Cosmic Zoom (National Film Board, Canada, 1968)

I wanted to introduce you to this resource: an animation film produced by Canada's National Film Board in 1968.



This is just an example of a "discussion starter": what concepts and ideas concerning our PII and conceptual framework makes you this film think about?

Corporate Global Citizenship

Mega planning -in the form of corporate global citizenship- has become part of the agenda of Davus 2008 Global Forum.

Michael Porter, global firms as Pepsico and Cisco and the PMs of Grean Britain and Jordan discuss what CGC means for their societal performance:



How could our PII projects benefit from these lessons and ideas?
How can we attract CGC corporations and governments to our South of Sonora ecosystem?

Downturns' paradox: strategy comes first

Michael Porter offers some interesting lessons on how companies must deal with economic downturns.



How Porter's recommendation apply to your PII project?

Sustainability: an open debate

One of the most compelling challenges affecting 21st century business and societies is finding a balance between growth and eliminating poverty and sustainable use of natural resources and good practices.

We might start with Milton Friedman -back in the 1960s- describing how in a global economy, most products and services are produced and delivered through a combination of many international ecosystems:



During the nineties, the debate on sustainability became increasingly intense. This session explains the challenges to taht global supply chain that Friedman described 40 years ago



The alternatives for some sustainibility advocates are as follows:



There are as well, skeptics, such as Bjorn Lomborg, who considers some of the prophecies about environmental challenges are overhyped:



Finally, the Davos 2008 Forum on Corporate Global Citizenship shows yet another perspective, explained by Michael Porter and othres in this debate:




In any case, sustainability becomes every organization's challenge.

How could your PII project make sure it is sustainable?

Mexican Intelectual Capital searchers: Rick Bayless' perspective

American chef Rick Bayless based its thriving food business and franchise on his ability to perceive the value of Mexican food, lifestyle and culture as sources of intellectual capital.

Today, Bayless has added to his Frontera Grill and Topolobampo



a TV show to promote new, high end Mexican food in the US and launched also a line of his products in US supermarket such as Whole Foods.

How could we apply the lessons from Bayless success to our PII projects?

Business opportunities during economic downturns VII: ePerformance builds bridges over H1N1

Higher fuel costs, airline industry problems or pandemic crises can have an unintended good consequence: accelerating e-performance technology adoption.

With more than 80 million users Skype free PC-to-PC teleconferencing system has become wildly popular.

Other collaborative systems -like Adobe Connect- help PII and ITSON to continue their educational programs in spite of restrictions to face-to-face meetings and classroom activities.

A recent New York Times article shows that the trend is becoming global and e-performance becoming mainstream.

Click on this image of a videoconference between Chicago, Obregon, Detroit and Florida to view an example of how a 4-ways synchronous meeting can help revise and define a proposal and present it in 48 hours:

How can we use e-performance and videoconferencing for our PII projects?

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References

• Sharkey, J. (2009) A meeting in New York? Can't we videoconference/ New York Times

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Mega becoming mainstream?: Tom shoes in Argentina

Tom shoes was born out of Blake Mycoskie's visits to Argentina -where he noticed plenty of shoeless children roaming through the streets during the 2001-3 economic meltdown-.

He also discovered an old local shoe still used by the gauchos at the countryside named Alpargatas -on behlaf of the original manufacturer- and started to think in improving from a 4 dollar shoe with a socially-focused business model: Tom would give one shoe to shoeless children in Argentina and every other country where it operates for each shoe sold in the US or to paying customers.

He started by himself, in a warehouse and with only 4 collaborators. In 6 months, Tom's social business model became popular in New York and at the end of the first year, the company was breaking even, delivering 50,000 shoes, with 50 million-plus dollars sales and 45 full time employees.

Tom's marketing was all "viral" -mostly using You Tube videos like these, created and uploaded by fans and crew-

Mycoskie didn't stop there his connections with Mega, and started to sell Tom's eco-shoes (made of recycled materials) at Whole Foods and launched women's strap boots inspired in Polo horses' vendages with equal success.

Is this a sign that Mega has become mainstream?

Do you know of other examples?

How can you aply Tom's model's ideas and principles to your PII project?

Fighting back bad publicity: Mexico and Pork producers come with ideas

Here are some ideas from advertising experts about how to conduct a campaign in favor of pork after the damaging effects of H1N1 influenza misinformation .

Why not to use a great barbecue celebration with certified pork produce? Here is how it looks at the Virginia Pork festival.

We could call it an "asado de desagravio" in Spanish...

Could anybody beat Mexicans (and Sonorans) at that? Who knows better how to celebrate life?

Let's show the world how.

A celebration that would show consumers that there is nothing to fear from the pork when it is properly produced and prepared.



What could we do for Mexican tourism building on these images?



Time for fishing in San Carlos?



Or to invite them back?



It is time to help, post your ideas as comments

How can we help Mexico's tourism and pork production to get a quick recovery from the flu scare?

2009 Global Recession: 3 million jobs wanted?

This BusinessWeek edition shows paradoxical news: with 13 million people unemployed during the current recession, there are 3 million job offerings uncovered.

The problem seems to arise from the combination of two factors: (1) a mismatch between supply and demand and (2) reduced mobility due to the real estate market crisis.

(1) As manufacturing and construction reduce their workforce -as well as finance-, health, education, social work, business services, government, reatil, leisure and hospitality are in high demand with fewer prepared people to respond. Too many MBAs and too few nurses and teachers? That might be good news for ITSON...

The problem behind the mismatch is the use of a "benchmarking", "follow the trend" model that always arrives late with inadequate supply. Those MBAs that were in high demand in 2000, are precisely oversupplied in a post-crash market with dying banks.

ITSON's new strategy is proving smarter: instead of "responding" to the "trends", our strategic projects create them, pointing at a longer term timeframe and to Mega-level requirements. That is why our PII projects are in... education, health, hospitality, business services and government.

(2) Real estate crisis has an unintended consequence: people that cannot sell their current homes -those oversold on the promise of an "ownership society"- cannot move to where the demand is either. Renting can be a wiser model.

US growth has always been based on a highly mobile, trainable workforce. Helping with real estate might help in increasing supply's elasticity.

How can PII projects respond to this new reality?

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References

• Coy, P. (2009) Help Wanted: Why That Sign's Bad
  The nation has 3 million jobs going begging. And without retraining, U.S. workers may not be able to fill them . BusinessWeek
• Ewing, J. (2009) Learning Labor Market Lessons from Germany
  By reforming benefits and other programs, unemployment in Germany has increased only slightly. The U.S. could learn a thing or two.BusinesWeek
  

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