Q&A Hero

Q: Research has failed to find a positive relationship between mission statements and organizational performance.

Q: Simply having a code of ethics A) will ensure ethical business behavior. B) eliminates the need for periodic ethics workshops. C) is all that is necessary to sensitize people to workplace circumstances in which ethics issues may arise. D) is insufficient to guarantee that employees behave in an ethical manner. E) secures an ethics culture in the workplace.

Q: One R&D strategy is to be an innovative imitator of successful products.

Q: Cash Cows represent the organization's best long-run opportunities for growth and profitability.

Q: One aspect of ads in a recession is that they generally take more direct aim at competitors.

Q: According to King and Cleland, carefully developed and written mission statements ensure unanimity of purpose within the organization.

Q: A code of business ethics is A) a document that provides behavioral guidelines that cover daily activities and decisions within an organization. B) concerned with what responsibilities the firm has to employees, consumers, environmentalists, minorities, communities, and other groups. C) a report that reveals how the firm's operations impact the natural environment. D) a set of strict regulations requiring firms to conserve energy. E) a series of voluntary standards in the environmental field.

Q: A major effort in R&D may be very risky if technology is changing rapidly and the market is growing slowly.

Q: Stars, Question Marks, Cash Cows, and Dogs are the four quadrants exhibited by the SPACE Matrix.

Q: Total advertising expenditures in the U.S. in 2011 is expected to be down 2.5 percent from the prior year.

Q: According to Campbell and Yeung, an organization's vision is associated with behavior and with the present.

Q: Unethical activities that plague online commerce include all of the following EXCEPT A) inappropriate gifts B) spreading viruses C) identity theft D) internet fraud E) hacking into company computers

Q: R&D policies can enhance strategy implementation efforts to emphasize product or process improvements.

Q: In a BCG Matrix the pie slice indicates the proportion of corporate profits generated by that division.

Q: During the 2011 Super Bowl, a 30-second advertisement cost between $2.8 and $3 million.

Q: According to Campbell and Yeung, the process of developing a mission statement should create an "emotional bond" and "sense of mission" between the organization and its employees.

Q: Which of the following business actions is considered to be unethical? A) Satisfactory product or service safety B) Selling products in foreign markets C) Providing equal opportunities for women and minorities D) Filing expense accounts E) Misleading labeling

Q: According to research, the most successful new product companies use a research and development strategy that ties internal strengths to external opportunities and is linked with objectives.

Q: The size of the circle in a BCG Matrix corresponds to the proportion of corporate revenue generated by that business unit.

Q: A new trend with regard to advertising products or services on the Internet is to base advertising rates solely on sales rates.

Q: The first step in the process of developing a mission statement is to ask all participants to prepare what they believe the organization's mission should be.

Q: All of the following business actions are considered to be unethical EXCEPT A) moving jobs overseas B) preventing environmental harm C) overpricing D) sexual harassment E) insider trading

Q: If the rate of market growth and technical progress is rapid and there are few barriers to possible new entrants, then in-house R&D is the preferred solution.

Q: The midpoint on the x-axis of a BCG Matrix is typically set at 0.05.

Q: Successful strategy formulation generally rests upon the ability of an organization to sell some product or service.

Q: When developing a mission statement, it is usually advisable to involve as few managers as possible.

Q: Which of the following companies ranks among those against whom some of the largest payouts for class-action legal fraud suits ever were judged? A) AOL Time Warner B) Walt Disney C) Starbucks D) Herman Miller E) Edison

Q: Buying off the outstanding shares of your company from the open market to make the company private is what going public means.

Q: Relative market share position is given on the x-axis of the BCG Matrix.

Q: A form of customer analysis is administering customer surveys.

Q: In order to motivate a workforce effectively, both profit and vision are needed.

Q: _______ are the individuals primarily responsible for ensuring that high ethical principles are espoused and practiced in an organization. A) Non-management employees B) Mid-level managers C) Shareholders D) Strategists such as CEOs and business owners E) Governmental regulatory bodies

Q: The only costs involved in going public are the initial costs.

Q: Conservative strategies in a SPACE Matrix most often include product development, market development, market penetration and related diversification. Answer: TRUE Learning Outcome: Define corporate strategy and identify its key elements 19) The firm should pursue conservative strategies if the coordinates of a SPACE directional vector are (-1, +4). Answer: TRUE 20) A firm should pursue defensive strategies if the coordinates of a SPACE directional vector are (+2, +3). Answer: FALSE Learning Outcome: Define corporate strategy and identify its key elements 21) The firm should pursue aggressive strategies if the coordinates of a SPACE directional vector are (+5, +4). Answer: TRUE Learning Outcome: Define corporate strategy and identify its key elements

Q: There are seven basic functions of marketing: customer analysis, selling products/services, product and service planning, pricing, distribution, marketing research, and opportunity analysis.

