Knowledge at Wharton

Just how bad will the economy get? For employers facing tough decisions about layoffs the question is far from rhetorical. If the current economic turmoil is contained sooner than expected premature layoffs could be a disaster. If not enough employees are laid off and the recession continues the company’s bottom line could suffer. What options do employers have when it comes to cutting payroll wit...

Before the stock market and the broader economy can return to something that looks like normal banks must start to lend the billions they are getting from the U.S. Treasury’s Troubled Asset Recovery Program says Wharton finance professor Jeremy Siegel. In an interview with Knowledge at Wharton he also discusses the government’s rescue of Citigroup and the proposed bailout of the U.S. auto industry...

With corporate managers under enormous pressure to control costs and maintain liquidity in the current credit crisis advertising budgets often appear to be a dispensable luxury in the struggle to survive. According to Wharton faculty and marketing experts that attitude can result in short-term gains but long-term trouble. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Although companies around the world are clearly feeling the impact of the economic crisis Coca-Cola CEO Muhtar Kent insists that he will remain focused on moving the company toward an ambitious goal: Increasing global annual revenues for the firm and its more than 300 independent bottlers from $650 billion now to more than $1 trillion by 2020. During a recent Wharton Leadership Lecture Kent talked...

At a time when many bulge bracket investment banks are drowning as a result of the financial crisis Moelis & Co. is swimming against the tide. Founded in July 2007 by Kenneth D. Moelis a Wall Street veteran the Los Angeles-based firm has been busy hiring. In just about 15 months it has recruited more than 150 people including some 100 bankers besides opening offices in Chicago New York and Bos...

Jim Smith and Vikrant Kothari each had ambitions to start a company whose focus would be on using information technology as a way to help solve social problems. But it wasn’t until they met in Wharton’s MBA Program for Executives that their idea came together in the form of the Digital Network Group. Two affiliates under the Digital Network Group umbrella include one targeted to helping non-profit...

Change is the new status-quo and success at work will require agility talent and the ability to learn from -- rather than fear -- failure according to Gregory Shea adjunct professor of management at Wharton and business writer Robert Gunther. The two recently co-authored a book titled Your Job Survival Guide a Manual for Thriving in Change. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informati...

How will the U.S. pay for its plans to prop up the financial sector? Answer: by borrowing -- raising worries about how the country’s ballooning annual budget deficits and aggregating debt will affect the economy and financial markets. Some guidelines such as interest rates and the ratio of debt and deficits to gross domestic product suggest the new debt will be digested easily. But some experts th...

As Wall Street unravels and the economy confronts its crucial holiday spending season consumers cannot be expected to prop up retailers as they have in past downturns. Even luxury stores whose customers have been immune in recent years to retail price sticker shock are expected to take a hit this time according to Wharton faculty and consumer analysts. As one commentator notes: ”It will be a lean...

While discussion at the recent Erin Anderson B2B Research Conference at Wharton focused on cutting-edge research in the field of business-to-business relationships participants also acknowledged the impact on marketers of the ongoing financial meltdown. Along those lines three university professors and a moderator took part in a panel that analyzed the effect of the economic downturn on the B2B gl...

As the financial crisis continues to roil credit and stock markets around the globe it seems that no country or continent is being spared the consequences. Brazil Russia India and China -- the BRIC countries -- are no exception. In this Knowledge at Wharton podcast Shiv Khemka vice chairman of SUN Group based in London New Delhi and Moscow; Silas K.F. Chou president and CEO of Novel Holdings based...

In merger-and-acquisition advice an investment bank’s market share does not seem to equate with value delivered to clients two scholars from Wharton and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology conclude in a research paper. Indeed the opposite may be true: The more market share an investment bank has the less value it will deliver to clients. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more inform...

A ”Fiscal Wake Up Tour” is warning voters that today’s financial crisis is a mere ripple compared to the tsunami that will wash over the U.S. Treasury as millions of Baby Boomers demand what they have been promised by Social Security and Medicare. The tour sponsored in part by Wharton’s Business and Public Policy Department was organized by a bipartisan coalition concerned about the unchecked grow...

