Business Success - Two Things to Do and One Thing Not to Do

         As one of the last students probably to submit this posting, I do not beg pity or claim complete unintended procrastination. However, as a measure of guiltless, last-minute posting I plead that this minor delinquency is in fact related the the greater altruism of the class blog posts as a whole. Further, I did this act as a way in which I could read the feedback of the other students remarks and create a post that would hopefully better the good of the group and contribute to the collective efficacy within our class.

As a part business major, I decided to pursue the correlations Sampson draws in his chapter "Social Altruism, Cynicism, and the 'Good Community' of collective efficacy, altruistic character and the moral/legal cynycism to the wellbeing of communities. Specifically, I wanted to target in on the positive impact a business can have, a.k.a. altruism, on the world. To expound, I wanted to be able to prove locally and corporately, that business if pursued ethically, legally, and morally and following an altruistic bushiness model could indeed create a highly successful business venture. Not only financially but also creating a social impact that could be life-changing.

Sampson pulls data from two experiments in the chapter and both support the the facts that the more collective efficacy and altruistic character that are present in a community the better it's wellbeing. The third interesting discovery came by way of the greater the presence of the moral or legal cynicism in the community the lower the community wellbeing. See the figure from Sampson's text,  (232).

Because we can pull these distinctions from these neighborhood groups we can also correlate these findings towards a business model's success. If we think of the business as a whole similar to that of a community. Namely, that if the presence of collective efficacy and altruistic character are in high levels, and in contrast if moral and legal cynicism are in short supply, then the business should therefore succeed and have a "durable structure" as Sampson discovered (221).

Examples of these business models where collective efficacy and altruistic tendencies are in abundance, are Starbucks, Tom's, and Land Over Yonder. I'll highlight these companies starting with the largest of the three companies. 

Starbucks, as we all know sells a lot of coffee. In 2011, a study performed by The Chronicle of Philanthropy found that Starbuck's gave away $30.5 million dollars in pre-tax profits (Forbes, "American Companies That Give Back the Most"). That same year they grossed $11.5 billion dollars yet they still gave away 2.1% of their pre-tax dollars to charitable donations (Starbucks Corporation, "Fiscal 2011 Annual Report"). Out of 300 top U.S. companies reviewed, Starbucks was in the Top 10. Is it any relation that their main goal at becoming a responsible company is this; 

"At Starbucks, we have always believed in the importance of building a great, 

enduring company that strikes a balance 

between profitability and a social conscience." 

(Starbucks, Starbucks Company Profile Sept. 2013.)

Starbucks is a model child to build a business after if you do indeed want to give back to the greater good and make a billion or $10 billion dollars. 

To highlight a second company that has achieved wild success by jumping on the collective efficacy and social altruism bus is a company you may have heard of called Tom's. Tom's is best known for giving away a pair of shoes for every shoe that is purchased. Their slogan is, "One for One." Since 2006, the company's founding date, Tom's has donated over 10 million pairs of shoes (Toms, Giving Report 2013). Spanning over 60 countries, Tom's is leaving their mark and without a doubt benefitting the greater good of the communities they donate shoes to. 

The final company I would like to highlight is a local company based right here in St. George, Utah. A company that is also founded on principles of benefitting the "common good". Land Over Yonder is one such example. LOY, gives school uniforms to children in developing countries. With use of their sales profit, donations from LOY are able to ultimately facilitate education. In certain developing countries without school uniforms students aren't allowed to attend public schools. Their slogan is "Look Good, Do Good." In 2013 so far, they have been able to help 25 students receive school uniforms (Land Over Yonder, Mission). As a new company I hope their business model follow's the hard evidence of Sampson so they can benefit from a successful company that will in turn benefit the greater humanity of this earth. 

All things considered, it is heartbreakingly obvious that by increasing the presence of cynicism and lowering the presence of both collective efficacy and community altruism that yes, indeed, your company will most likely fail (take Enron for example). The companies showcased above namely Starbucks, Tom's, and Land Over Yonder have taken the opposite path. They will continue to see sweeping success by continuing to give back and keep in mind three important factors. They are as follows, first, focus on the collective efficacy of the business, remember who keeps you alive (Hint, hint: others). Secondly, polish your altruism and keep that as guiding star. Lastly, do not associate with any type of cynical or selfish entity. 

In the wise words of the billion-dollar company Starbuck's, 

"an enduring company strikes a balance between profitability and a social conscience."

Sources:

Sampson, Robert. Great American City: Chicago and the Enduring Neighborhood Effect. Chicago:          The University of Chicago Press, 2012. Print. 

"American Companies That Give Back the Most". Forbes. The Chronicle of Philanthropy. n.d. Web. 30 September 2013. 

"Starbucks Company Profile". Starbucks. September 2013. Web. 30 September 2013. 

"Fiscal 2011 Annual Report". Starbucks. September 2011. Web. 30 September 2013. 