Q: Whereas the mission statement answers the question, "What do we want to become?," the vision statement answers the question, "What is our business?"

Q: Bad ethics can _______ strategic plans. A) derail all but the best B) derail even the best C) derail only poorly-intentioned D) derail only ill-conceived E) never affect

Q: It is generally not recommended for companies with less than $10 million in sales to go public.

Q: The SP and CP dimension variables in a SPACE Matrix are assigned a numerical value ranging from -1 (best) to -7 (worst).

Q: The controlling function of management is synonymous with strategy formulation.

Q: An important question a mission statement should answer is, "What do we want to become?"

Q: A highly ethical company that does an excellent job on social responsibility and environmental sustainability issues, GM spent ________ million in the last quarter of 2010 to give its U.S. union employees profit-sharing payments. A) $42 B) $135 C) $200 D) $339 E) $500

Q: The only reasons businesses have for determining their worth is preparing to be sold or to buy other companies.

Q: Market penetration can be classified as either a conservative, aggressive, or competitive strategy.

Q: The management function of organizing is included in human resource management.

Q: Carefully prepared statements of vision and mission are widely recognized as the first step in strategic management.

Q: Business ethics, _______, and sustainability issues are interrelated and impact all areas of the comprehensive strategic-management model. A) social responsibility B) social networking C) fiscal irresponsibility D) cultural indifference E) None of the above

Q: As a balance sheet entry, goodwill represents the favor a business has acquired through its environmentally conscious and socially responsible actions.

Q: The four strategies of the SPACE Matrix are aggressive, conservative, offensive and defensive.

Q: Motivation is one explanation why some people work hard and others do not.

Q: A mission statement can sometimes be called a statement of philosophy.

Q: Sustainability refers to the extent that an organization's operations and actions _______ the natural environment. A) protect B) mend C) preserve D) reflect good stewardship of E) All of the above

Q: To determine the price-earnings ratio, divide the market price of the firm's annual earnings per share by the common stock and multiply this number by the firm's average net income for the past 10 years.

Q: The most important determinants of an organization's overall strategic position are considered to be the two internal dimensions, financial position (FP) and competitive position (CP), and the two external dimensions, industry position (IP) and stability position (SP).

Q: The purpose of organizing is to achieve coordinated effort by defining task and authority relationships.

Q: A mission statement is a declaration of an organization's financial status.

Q: ISO 14001 is a technical standard and as such replaces technical requirements embodied in statutes or regulations.

Q: One of the four recommended approaches for determining a firm's worth is to base the analysis on the selling price of a similar company.

Q: The SWOT matrix is widely used as an organizational tool and, if used appropriately, does not have any limitations.

Q: The controlling function of management is especially important for effective strategy evaluation.

Q: Small, nonprofit organizations never develop mission statements.

Q: The ISO 14000 family of standards concerns the extent to which a firm minimizes harmful effects on the environment caused by its activities and continually monitors and improves its own environmental performance.

Q: A conservative rule of thumb for measuring the value of a firm is to establish a business' worth to be 10 times the firm's most current annual profit.

Q: One of the steps of the SWOT Matrix is to list the firm's key external opportunities.

Q: Planning should be performed mostly by middle management and then presented to top management for analysis and approval.

Q: A mission statement, sometimes called a creed statement, can be defined as an enduring statement of purpose that distinguishes one organization from other similar enterprises.

Q: ISO, the world's largest developer of sustainability standards, is legally authorized to enforce their standards.

Q: All the methods for determining a business' worth can be grouped into three basic approaches: what a firm earns, what a firm spends, and what a firm will bring in the market.

Q: A SWOT Matrix is composed of four cells for the four types of strategies it creates.

Q: Organizing is the cornerstone of effective strategy formulation.

Q: A mission statement is a declaration of an organization's reason for being.

Q: Corporate recruiters are interested in hiring students who will help their firms find solutions to societal challenges, but they are having trouble finding students with these skills.

Q: A limitation of financial budgets is that they can hide inefficiencies if based solely on precedent rather than on periodic evaluation of circumstances and standards.

Q: Strengths-opportunities strategies are based on using a firm's internal strengths to take advantage of external opportunities.

Q: The only certain thing about the future of any organization is change.

Q: According to Peter Drucker, asking the question "What is our business?" is synonymous with asking the question "What is our vision?"

Q: General Electric achieved $20 billion in sales by 2011 in eco-friendly technologies.

Q: Although cash budgets can be a useful financial tool, publicly held companies are not required to complete them.

Q: The purpose of matching key factors is to generate feasible alternative strategies.

Q: Allocating resources is one of the five basic activities (functions) performed by managers.