Books in the Management for Professionals series

This book illustrates how to access the right information for making the best decisions during turbulent times. It is written from an experienced-based perspective that is beneficial for those looking for the development and improvement of the decision-making process. The approach is centered on the author's experience in developing and implementing effective and efficient approaches to decision-making in business and government. Based on those experiences, this book provides insights into how to improve the decision making process of your organization, whether it be large or small.For decision makers and those providing market information for making decisions, this book provide guidelines for a framework which includes systems thinking. For those interested in change management and corporate governance, the book presents examples where it was done well and some examples where it was not and the ensuring consequences.

This book selects Chinese excellent enterprise management cases, integrating into the education system of business schools, sharing "e;China's new story"e; to readers, and boosting the process of national economic construction and enterprise transformation.Chinese enterprises face unprecedented opportunities and challenges under the circumstance of fast-changing technology, economy, and political environment. In the face of various uncertainties, they have risen to prominence and constantly summed up enterprise management concepts and practical experience suitable for their own development to reshape their competitive advantages and enhance their market value.Based on the investigation, this book covers the major theoretical aspects of management principles such as planning, organizing, leading, controlling, and innovation. The 17 selected cases from manufacturing, retailing, technology/big data service, agriculture, and other industries cover strategic management, entrepreneurial management, human-oriented management, information management, and organizational innovation management. We hope that readers can get some valuable practical experience and enlightenment from the practices in these fields.The book also includes two case study guides, which guide readers to form a case study's thinking. It also encourages readers to broaden their learning ideas on management.

This book helps marketing decision makers in allocating their budget to diverse communication channels and different business units in an ROI-optimal way, and to adapt it in an agile manner. The optimal allocation of resources in marketing is not very complex in theory, but in practice a variety of questions arise, for example: How do you find the optimal mix, even across brands and product lines, and how do you adjust it dynamically? What is the right balance between image and performance marketing? How do you tackle strategic data management and other organizational challenges?The authors guide the reader through the entire process from data collection to marketing mix modeling and campaign tracking to tool selection. The book strikes the right balance between theoretical sophistication and necessary pragmatism, with numerous concrete recommendations for decision makers.

In times of globalization, digitalization and demographic change, the COVID-19 pandemic has shown us the fragility and complexity of the world of work. It represents the peak of a process of change in the world of work in economic, social, socio-political and individual psychological terms.This book outlines how effective and future-oriented human resource management can look like in times of demographic and technological change on the one hand and the immediate and lasting effects of the coronavirus pandemic on the other hand. It provides the tools for effective human resource management, summarized in the following seven success factors: demographic-oriented recruitment, strength-oriented workforce deployment, age-appropriate HR development, new generation contract, family and gender, the vital employee, management of interests and expectations.The aim of the book is not only to provide solutions to problems caused by the changing world of work and the pandemic, but also to show how success factors can emerge from these inevitable phenomena. It will be of interest to professionals in the field of human resource management.

This book provides an end-to-end view of revenue management in the hospitality industry.  The book highlights the origins of hotel reservations systems and revenue management, challenges unique to hotels, revenue management models, new generation retailing, and personalization and steps required to remain competitive in the marketplace. This book is intended for practitioners to understand the basics and have a comprehensive view of the impacts of revenue management on product distribution, reservations, inventory control, including the latest advances in the field of attribute-based room pricing and inventory control.There are several aspects of revenue management that are not covered in books and journal articles such as hotel pricing, hotel fully allocated costs, content parity, impact of Online Travel Agencies on hotels, competitive revenue management and attribute-based room pricing and inventory control which represents the last frontier in hotel revenue management with intelligent retailing. Leveraging emerging technologies, such as Artificial Intelligence and Blockchain and the future state of revenue management, are also addressed.

This book describes the development of quality over various stages, from product inspection, through quality control to the present ISO 9000 systems. It also highlights the advantages of the quality management system (QMS) standards and the need for certification by organizations and enterprises/firms interested in taking advantage of the various benefits of these standards to improve their systems and aid their survival in a globally competitive market. The author provides simplified information to enable even those hearing the word ''quality'' for the first time to be able to appreciate and understand the various quality management philosophies irrespective of their background and position.

