What is Procter & Gamble’s business strategy? What is the relationship of collaboration and innovation to that business strategy?
The present strategy of Procter & Gamble (P&G) is related to three major goals. In particular, the company strives to maintain the popularity of its current brands (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 71). Secondly, the managers emphasize the need to introduce new products under existing brands. Finally, they focus on the creation of new brands (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 71). Collaboration and innovation are critical for the successful implementation of this strategy. For example, one can speak about the cooperation of such professionals as marketers, researchers, business administrators, or other professionals involved in product development, manufacturing, or marketing. Moreover, this approach can be efficient if the company can introduce innovative products on a regular basis. Overall, this strategy enables P&G to withstand competition and increase its market share.
How is P&G using collaboration systems to execute its business model and business strategy? List and describe the collaboration systems and technologies it is using and the benefits of each.
Currently, this company uses several collaboration systems in order to foster information sharing within this organization. Secondly, this company adopts various technological solutions to improve the process of product development. It is possible to speak about various collaboration systems. For example, one can mention such an application as Teamcenter. This software enables employees to share 3D product data with one another (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 72). The main benefit of this tool is that it involves a greater number of workers in the development of a product. Additionally, this company uses Cisco TelePresence, which is helpful for holding high-definition meetings of people who may be located in different parts of the globe (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 72). This technology facilitates decision-making and reduces travel expenditures. Apart from that, the company adopts various applications developed by Microsoft. In particular, one should mention Outlook and SharePoint. These tools are necessary for such activities as instant messaging and task management. To a great extent, these applications facilitate the flow of data across various departments or divisions.
What problems do collaboration systems solve for P&G?
Collaboration systems have helped P&G address different problems. For example, in the past, some business executives could not integrate discussions or reports into a single document (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 72). In particular, one of the managers had to type quantitative data into a PowerPoint slide, while another had to enter the results of various experiments into Microsoft Word Documents. Moreover, in many cases, employees could not properly communicate their ideas to colleagues because they could rely only on email. Furthermore, it was often difficult for managers and employees to search for information that was stored in a digital form. In turn, various technologies proved helpful for overcoming these challenges.
Why were some collaborative technologies slow to catch on at P&G?
It should be mentioned that some of the new technologies did not become popular among employees at once. For example, many employees did not want to apply new communication tools because since they were accustomed to using emails (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 71). To some degree, these people believed that they would have to spend much time and effort to adjust to new software, but the results would be the same. This is one of the difficulties that the company encountered. Moreover, the efficiency of many collaboration systems could be fully demonstrated only at the point when they were used by a great number of employees. So, when workers saw the benefits of these tools, they became more willing to use them.
Compare P&G’s old and new processes for writing up and distributing the results of a research experiment.
Before the adoption of new technologies, many researchers had to write up the results of their experiments with the help of Microsoft Office applications. Secondly, they needed to print these results out and “glue them page by page into notebooks” (Laudon & Laudon, 2012, p. 71). Currently, researchers use such a tool as InnovationNet that contains millions of documents related to experiments. Therefore, these studies become more accessible to various employees of P&G. Moreover; they often use SharePoint pages that can integrate different types of data.
Why would telepresence be such a useful collaborative tool for a company like P&G?
Telepresence communication tools are helpful for corporations like P&G because this organization consists of numerous divisions or departments that can be located in different parts of the world. Under such circumstances, communication via email or telephone may not be sufficient for discussing some important decisions or urgent problems. Additionally, companies have to incur significant expenditures that are related to travel and lodging. In turn, the Cisco TelePresence helps the company cut these expenditures. Furthermore, this tool reduces the amount of time which is spent on traveling.
Can you think of other ways P&G could use collaboration to foster innovation?
There are several strategies that can assist the management of P&G in promoting innovation. For example, they can organize regular online or telepresence conferences during which scientists, who may be located in different parts of the world, can speak about the projects that they are working on. In my opinion, these researchers can express ideas that complement one another. Moreover, these people may work on similar tasks that can be viewed as a single project. Thus, by joining their efforts, they can better develop new products. Moreover, P&G can use voice-over-IP technologies such as Skype in order to foster communication between scientists employed by the company. This tool is helpful because it supports the transfer of voice, data, or video. From my viewpoint, this application can facilitate communication between research departments.
Reference List
Laudon, K., & Laudon, P. (2012). Essentials of management information systems (10th ed.). Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, Inc.