Work - Life Balance

A few months ago my friend was leaving for the day, about 2 hours late, and getting ready to head home. She popped her head in to her boss's office to say good-bye and he said, "what, leaving already?" To that she responded, "yep, it's been a long day, it's all about work-life balance." He replied, "are you sure it's not LIFE-work balance?" in a bit of a sarcastic tone. He said, "If you want to make senior (tax accountant), sometimes you need to put your career first."

Once home, she decided to tell her mom about the situation. Her mom replied, "you need to put your family and friends and yourself first or you'll never be happy.

Hearing the conflicting advice between two important people in life is confusing. Now, I don't have children yet, as I am certain that brings a whole new ball into this juggling act. How do you prioritize your goals in life? Is it more important to work hard, especially for those with a high achievement orientation, to get that promotion, or to work just hard enough to get your paycheck and spend time with your friends and family?

Find out if you are considered a workaholic by taking this quiz.

You Own Your Own Development

In response to some of the comments posted, I have some follow up answers. I began my journey with Target in the summer of 2007 with an internship at a store in Pittsburgh. The internship was essentially a 12 week long interview which turned out really well and led to an advanced internship during the fall of 2008. During my last semester at Pitt I did another internship at a different store in Pittsburgh and also acted as the Campus Liason for Target and Pitt and participated in many recruitent activities. Upon graduation in December I started my 6 week "business college" training and asked about any potential opportunties in the Lehigh Valley where Matt and my families were. I spent about a year at Stroudsburg as the ETL-Guest Experience, and was then transferred to Quakertown this past April.

You own your own development. That's a phrase you will commonly hear at Target. If you have the ambition and drive to get to the next level, Target will help get you there. It's most common to stay within your own store when moving from a team member to specialist to team lead position. When moving from a team lead to a salaried executive position it's usually best to move to a near store. The great thing about Target is the that there are so many stores in the district you have many opportunties for development and promotion without having to move to a new state. There are so many tools and resources to help you own your own development. Every month you re-evaluate your accomplishments from the month before and address your areas of opportunties. You choose new challenges to work on problem areas in your workcenter, the store, or your team and choose activities that will address these problems and continue to develop your leadership by focusing on your own personal strengths and opportunities.

I am excited that I am working on my own development while addressing challenges at the Quakertown store. I am also stretching my leadership by assuming new captainships and responsibilities like inventory captain and recruiting captain. I hope to have my own store by this time next year!

Expect More. Pay Less

Hi everyone!

My name is Jessica. This is my 4th semester in the Kutztown MBA program. I graduated from the University of Pittsburgh in 2008 with a BSBA in Finance and Marketing, a minor in economics and an International Business Certificate. I got married this past summer to my amazing husband Matt!

While at Pitt I studied abroad in China and interned at Fedex and at Target. I started with Target full time after graduation. I currently work as an Executive team Leader, much like as assistant manager. I also happen to be the recruiting captain for Kutztown. If anyone is interested in learning more about a career at Target please let me know. You can also check out our website. We are holding mock interviews on campus the last week in september, as well as an internship fair on October 20th and an information session on October 27th. Come and check us out!

Abstract: Corporate Social Responsibility: The New Competitive Advantage

One of the major challenges that managers face today in order to be competitive is the growing demand for corporate social responsibility. Most businesses compete on efficiency, price, or the level of quality or service as their competitive advantage. The purpose of this paper is to show that managers can think strategically and utilize corporate social responsibility (CSR) as a new source of competitive advantage to ensure long-term business competitiveness and success.

There are many aspects to CSR that managers can act on to gain a competitive advantage. The most common being philanthropic and environmental sustainability will be developed further in this paper. However there are several other aspects to CSR including a commitment to diversity, business ethics, legal, and economic. These components of CSR are necessary for companies to build a positive reputation and will help managers realize several benefits including better access to human and intellectual capital with diversity in the workplace, better access to financial capital and a corporate identity that others trust by building ethics into the corporate culture, and increased shareholder value and increased revenue by maximizing shareholder wealth with economic CSR. These benefits, as well as others such as strategic branding and operational efficiency can be achieved through philanthropic and environmental CSR.