The COVID-19 pandemic has reminded us of how important the life science industry is, and compels us to find efficient management methods specific to the industry. Pharmaceuticals, drug and vaccine development labs, R&D labs, medical instrumentation, and tech companies, hygiene supply companies, medical distribution chains, all form an integral part of this industry. At the interface of scientific research, technology, innovation and management and embedded in regulatory and legal frameworks, life science management is still an under-researched field of practice and science. This edited volume addresses this research gap and offers a wide range of practical and theoretical contributions that provide insights into one of the most exciting industries. The book is primarily directed at practitioners and decision makers in the life science industry. Students and professionals of life science management at all levels as well as policy makers will find valuable insights and inspiration for their daily work and career development.

Fierce competition in many industries, megatrends, the COVID-19 pandemic, the ongoing globalisation and the permanent liberalisation of markets have changed the face of economies and businesses drastically. Companies must establish suitable and long-term strategies and performance criteria in order to survive in this dynamic and hostile environment. This book provides a holistic and practical approach to strategic performance management. It combines all functions of the value chain and contains best practices in performance. The author demonstrates how new paradigms enable companies to concentrate on value-adding activities and processes to achieve a long-term sustainable and competitive advantage. The book contains a variety of best practices, industry examples and case studies. Focusing on best-in-class examples, the book offers the ideal guide for any enterprise to achieve a competitive advantage across all business functions focusing on value-adding activities. 

This book examines human resource development (HRD) strategy as a learning process, connecting learning and adult development with organizational development and change, and talent development, with a particular focus on the use of artificial intelligence (AI). It provides professionals and practitioners as well as students with processes and tools that will help them meet the needs of employees and the organization. It takes a scholar-practitioner perspective connecting theory with practice. HRD has evolved into a mature field of scholarship in recent decades. At the same time, practices of learning and development in organizations continues to evolve dramatically. At the individual, developmental, and organizational levels, workers, managers, and executives have to be continually learning from current and emerging trends in order to strategically reposition themselves for performance and future possibilities. This includes developing the competencies to navigate the complexities of a world in which people are interacting with 'smart' digital technologies that are broadly grouped together under the umbrella term artificial intelligence (AI).  Featuring specific strategic learning methods and case studies from senior HRD professionals, this book is a valuable resource for managers, practitioners, students, scholars and others interested in strategic HRD practice.

The concepts for Industry 4.0 and the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) will fundamentally change supply chains, production processes and industries. Intelligent technologies such as IoT, edge and cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence and digital assistance systems are drivers of this change.  This book provides a comprehensive overview of IoT use cases with illustrative practical examples of how digitization or innovation projects can be successfully implemented. It takes into consideration that processes are getting more flexible and efficient, and new digital technologies allow seamless, location-independent communication in near real time between things, processes and people through the digitization of physical objects and processes. Considering these changes, the book provides a guideline on how companies should position themselves for the future with industrial IoT in order to still play a decisive role in the industry in a few years' time. The book is aimed at both decision-makers and practitioners who, on the one hand, recognize the opportunities and possibilities for their company and, on the other hand, want to learn how to use the appropriate technologies. With this in mind it will be valuable for entrepreneurs, managers, architects and also developers in the field of Industry 4.0.

Using site-specific optimization approaches in international manufacturing networks is increasingly proving insufficient. To solve this problem, several holistic and integrated alternatives have been developed to reflect a global perspective. This book presents advances in the St. Gallen Global Manufacturing Network Model and its application in numerous industry-, benchmarking- and research projects. The contents combine data-driven solutions with qualitative management frameworks for the strategic optimization of international manufacturing networks.In the first part, the book addresses the foundation of manufacturing network management and further describes the St. Gallen Operational Excellence approaches to manage plant performance. On this basis, the authors show how plant- and network-level performance can be enhanced via key improvement domains (e.g., strategy, configuration, coordination, performance management, digitalization). In turn, the second part demonstrates the application of the constructs in manufacturing companies from various industries. By combining research and practice, the book offers unique perspectives on the management of global production striving toward higher performance on manufacturing site and network level.

