failure; some potential measures; and the relationship to strategy maps, the links it can create within the organization, and the need to link it to rewards. This note is intended to be used in conjunction with sessions on performance evaluation and rewards.

Indupalma was managed as a plantation during its first 30 years. Labor cooperatives emerged as a response to a financial and governance crisis that led Indupalma to the brink of bankruptcy at the beginning of the 1990s. Workers and peasants formed associations to create autonomous business units (such as cooperatives, microenterprises, and associations), which sold their services to Indupalma. The company invested a great deal of resources in technical and administrative training and in human resource development for associates. The performance of workers improved, and the financial viability of the company was regained. Today, cooperatives face multiple social and economic challenges; the role of Indupalma in facing these challenges (intervention, paternalism, empowerment, or indifference) will put to the test the solidity and true impact of the development process.

Minuto de Dios (MD) is a social service organization that uses alliances for the majority of its projects. Illustrates the creation, development, and full growth of a social enterprise like MD, the leadership of its founder, Eudist Father Rafael Garcia Herreros, and the several types of cross-sector collaborations developed by the organization over time. In its first 40 years, MD built more than 15,000 housing solutions in 17 Colombian cities and more than 40,000 houses in disaster relief projects.

The CEO of Best Buy, a hugely successful retailing company, has hired consulting firm Strategos to imbue the company with an improved innovative capability. The six-month program of experimental learning yields new business ideas and also trains Best Buy employees as innovation coaches. However, this kind of learning is expensive and time consuming. The case details the learning journey as experienced by Best Buy employees and raises the question of when such development programs are appropriate. Focuses on the learning process and stimulates debate about how people and organizations learn in general, as well as how an innovation capability can be fostered.

Executives who were rated "outstanding" by superiors used humor more than twice as often as those deemed just average. What's more, the funnier the executives were, the bigger their bonuses.

Many investors and their advocates believe that separating the roles of board chairman and CEO would improve corporate governance. But the practice could encumber well-functioning businesses and harm shareholders.

Big projects fail at an astonishing rate--more than half the time, by some estimates. It's not hard to understand why. Complicated long-term projects are customarily developed by a series of teams working along parallel tracks. If managers fail to anticipate everything that might fall through the cracks, those tracks will not converge successfully at the end to reach the goal. Take a companywide CRM project. Traditionally, one team might analyze customers, another select the software, a third develop training programs, and so forth. When the project is finally complete, though, it may turn out that the salespeople won't enter in the requisite data because they don't understand why they need to. There is a way to uncover unanticipated problems while the project is still in development. The key is to inject into the overall plan a series of miniprojects, or "rapid-results initiatives," that each have as their goal a miniature version of the overall goal. In the CRM project, a single team might be charged with increasing the revenues of one sales group in one region by 25% within four months. To reach that goal, team members would have to draw on the work of all the parallel teams. But in just four months, they would discover the salespeople's resistance and probably other unforeseen issues, such as, perhaps, the need to divvy up commissions for joint-selling efforts. The World Bank has used rapid-results initiatives to great effect to keep a sweeping 16-year project on track and deliver visible results years ahead of schedule.

Coming up with creative ideas is easy; selling them to strangers is hard. Entrepreneurs, sales executives, and marketing managers often go to great lengths to demonstrate how their new concepts are practical and profitable--only to be rejected by corporate decision makers who don't seem to understand the value of the ideas. Why does this happen? Having studied Hollywood executives who assess screenplay pitches, the author says the person on the receiving end--the "catcher"--tends to gauge the pitcher's creativity as well as the proposal itself. An impression of the pitcher's ability to come up with workable ideas can quickly and permanently overshadow the catcher's feelings about an idea's worth. To determine whether these observations apply to business settings beyond Hollywood, the author attended product design, marketing, and venture-capital pitch sessions and conducted interviews with executives responsible for judging new ideas. The results in those environments were similar to her observations in Hollywood, she says. Catchers subconsciously categorize successful pitchers as showrunners (smooth and professional), artists (quirky and unpolished), or neophytes (inexperienced and naive). The research also reveals that catchers tend to respond well when they believe they are participating in an idea's development. As Oscar-winning writer, director, and producer Oliver Stone puts it, screenwriters pitching an idea should "pull back and project what he needs onto your idea in order to make the story whole for him." By finding ways to give your catchers a chance to shine, you sell yourself as a likable collaborator.

The Twenty-First Century Leaders Program was launched by a group of business leaders from the Presidential Forum of the Chamber of Commerce of Bogota. Ten business leaders and private schools agreed on a common objective: to improve the quality of education in Colombia. Today, 187 public and private schools have allied with 109 businesses in nine cities to strengthen schools as organizations and to benefit more than 100,000 children. The project helps schools to adopt better administrative practices and, since 2001, it has led national forums on the topics of quality in school administration to highlight the experience of schools that have experienced the greatest progress. Besides the topics related to quality, the project is also directed toward policy planning and implementation. Highlights the role played by Meals de Colombia, a frozen foods manufacturer and retailer that has led the program since its beginning.

Describes the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's 2003 proposal to allow shareholders to nominate a "short slate" of directors for the board of listed companies. Includes comment letters for and against the proposal.

The response of former Self-Assessment and Career Development student Amy Kelly to the "48-Hour Diary" assignment.

Presents former Self-Assessment and Career Development student Amy Kelly's response to the "Written Interview" assignment.

Rick Cohen, president and CEO of C&S Wholesale Grocers, is trying to decide whether and how to implement the self-managed teams concept in his warehouse. Eight months earlier, C&S had begun to act as principal wholesaler to A&P throughout New England, a decision that was consistent with the firm's growth strategy, but that also represented a significant increase in daily throughput. Cohen was concerned about whether the company's existing operations would be able to meet the needs of all its customers and maintain the high levels of customer satisfaction for which the company was known throughout New England. When implemented successfully, the self-managed teams concept had been credited with enhancing an organization's productivity and competitiveness. Cohen wondered how such a concept could be implemented in the context of a labor-intensive, unionized warehouse environment.

A new political appointee with years of volunteer experience takes over a highly responsible job in the state government and is met with bureaucratic inertia. Describes a successful strategy to overcome organizational resistance to change.

Supplements the (A) case.

Supplements the (A) case.

Provides a history of the board of directors of the Coca-Cola Co. through 2003. Describes the evolution in the board's membership, practices, and structure and the role it played in the company's governance. Questions are raised about the relationship between the board and top management, especially how the board is carrying out its responsibilities in the 21st century.

Supplements the (A) case.

In 1999, after posting losses in eight of the preceding nine years, Nissan seeks a partnership with Renault. At the request of Nissan, Carlos Ghosn is appointed COO. Ghosn, a Frenchman with Brazilian-Lebanese heritage, who has spent much of his career in Michelin in Latin America and the US, has earned the nickname "Le Cost-Killer" during his tenure at Renault. Despite his multi-cultural background, he speaks no Japanese and has no Asian experience. His charter, however, is to quickly turn around the ailing Japanese car-maker, with all the unique challenges of leading change as a foreigner in Japan. His commits to doing it within three years or resigning. Enlisting middle management, he uses solid change management techniques and is successful, but now must confront the process of institutionalizing his initial successes and planning for a successor.