Dumbest business decision of the decade

Leave a reply

The Swedish business paper “Dagens Industri” has listed ten candidates for the not so flattering distinction “dumbest business decisions of the decade” in Sweden. Stora Enso tops the list for the decision to acquire Consolidated Papers for EUR 4.9 billion in the year 2000.
Stora Enso’s CEO Jukka Härmälä and Chairman Claes Dahlbäck burned additional billions in restructuring the North American paper company, before finally divesting the remaining assets to NewPage for EUR 1 billion in 2007. The deal also comprised 19,9% of the shares, which recently became practically worthless.
On top of this, the duo sold Finnish and Swedish forest resources and hydropower assets, just before the booming of wood prices and cost of electricty.
The total loss for Stora Enso has been between EUR 5 and 7 billion according to the newspaper.

Sports beat Paper!

Leave a reply

Paper industry has lost almost its entire glow, the recent recession almost wiping out any remaining aura. Earlier on, even visiting groups of students were treated with good food and drink. Nowadays, they are often not even welcome since there are no resources to receive visiting groups, and if they are allowed on, a cup of coffee and a dry biscuit is enough.
Recently, Amer Sports (owner of Salomon, Wilson, Atomic) were proud to announce to new executives that they recruited from Stora Enso. Sports is today obviously much more attractive than paper.

Jussi Siitonen appointed Amer Sports Senior Vice President, Finance

Failing algorithm

Leave a reply

Amazon has prospered from their amazing algorithms that keep track of customer preferences. This way, they have been able to recommend books based on earlier buys and what other buyers of the same books have bought.
But today, I received a recommendation to buy two books that I already have bought from Amazon. It happens that I forget what I have bought – and even have read – but that can’t be part of Amazon’s algorithms – or…?

No newspapers on Amazon Kindle?

Leave a reply

Rupert Murdoch has indicated Newscorp will probably not publish with the Amazon Kindle device in the future. Amazon keeping what is thought to be 70% of the revenue is not a fair deal to him. The same attitude seems to hold for Australian Fairfax Media, who obviously is interested in the potential of Apple’s iTunes and iPhone. So where is the mobile news going?

Old media is dying…

Leave a reply

The classic oldtimer magazine Reader’s Digest is going bankrupt. Or maybe it is more correct to say that the Reader’s Digest Association is trying to survive after reaching an agreement with its creditors to reduce debt. So the magazine will maybe survive under bankruptcy protection. My father used to read the Swedish version of Reader’s Digest, and occassionally I spotted books from Reader’s Digest with other people in his generation. But this was long ago – who is actually reading their publications today?
Read more at Folio Magazine.

Rival logo illuminated through red wine

Illuminated logo

Leave a reply

Taken by surprise I had a glass of Italian red with a rock star at the Rival bar in Stockholm. He put his glass on the paper napkin, and to our amazement the printed logo was coloured red by a spotlight shining through the wine in the glass. One chance in a million to get the right conditions for this?

 

Victory of “Dead-Tree” Communication

Leave a reply

According to a recent report in Knowledge@Wharton, marketing in print is so much more effective than in digital media. Actually, it is the print that drives the traffic to the web sites! The findings were supported by several comments to the article.

The report was also referred to in the Print CEO Blog, again with a supportive comment about the positive effect of combining blogging and print advertising.

Digital media are overrated!

Leave a reply

An IT researcher at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology (HIIT) told me that the digital media as web and e-mail are overrated. Paper and print ar often superior. But we are lacking (simple) tools to create printed products (user-generated print media). Unfortunately, there is no actor that takes this really seriously. The digital media industry just don’t get it with paper media. The paper industry has as always its focus on the large paper mills, with hundreds of thousands of tonnes that are “allocated” to different markets. The graphic industry is fully occupied with becoming certified printers according to the ISO 12647 standard.

Who will take the first step?

Read Risto Sarvas post here:
The industry must show both consumers and businesses that paper is often far superior to digital alternatives. Finally, the industry must accept new design and business perspectives such as human-centric design and user-generated content.

What is innovativeness?

Leave a reply

I asked Rolf Jensen (of Dream Company):

What do we actually mean with INNOVATIVENESS?
Can it at all be measured?
What does it take to define a person, a group, a company or a region (city/country) as truly innovative?

Rolf Jensen answered:

Dear Petter Kolseth,
Innovation is used in a lot of ways, I do not believe we can measure it. To me an innovative person/company is one that can put together things or ideas – that other people haven’t thought about. My favourite quote just now is this: “Unless, there is a consensus that it is nonsense what you are doing, it is not a breakthrough” (by Burt Rutan, the guy with SpaceShipOne)

Can an old company turn modern?

Leave a reply

I read Gary Hamel’s new book The Future of Management with enthusiasm and frustration. He sets the tone already in the preface with the following statement:

Most companies have a roughly similar management hierarchy (a cascade of EVPs, SVPs, and VPs). They have analogous control systems, HR practices and planning rituals, and rely on comparable reporting structures and review systems. That’s why it’s so easy for a CEO to jump from one company to another…

His main message (to me) is about utilising the collective power of the organisation in all decision making, which calls for openness and a lot of lateral communication. Unfortunately, lateral communication is too often blocked by hierarchical structures.

Maybe I am a “romantic” (just as Gary Hamel?) who is so inspired by the book that I want to begin a crusade against 19th century management principles. Would it not be fantastic if one of the many dinosaur companies could change?

Watch an excerpt from a speech by Gary:
Continuous Management Innovation: What, Why and How?