With stock markets in free fall U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson announced on Tuesday that the government’s effort to unlock credit markets would include direct investments of $250 billion in bank equities. He also warned bankers not to hoard the money but to use it to make the loans that lubricate the nation’s economy. In separate interviews Wharton finance professors Richard Marston and Jer...

European wind-power firms see an opportunity in the United States’ increasing interest in alternative energy. Indeed the inroads that electricity-generating wind turbine technology has made in the U.S. are due in large part to the efforts of companies based in Europe. Gamesa Siemens and others ply their expertise in a country where public policy has not consistently encouraged domestic investment....

Executives who hone their skills at the helm of private companies tend to be more driven more bottom line-oriented and have much more flexibility than CEOs at publicly owned companies who are constrained by their need to balance multiple objectives in a corporate ecosystem. That was the consensus of four panelists who discussed the management challenges at private equity-backed firms during the re...

As officials worldwide scrambled to contain the spreading financial virus hopes are rising that the latest government plans to purchase equity stakes in banks may finally offer the right medicine. And with the patient showing intermittent signs of improving thoughts turn towards next steps including new restrictions on the markets. In addition expect individuals and business to have a tougher time...

Nancy Mahon doesn’t consider herself a glamour girl but she believes in the power of lipstick -- Viva Glam shades 5 and 6 in particular. Mahon is a senior vice president of MAC Cosmetics and executive director of the MAC AIDS fund which last year donated $20 million to programs in 57 countries. During a recent Wharton Leadership Lecture Mahon offered her perspective on what it takes to launch and...

Despite the rash of bad economic news the recent 11th annual Wharton Investment Management Conference offered its audience some hope for relief or at least a few possible bargains in selected industries. And while no one -- including keynote speaker David McCormick undersecretary of the U.S. Treasury -- felt the crisis would be over anytime soon some still found reasons to be optimistic. Said one...

Ann Taylor Stores -- a New York-based retailer of upscale women’s clothing -- is using a new computer scheduling system that assigns the busiest and most desirable hours to employees with the strongest sales numbers. Those with less success on the selling floor get far fewer and less desirable hours when new schedules are posted. While systems like these can help improve productivity Wharton facul...

The new president’s job says one Wharton professor ”will be as hard as any job any person has ever had.” For the 44th president of the United States extraordinary managerial and cognitive abilities will be needed to tackle unprecedented challenges including wars being waged in two countries and a financial system on the verge of collapse. Wharton and University of Pennsylvania faculty members offe...

Dreamworks Animation CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg called the latest 3D movie technology ”the greatest innovation to occur in the movie business in 70 years.” A bevy of theater chains are exploring or installing digital cinema and 3D systems in the second half of 2008 into 2009. Intel and others are creating tools for companies to make a new generation of 3D animation films. Experts at Wharton say 3D mov...

Here’s a piece of advice: Don’t read this story if you have just had a fight with your spouse or a co-worker. You will probably ignore it despite its grounding in solid academic research. At least that’s what Maurice Schweitzer a Wharton professor of operations and information management would suggest. In a recent co-authored paper he shows that emotions not only influence people’s receptiveness t...

Is water the new oil? The answer is yes according to a number of economists business leaders scientists and geopolitical strategists who argue that it’s time to stop taking for granted the substance that covers 70% of the planet and makes up a similar proportion of the human body. Just as the late 20th century saw an oil shock the early 21st century may feature a water shock where scarcity leads t...

According to Hal Sirkin senior partner and managing director at The Boston Consulting Group ”The age of globalization is over.” In its place is a new reality that Sirkin and BCG colleagues Jim Hemerling and Arindam Bhattacharya define in their recently published book GLOBALITY: Competing with Everyone from Everywhere for Everything. In an interview with Knowledge at Wharton Sirkin describes how ra...