"Giving Report". Toms. 2013. Web. 30 September 2013. 

"Our Mission". Land Over Yonder. n.d. Web. 30 September 2013. 

Collective Efficacy Theory - Chicago vs. Adventure Racing

Collective Efficacy Theory is a social cohesion for shared and controlled expectations by a group or community. It is their social organization shared together that can control or effect directly an outcome or expectation. This definition proves largely concrete and repeatable throughout it's testing.
One such experiment was done in an Adventure Racing scene. The Adventure Racing team tested in the experiment I read about consisted of three person teams. All of the teams that competed in this particular race participated in the experiment. Their findings were outstanding and are summarized here,

"Consistent with the theoretical concept, the results of the study indicated a moderate to strong positive relationship between perceptions of collective efficacy and subsequent performance at each CP (checkpoint) and throughout the race. The findings provide some support for the structure and relationship defined by the theoretical concept (of Collective Efficacy). That is, a reciprocal relationship exists between col- lective efficacy and performance (Myers et al., 2004; Watson et al., 2001)."

So to reiterate the point of their findings, the higher or more prevalent the collective efficacy of the team the higher or better performance was found. Those teams who showcased high levels of Collective Efficacy performed the best in the race. 

As far as answering the questions posed by Sampson, here are my responses below (I will be answering the questions on a 1-5 scale. 1 being least likely to to action and 5 meaning extremely likely to take action.):

1.  The likelihood of my neighborhood taking action if children on a street corner were hanging out and skipping school would be a 4. 
2. The likelihood of my neighborhood taking action if children are spray-painting a graffiti on a local building would be a 5. 
3. The likelihood of my neighborhood taking action if children were showing disrespect to an adult would be 3.
4.  The likelihood of my neighborhood taking action if a  fight broke out in forms of their house would be a 5.
5.  The likelihood of my neighborhood taking action if the fire station closest to home was threatened with budget cuts would be a 3. 

All things considered after answering these questions myself, I feel my neighborhood has a medium to high presence of collective efficacy. I do feel safe and have a high confidence level that if the situations above were to occur or if a serious crime took place in my neighborhood the probability for action to be taken would be very high! 

Reference to Adventure Racing here - http://sgr.sagepub.com/content/40/2/163.full.pdf+html

"Real Communites" - Are they or Aren't they? - Second Blog Response

The importance of place in a neighborhood is highly important as Sampson suggests, however the globalization and correlations of this "neighborhood effect" showcase a common theme that could be happening in cities everywhere. On a different note, Sampson sheds light to an alternative ideal showcasing that "placelessness"is appearing as well. He provides facts to both sides and then presents us with his findings of what he has researched in Chicago and the similarities throughout other neighborhoods in the world.

I have recently moved to a home a couple blocks from the apartment I lived at previously. The home I live in now actually feels like a home. I have a sense of security and feel safe. It's the same feeling I had growing up in my small farming hometown. It's great, it really is. In contrast, at the apartment I lived at before this home, I didn't have those same feelings of place, so to speak. The feelings of "placelessness" were more present and I didn't have a non-spatial community to relate to as some social-network theorists have shown can cross-cut geographic ones. Why, since I have moved, is the feeling place suddenly there? Why do I feel place when I only moved 4 blocks away?

My thinking to the above posed questions is somewhat vague as I largely don't know why there is such a difference. I feel some major factors in the feeling of place is a psychological association with the word "home". I live in a home now. That phrase rings deep psychologically and I believe connects neurons in my brain to the feelings of security, safety and love which I have mentioned earlier. The feeling of being "home" (assuming home has a positive definition), means to me a feeling of place. I associate home as a place where I feel connected and accepted. Although, I do live next to many strangers (neighbors I haven't introduced myself to yet) I still feel a sense of place.

This may stem from a belongingness to my work and school environment where I spend most of my time in the day. It is indeed interesting insight as to how I feel connected yet spend very little time at my home. I feel that work and school are to me other real communities and also, I feel I belong to a group somewhere out there in cyberspace to a group of creative bohemian photographers. :) This group is where I passionately belong and feel the most connected. Oddly enough, this connectedness is largely internet-based and has little face to face real-world interaction. It taps into the irony Sampson states that the "implication of the decline of community" and that it is dying due to technology and "globalization" yet it has been a "longstanding narrative of public intellectuals and scholarly pundits preaching the places - especially as instantiated in neighborhoods and community."

Stories from those intellectuals and pundits tells us we just might be doomed as our "community is dying", however the historic event of this occurring over and over seems to be a wolf cry. I'm not saying we are becoming more connected or less connected, I'm trying to push the notion that we may be seeing a revolution of community to a more non-spatial community that cross-cuts geographical boundaries. I am simply following the layout of Sampson and playing cards from both sides to shed light on the interesting events happening in community here and there.