Another form of philanthropic CSR that can yield a competitive advantage is cause related marketing. Cause related marketing is a form of marketing which partners a corporation with a non-profit for a mutual benefit relationship. There are several corporations and non-profits that have utilized cause related marketing such as Yoplait and Susan G. Komen, Mariott and March of Dimes, and of course the largest cause related marketing program Product Red with companies such as Motorola, Apple and the Gap. Environmental sustainability is the final major portion of CSR that managers can utilize to create a competitive advantage. Managers in business, government, and non-profit organizations need to understand how their business affects the environment and how to balance the needs of maximizing profit with those of the environment.

In conclusion, the term corporate social responsibility involves many aspects of business and is defined different ways by different people. Simply, it’s how a business decides to do what they think is right. It may be what’s right for society, by having a diverse workforce that allows their business to capitalize on the potential human and intellectual capital that’s available. It may be what the business feels is ethically and legally right. They may express their decisions in a code of conduct that all employees are expected to work by. When many hear the term ‘corporate social responsibility’ they immediately think of companies donating large amounts of their profits to various philanthropies, a way of sharing the wealth. While this may be true in some cases, businesses don’t need to just donate large sums at random. In fact, they can donate to their advantage by effectively marketing their donations, choosing a few causes to get more involved in, or sharing in the profits through cause-related marketing. A growing trend for businesses today is becoming environmentally sustainable as a form of doing the right thing.

Marketing the New Green

Just read an interesting article: "MARKETING THE NEW GREEN: Companies should be rightfully proud of their environmental improvements. So why can't they market those achievements without seeming mercenary?" by Jessica Tsai.

Some major points from the article:

-The reality is that, among existing companies, green processes are usually just a byproduct of cost-saving or efficiency- improving projects.

-In 2008, Acutate began seriously considering ‘going green’ and put Seema Haiiji, senior product marketing manager in charge of the initiative. Haiiji developed the Acutate Sustainabllity Management report, which includes interactive dashboards, sustainability scorecards, and strategy maps to help companies measure overall employee satisfaction, environ- mental impact, access to training and education, and community engagement

Top 6 trends in going green:

• o Integrating green initiatives into every aspect of the organization
• o Using ecolabels and ecologos on products or marketing materials
• o Engaging customers in green marketing
• o Adopting a lifecycle approach
• o Shifting to the online space
• o Asking and respecting customer choices and preferences

Many companies realize that going green is not only emerging as a huge competitive advantage but as a way to cut energy costs and improve brand image. Managers in business, government, and non-profit organizations need to understand how their business affects the environment and how to balance the needs of maximizing profit with those of the environment. The trend of going green is becoming very popular as businesses begin making improvements as little as adding recycling bins and changing window shades to major changes in the ways they do their business. Some businesses will take advantage of this trend and promote their efforts dubiously through green washing. However, with resources available on the Internet, consumers are privy to immense amounts of information and cannot be fooled as easily as before.

Marketing the New Green

Scoop it Forward

Recently Target and Ben and Jerry's partnered together to launch a new volunteering initiative. You can check out this website to find somewhere in your community to volunteer. Then receive a coupon to get your FREE ice cream at your local Target. Ben and Jerry's has 2 target exclusive flavors, cleverly named "Brownie Chew Gooder" and "Berry Voluntary."

This is a great partnership between Target and Ben and Jerry's. This initiative flows nicely with both company's mission statements and CSR activities. It seems like a win-win collaboration for both companies. The coupons help to get customers (or guests as we call them) into the store where they end up purchasing even more stuff. Both companies build a better brand image and market the fact that they are involved in the community.

I scream you scream we all scream for ice cream!