The Strategy of the World's Largest Producer of Bearings Case Study - 10

The Strategy of the World's Largest Producer of Bearings - Case Study Example SKF has been contacted by ITC, its major distributor in the United States in order to participate in a reverse auction by Steelcorps, one of SKF's customers through ITC. The process of procurement will award the lowest bid in terms of price for the raw materials that Steelcorp needs, and with SKF as its major supplier of bearings during the past couple of years, the latter is expected to join the reverse auction.Answering the invitation and participating in the reverse auction is not an easy choice to make for the executives of SKF, however. The executives are on a crossroad between two major decisions: to join or not to join the reverse auction.If SKF joins the reverse auction, it signals the whole industry about the change in its value proposition, which is to deliver excellent services at a premium – a more for more strategy in the value proposition matrix (Fathy & Smithee 1999). If it joins the reverse auction where the winner will be determined based on the lowest price o f the bid, the company becomes inconsistent with its strategy and it blurs what its brand stands for; this is one of the considerations. On the other hand, Steelcorp is one of the company's major source of revenues through ITC, its biggest distributor in the US. ITC relies on SKF with the latter's high mark up an allowance for ITC, as ITC needs the profit margins from the SKF sales to Steelcorp in order to boost its profitability. Because of the recession, SKF's revenue targets are 5% lower than the previous year; dropping the Steelcorp reverse auction will also substantially affect its profitability for the current year. These are the complications.

Compare and contrast binet and simons approach to measuring Essay

Compare and contrast binet and simons approach to measuring intelligence with that of sternberg - Essay Example In 1905, Binet and Simon devised one of the first tests of measuring intelligence in French children. The test was carried out in order to detect French children that were likely to face difficulties in their studies so that these children could receive special education. Binet and Simon developed tests that assessed each child’s intelligence. As a result of these tests, Binet and Simon discovered that tests of memory, practical skills, puzzle solving skills and vocabulary tests were better at predicting the level of intelligence in school children than the simple sensory tests that was previously used (Binet & Simon, 1916). In the approach employed by Binet and Simon to measuring intelligence in children, children were instructed to perform certain tasks; such as defining abstract terms, defining common words, spotting the differences between two objects, recognising objects in pictures, repeating spoken digits and following simple commands and gestures. Sternberg on his own part proposed an alternative, cognitive-components approach to measuring intelligence (1977); he posited that the level of intelligence of an individual could be measured in terms of a data-analysis component that constitutes some form of multifaceted analysis such as deductive reasoning and logical inference. He used this data and statistical analysis technique to disintegrate mental task performance into its fundamental constituents. Binet and Simon invented what is generally known as the Binet-Simon scale, which encompassed a series of tasks that they thought typically represented the intellectual competencies of the children at different ages. They tested their measurement on a sample of fifty children that were divided into five age groups; each group comprised ten children believed to be averagely intelligent. The main aim of the Binet-Simon scale was to compare the mental abilities of some children to those of their