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Competitiveness appears to be the order of the day. Prominent international bodies including the OECD, the ILO and the World Economic Forum would seem to have conspired to synchronize the publication of their world economic forecasts during the month of November. Finland takes the prize as the world's most competitive economy, while the United States holds on to second place, and Japan begins to pull out of its long recession. IESE was the World Economic Forum's Spanish partner for the Global Competitiveness Report 2003-2004, with a team headed by Professor Eduardo Ballarín, holder of the Nissan Chair of Corporate Strategy and International Cometitiveness, and with the support of the Anselmo Rubiralta Center for Globalization and Strategy. According to Professor Ballarín, Spain's position in the global ranking is ambivalent: while its macroeconomic indicators are encouraging, its companies are uncompetitive compared to those of its closest rivals. Leaving statistics to one side, in this edition of IESE Insight we have chosen to focus on what productivity really means and how it affects the growth of nations and companies. Besides Professor Ballarín's report on the competitiveness ranking, you will find an interesting study of differences in productivity within one and the same company, as well as new work on corporate governance, ethics, and human resources, which also decisively influence company performance.
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Economics |
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Competitiveness = Productivity |
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| Eduardo Ballarín |
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Each year, the World Economic Forum's Global Competitiveness Report surprises us with its indices of country competitiveness. According to the latest edition, Finland is now the world's most competitive economy, ahead of the United States, while Spain takes an undistinguished 25th place, trailing countries such as Estonia, Malta and Luxembourg. But what makes a competitive economy? How do you measure a country's productivity? Or its growth potential? IESE Professor Eduardo Ballarín, who coordinated the Spanish chapter of the Global Competitiveness Report 2003-2004, unravels these questions by examining the results. 
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Leadership, Strategy and Change |
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People Matter!: Why Some Company Units Outperform Others |
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| Johanna Mair |
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| Within the same company, why do some units consistently yield better results than others? This is a key question of strategy research, which IESE Professor Johanna Mair answers by focusing on people. Though corporate strategy is determined at the top, it is the middle managers who are responsible for translating plans into action and real results. Mair finds that how mangers enact strategy, who they are and where they are significantly affects a unit's performance.
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Corporate Governance |
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What Makes Family Firms Prosper and Endure |
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| Joan M. Amat, Miguel Ángel Gallo |
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| What makes some family firms succeed and live on, generation after generation, while others fall at the first hurdle? In the book "Los secretos de las empresas familiares centenarias" ("The secrets of family firms that live to a hundred"), IESE Professor Miguel Ángel Gallo and Joan M. Amat, partner-director of SMC Consultores, delve into the distinguishing characteristics of the most long-lived family firms and derive some practical advice for managers.
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Business Ethics |
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Ethical Rules Needed, As Well As Good People |
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| Javier de los Santos, Juan Fontrodona |
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| Companies need more than just good managers. They need managers who will make it clear to their subordinates exactly what they are expected to do on an ethical level, and provide them with useful, manageable tools to guide their behaviour. According to the survey of the ethical climate in Spanish companies conducted by Professor Juan Fontrodona of IESE and Research Assistant Javier de los Santos, companies that have acted on this advice benefit from improved decision making and deeper employee commitment.
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Finance |
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A New Model of Universal Banks |
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| Jordi Canals |
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| A decade ago, some experts predicted the decline of the traditional bank. Yet many financial firms have responded to the modern challenges of globalization, deregulation and technology by creating a new model of universal banks. IESE Professor Jordi Canals, explains how these large and powerful financial groups - such as Deutsche Bank, HSBC, Bank America, Citigroup, and ABN-Amro - now shape the destiny of financial markets. He also reflects on what it will take to make the universal banking model sustainable.
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Organizations and People |
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Agilent's Tower of Babel |
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| José María Rodríguez Porras |
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| The Biblical story of the Tower of Babel tells how the descendants of Noah were unable to complete their work once God confused their language so that they could no longer understand one another. In a modern-day version of the mythical Tower, almost 500 people of 34 different nationalities, speaking 23 mother tongues, were asked to work together for Agilent Technologies' Shared Services Center in Barcelona. How should an organization with such diverse people be run? Would Agilent be able to carry over and consolidate the corporate culture in such a diverse environment? IESE Professor José María Rodríguez investigates.
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Leadership, Strategy and Change |
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Linux Vs. Microsoft: Who Wins? |
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| Ramón Casadesus-Masanell, Pankaj Ghemawat |
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| "Under NO circumstances lose against Linux," a Microsoft executive's email read in 2002. Starting from the rivalry between Microsoft and Linux in the operating system market, Professor Ramón Casadesus-Masanell of IESE and Professor Pankaj Ghemawat of Harvard Business School analyze this dynamic mixed duopoly in which a profit-maximizing competitor interacts with a competitor that prices at zero (or marginal) cost. Might the sales-maximizer somehow displace or push out the profit-maximizer from the market? Over time, say the authors, the cumulation of output affects their relative positions.
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