Adhering to the combination of theoretical introduction and practical case introduction, this book summarizes the basic concepts and methods in management and big data analysis at home and abroad and introduces a large number of relevant practical cases, especially new cases in the Internet era, to help readers integrate theoretical knowledge into practical applications. The chapters of this book are interrelated and independent of each other, making it easy for the reader to study in pieces or to delve deeper into a particular topic of interest. Covering an array of theories about management and big data at home and abroad, this book lays a solid foundation for being an authentic manager. It is organized into sections on decision-making, organization, leadership, control, innovation, and big data to fully dissect and summarize the basic concepts of these characters in management and to show the basic methods that managers can use to solve problems. Each section contains a large number of examples to demonstrate how entrepreneurs successfully manage their large companies and overcome the difficulties in the business, utilizing the corresponding management functions or big data technology. Further, in order to adapt to the development of the Internet era, this book also absorbs a lot of practice cases of management innovation and big data which have emerged in recent years based on advanced network platform and big data analysis. This book puts great emphasis on the innovative function of management, adding more comprehensive methods and more updated cases related to the Internet.

This book is a holistic impact study, replete with real-world examples, of digital transformation enhancing businesses and influencing managers' thinking. It links economic value with digital disruptions, arguing that these disruptions deliver economic benefits, boost shareholder value, and provide societal value. The central discourse is on the ability of digitization to make the world a better place to live in. The book analyses wealth creation due to digital disruption with a global span. It extensively incorporates anecdotal examples of disruptive digitization across countries, accentuating the impact of major digital disruptions. It is targeted at any professional interested in studying digitization's holistic impact. The book provides a discourse on digital topography to make business students industry-ready. Given the pervasive digital economy and a rapidly evolving business world, the book helps practicing managers better appreciate their digital environments. Management students who not only have to survive in this digital landscape but also thrive and chart out a lucrative career will benefit significantly from the book.

This book describes the neurology of a business as a new dimension of organization and as a basis for success in a complex world. Comparing organizations with living organisms, it places an organization¿s neurology (control and communication) as a third dimension beside its anatomy (structure) and physiology (process). Overlooked by classical organizational theory, this third dimension offsets its typical drawbacks.The Neurology of Business introduces Stafford Beer¿s Viable System Model (VSM) and shows how this helps managers to diagnose, discover, and unleash the potential and performance lying dormant in today¿s enterprises.The book is based on numerous consulting projects and management seminars conducted in Europe, America, and Asia. It guides the reader through the diagnosis and design process and illustrates application issues with practical examples. In this way, the book provides managers with the language needed to have meaningful conversations abouthow their organizations are functioning. As such, it will benefit managers in business and nonbusiness organizations, as well as readers interested in general management.

This book analyses several aspects of Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM), a form of hybrid public-private partnership (PPP) for development of roads sector in India. The book covers contractual, financing, taxation and accounting aspects of the HAM based PPP projects in India and provides a complete multi-dimensional view for readers. It is a comprehensive guide for multiple stakeholders involved in the development of infrastructure projects in developing economies across globe. The book is authored by professionals having hands-on advisory experience for HAM PPP projects in India. Given that these are long-term concession agreements (around 15 years), there are inherent complications and the authors have tried to provide clarity on practical issues. The book adopts a novel case-study approach. Based on detailed financial and commercial assumptions for a road project in India, the authors have used around 100 numerical illustrations to provide a quantitative and qualitative understanding for readers. Another highlight of the book is use of international case-studies to provide key learnings in areas of project preparation and structuring for such hybrid PPP models. The risk allocation framework is also contrasted with the HAM PPP model to highlight the key differences. The international case studies have been selected from transport and water sector to illustrate the applicability of hybrid PPPs across multiple sectors to support sustainable infrastructure development.The target audience for this book include private sector developers, government agencies, deal practitioners, advisors, researchers and academia . This book will also serve as a useful guide for commercial lenders, development finance institutions (DFIs) and institutional investors who are looking to finance such infrastructure projects in the long term.